Tzatziki
Cool strained yogurt with cucumber, garlic, olive oil, and fresh dill — one of the eastern Mediterranean's oldest condiments, a cornerstone of Greek meze, and proof that some recipes don't need improving.
- 2 cupsGreek yogurt(full fat preferred)
- 1 mediumEnglish cucumber
- 2 clovesgarlic(minced or grated)
- 2 tbspfresh dill(chopped)
- 1 tbsplemon juice(fresh squeezed)
- 1 tbspolive oil
- 3/4 tspkosher salt(divided)
- 1/8 tspwhite pepper
Best after chilling 2-4 hours. Keeps refrigerated up to 4 days but will release liquid - just stir before serving.
- 1Grate cucumber on large holes of box grater
- 2Toss with 1/2 tsp salt and let drain in a fine mesh strainer for 15 minutes
- 3Squeeze cucumber firmly to remove excess liquid
- 4Combine yogurt, garlic, dill, lemon juice, olive oil, remaining salt, and pepper
- 5Fold in drained cucumber
- 6Taste and adjust seasoning
- 7Refrigerate at least 1 hour before serving
- 8Drizzle with olive oil and extra dill to serve
Salting and draining the cucumber is essential to prevent a watery dip. Greek yogurt must be thick - strain regular yogurt if needed.
Tzatziki belongs to a family of yogurt-cucumber-garlic preparations that trace their roots deep into Central Asian food culture. Wikipedia cites food historian Nawal Nasrallah's research identifying the 10th-century Abbasid Arabic cookbook by Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq as containing the earliest known recipe for jājaq — yogurt salads that are direct ancestors of the modern preparation. Later mentions appear in Egyptian cookbooks of the 14th and 15th centuries, and the 17th-century Ottoman traveller Evliya Çelebi recorded cacık in his 1665 travelogue Seyahatnâme. The first printed Ottoman definition appears in 1844 in Hoca Kâmil Pasha's Melceü't-Tabbâhîn — the first Ottoman cookbook — which describes it simply as "yogurt with cucumber and garlic." The name tzatziki comes from Modern Greek and traces back to the Turkish word cacık, which derives from the Persian zhazh (herb mixture) combined with the Turkish diminutive suffix -cık. Central Asian yogurt culture spread into Anatolia, the Balkans, and the broader Middle East through Turkic migrations, and Medieval Turkish cooks introduced yogurt-based cold sauces and soups to the region. Related preparations still appear across a wide geographic arc: tarator in Bulgaria and the Levant, mast-o-khiar in Iran, raita across South Asia. The Greek word "tzatziki" itself entered English only around the mid-20th century, though the dish it describes had been on tables in the eastern Mediterranean for a thousand years before that.