Yogurt Seduced By Chocolate

Life is full of the unexpected. It’s lovely when you peel off the sunset tangerine skin of an orange to reveal deep garnet flesh, signaling that your fruit is actually a blood orange. Pulling off your covers at 6 am to reveal that your apartment is 53 degrees and has an improperly working shower water heater is not the stuff of sunsets and gemstones. But that's life. I try not to dwell.

I’ve grown accustom to this dichotomy and have developed, what some may deem, an unusual sense of humor because of it. This week, I chuckled when I noticed my grocery shopping list included bittersweet chocolate, cocoa powder, and Draino. Revealing that I am either a woman on the verge—deciding whether to turn towards cacao or sodium hypochlorite—or a lady with a clogged drain that loves chocolate. Luckily, today I am the latter.

Which leads me to the ultimate unexpected chocolate delicacy: chocolate yogurt. I've made it many times and it never ceases to impress and delight. It's really more like chocolate pudding masquerading as yogurt. You could even go so far as to say it is a yogurt that’s been sexed up, like it’s wearing strands of pearls and red panties.

It could be argued this yogurt comes to the table with its seductive accessories a few days late, given that we’ve passed Valentine’s Day. But even if you think you've had your fill of cacao (mon dieu!), the chocolate in this yogurt is subtle, light, and refreshing.

At the moment, I can’t think of anything quite like making homemade chocolate sauce to fold into milk and then warm overnight into yogurt. The yogurt sets to pale brown, with a luscious cream layer on top and a thicker chocolate layer at the bottom. And just like red panties—really now—is there ever actually a bad time for chocolate? Especially when it’s not expected.

Chocolate Yogurt

3 3/4 cups 2% milk

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup half and half

1/3 cup coffee

6 oz 2% Greek yogurt

1/4 cup maple syrup, or more to taste

Heat milk in a medium saucepan until it boils, whisking occasionally. Remove from heat and let cool until lukewarm (about 90 degrees). In another pan, while milk is heating, combine cocoa, sugar, half and half and coffee and whisk on medium heat until smooth and glossy (it will look like chocolate syrup). Set aside until milk has cooled. If the chocolate sauce sits too long and starts to harden, simply warm it slightly again, though you don't want the sauce to be too hot because you'll eventually be adding it to your yogurt and your lukewarm milk.

Whisk the Greek yogurt into your chocolate sauce and then add to your milk. Add maple syrup and whisk until combined. At this stage, you may want to taste to make sure your yogurt is sweet enough; simply add more maple syrup as needed.

Pour the yogurt mixture into 6 oz glass jars (without their tops) and then into a yogurt maker for 12 hours (it will look soupy). Refrigerate before eating.

Makes about 7-6 oz jars.

Notes

-Alas, you need a yogurt maker for this. While not normally a fan of specialty gadgets (one has to be choosy when living in a studio apartment), I love my yogurt maker and use it more than I ever thought I would. It's from Williams-Sonoma (and Euro Cuisine is the brand).

-Yes, technically you are using yogurt to make yogurt. But you need to get your cultures somehow (and this is the easy way). Greek yogurt adds nice body. Having a little fat helps too.

-I've used honey instead of maple syrup and it also works well.

-This does require some planning. I usually try to make it a few hours before I go to bed.

-I like the intense chocolate flavor non-alkalized cocoa powder provides, so that's what I tend to use.