fantasy football + tzatziki
Sep. 8th, 2015 11:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sarea
I'm now in two paying fantasy football leagues. A guy from the first league asked if anyone was interested in participating in his league on Yahoo (which I did for fun last year), so I was like, why the hell not. He made league-wide introductions today, and it turns out that I'm not only the only girl, but am the only non-doctor/engineer! Ha! Fantasy football: underrated method to meet eligible bachelors. Okay, not really. I have no idea how old any of them are, how attractive any of them are, or even if any of them are bachelors. The draft for this league is tomorrow.
For the first (ESPN) league, our draft was last week, and I did okay, assuming my players perform up to expectations. I didn't get any Seahawks for many rounds. I chose Andrew Luck over Russell Wilson (because Luck passes all day long!), and from there on, all the Seahawks (including D/ST) I wanted at certain times got chosen before my turn came around again. However, I did select Tyler Lockett toward the end, as a potential explosion player (and of course, no one else would know who he was), and took a flyer on Fred Jackson, just in case he actually signed with Seattle. And a couple of days later, he did! So I have two Seattle players. I also did something kinda risky. A couple weeks back, I read an article that claimed running backs were overvalued, so to not even pick them until the later rounds. When Marshawn Lynch was selected before my first pick, I decided to give the strategy a try. And all the other top backs were taken almost immediately, so I didn't select a running back until waaaaay down the list. I have no idea if this strategy is going to bite me in the ass. I think for my Yahoo league I will go the more traditional route.
Meanwhile, I found the recipe for Lola's tzatziki (my mom's favorite spread) at Tom Douglas's blog, so I decided to give it a shot. I am REALLY happy with the results. It's not exactly like Lola's, but it's just as good, if not better. It's chunkier than what they serve in the restaurant; not sure if they're skimping or if I used more cucumber than I'm supposed to, but the directions aren't exactly 100% clear. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It's delicious. There's nothing like fresh tzatziki!
First I'll share the recipe undoctored:
Lola's Tzatziki
Ingredients:
- 1 small English cucumber
- 3 cups Greek yogurt
- 2 tsp garlic, minced
- 1/2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
- 2 tbsp. olive oil
- 1 tbsp. dill, chopped
- 1 lemon, juiced
- salt to taste
Directions:
1. Grate the cucumber, then mince it. Squeeze out all the water.
2. Mix it into the yogurt with all the other ingredients.
Okay, now here are my notes from making this.
- See how vague some of that is? What exactly constitutes a "small" cucumber? What if you don't get much juice from the lemon?
- I thought it was a little too garlicky. 2 tsp is about 3 medium cloves (which I grated, since I was already using the grater. I wanted it to disappear more than knife mincing would allow); next time I'd use half that amount or maybe just 1 clove.
- I doubled the dill. With 1 tbsp. it looked like there was hardly any in there.
- Use a neutral-tasting olive oil. I had just about 2 tbsp. of this really good/strong kind that I got from a fancy olive oil shop, but the taste was too distinctive; it kind of overwhelmed the other flavors.
- In terms of salt, I added a little at a time and mixed it in well, then tasted. I might have used as much as 1 tsp before it was satisfactory. I think it helps counter the sourness of the yogurt, and the end result does not taste salty at all. If you like your yogurt sour, use less salt.
- I accidentally purchased European style yogurt instead of Greek yogurt. It was the only organic kind Trader Joe's carried in that size (about 4 cups)! Well, it wasn't an accident so much that I thought they were trying to get cutesy with the naming, only to find out that European style is an actual style. >< It's thicker than normal yogurt, but thinner than Greek. So when I got it home, I put cheesecloth into a strainer, scooped the yogurt onto the cheesecloth, then set the strainer over a bowl, covered it with plastic and set it in the fridge. (Luckily I've made yogurt at home before, or I wouldn't have known to do this!) After waiting almost 24 hours, nearly all of the whey had been strained out. (The whey is greenish and tastes sour/bitter, so the resulting yogurt is not only thicker and creamier, but doesn't make my whole face want to pucker up when I taste it.) There was a LOT, maybe about a cup's worth. Next time, totally worth it to get proper Greek yogurt in order to skip this step.
- Lola charges $8 for a small container of their tzatziki (I know, right? $5, maybe even $6, I'll give them -- but $8?!). Making your own costs about the same, but you get like 10 times the amount! Totally worth it!
For the first (ESPN) league, our draft was last week, and I did okay, assuming my players perform up to expectations. I didn't get any Seahawks for many rounds. I chose Andrew Luck over Russell Wilson (because Luck passes all day long!), and from there on, all the Seahawks (including D/ST) I wanted at certain times got chosen before my turn came around again. However, I did select Tyler Lockett toward the end, as a potential explosion player (and of course, no one else would know who he was), and took a flyer on Fred Jackson, just in case he actually signed with Seattle. And a couple of days later, he did! So I have two Seattle players. I also did something kinda risky. A couple weeks back, I read an article that claimed running backs were overvalued, so to not even pick them until the later rounds. When Marshawn Lynch was selected before my first pick, I decided to give the strategy a try. And all the other top backs were taken almost immediately, so I didn't select a running back until waaaaay down the list. I have no idea if this strategy is going to bite me in the ass. I think for my Yahoo league I will go the more traditional route.
Meanwhile, I found the recipe for Lola's tzatziki (my mom's favorite spread) at Tom Douglas's blog, so I decided to give it a shot. I am REALLY happy with the results. It's not exactly like Lola's, but it's just as good, if not better. It's chunkier than what they serve in the restaurant; not sure if they're skimping or if I used more cucumber than I'm supposed to, but the directions aren't exactly 100% clear. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It's delicious. There's nothing like fresh tzatziki!
First I'll share the recipe undoctored:
Lola's Tzatziki
Ingredients:
- 1 small English cucumber
- 3 cups Greek yogurt
- 2 tsp garlic, minced
- 1/2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
- 2 tbsp. olive oil
- 1 tbsp. dill, chopped
- 1 lemon, juiced
- salt to taste
Directions:
1. Grate the cucumber, then mince it. Squeeze out all the water.
2. Mix it into the yogurt with all the other ingredients.
Okay, now here are my notes from making this.
- See how vague some of that is? What exactly constitutes a "small" cucumber? What if you don't get much juice from the lemon?
- I thought it was a little too garlicky. 2 tsp is about 3 medium cloves (which I grated, since I was already using the grater. I wanted it to disappear more than knife mincing would allow); next time I'd use half that amount or maybe just 1 clove.
- I doubled the dill. With 1 tbsp. it looked like there was hardly any in there.
- Use a neutral-tasting olive oil. I had just about 2 tbsp. of this really good/strong kind that I got from a fancy olive oil shop, but the taste was too distinctive; it kind of overwhelmed the other flavors.
- In terms of salt, I added a little at a time and mixed it in well, then tasted. I might have used as much as 1 tsp before it was satisfactory. I think it helps counter the sourness of the yogurt, and the end result does not taste salty at all. If you like your yogurt sour, use less salt.
- I accidentally purchased European style yogurt instead of Greek yogurt. It was the only organic kind Trader Joe's carried in that size (about 4 cups)! Well, it wasn't an accident so much that I thought they were trying to get cutesy with the naming, only to find out that European style is an actual style. >< It's thicker than normal yogurt, but thinner than Greek. So when I got it home, I put cheesecloth into a strainer, scooped the yogurt onto the cheesecloth, then set the strainer over a bowl, covered it with plastic and set it in the fridge. (Luckily I've made yogurt at home before, or I wouldn't have known to do this!) After waiting almost 24 hours, nearly all of the whey had been strained out. (The whey is greenish and tastes sour/bitter, so the resulting yogurt is not only thicker and creamier, but doesn't make my whole face want to pucker up when I taste it.) There was a LOT, maybe about a cup's worth. Next time, totally worth it to get proper Greek yogurt in order to skip this step.
- Lola charges $8 for a small container of their tzatziki (I know, right? $5, maybe even $6, I'll give them -- but $8?!). Making your own costs about the same, but you get like 10 times the amount! Totally worth it!
