Name: 2 ingredient yogurt cheesecake
Prep time: 5 min
Total time: 245 min
Ingredients: 250 g full fat Greek yogurt; 4-6 biscuits or cookies of choice

The 2 ingredient yogurt cheesecake, aka the Japanese viral cheesecake, seems to be everywhere at the moment. I’m sure N would say I’ve missed the boat and that it’s cropped up on my socials way later than he’s seen it. But I’m all for easy recipes, so if you’ve not seen it, here’s my variations on the little treat dish.

It has to be one of the simplest sweet treats going. With 2 ingredients many people have at home regularly. Just yoghurt and biscuits (or cookies if that’s the way you roll).

Unfortunately it’s not the fastest because you have to wait for the biscuits to take on the yoghurt. Think like overnight oats, but so much nicer (I’m not a fan of overnight oats, I much prefer mine as hot porridge). But depending on how soft you want your biscuit, will depend on how long you leave the cheesecake before eating.

Now strictly speaking it’s not cheesecake at all in the way we make them (English or American style) because there’s no soft cheese in it. But yoghurt (especially a nice thick greek yoghurt) tastes lovely with a soft bite of biscuit. And it also helps add the sweetness to the yoghurt.

Then you can add whatever toppings you fancy. A few berries will up the healthiness slightly. Or drizzle with a bit of melted chocolate as a real treat. But whatever you top with, it’s going to be a healthier version than a full on cheesecake with sugar, cream cheese, cream, butter and other fillings.

Plus these are easy to make in single portions meaning there’s little temptation to eat more than one.

These simple desserts are nice if you just want something easy,

If you make them ahead of time, you can have them ready for when you want them the following day.

What to serve the yoghurt cheesecake in

The lazy version is to add the biscuits to the yoghurt tub or pot.

But it’s nicer to serve it in a nice dish – although you do need fairly high sided ones to nearly cover the biscuits. You could use small glasses, or if you’ve got a pretty mug or tall-ish teacup that would work.

Greek yoghurt is quite filling, so keep your serving glass or bowl small, unless you’re serving more than one person. The original recipe I saw said 375g of yoghurt, but I made them with 250g, and even that was too much for one sitting. A small yogurt pot size would work well, but it’s not much yoghurt to stick biscuits in, hence upping the size. These don’t really ruin for a couple of days anyway, so you can eat half and come back o the rest later.

My ramekins are little mini cooking ramekins that came with lids from a pound shop. I’ve got a few of them in different colours. You can buy similar ones here for coloured ones, or these white mini souffle ramekins.

Ingredients

Just 2 ingredients are needed:

Biscuits of your choice – Rich Tea, digestives, Biscoff, pick your favourites. But none that are chocolate coated, otherwise the yoghurt won’t be able to soften the biscuits and take on the flavour.

Yogurt – Greek yoghurt is the best because it’s nice and thick. You can use other types of yoghurt (plain is best), but they’ll be a bit thinner and less like a cheesecake texture. And opt for full fat too – always thicker than reduced fat.

To make the japanese viral cheesecake

Spoon your yoghurt into a glass jar or individual bowl with high enough sides for the biscuits to sit sideways in.

Then just add a good number of biscuits on the side/standing upright in the yoghurt. Make sure you push them in so the yoghurt is at least level with the biscuit tops. Or just covering.

Now it’s time to chill them for a few hours, or even overnight.

Either serve as they are, or add your choice of toppings.

If you want to serve a few people, just make more individual servings or use a larger dish for a larger amount of ingredients. But if you need to know you’ve got a few ready to go, you can make 2 or 3 at once. They’ll keep for a couple of days in the fridge covered.

For my first try of the recipe, I used coconut ring biscuits for one. The coconut one was delicious. It really did have that cheesecakey texture from the thickened yoghurt, with the biscuity base from the softened yoghurt.

The other I used some cinnamon spiced biscuits for a touch of Christmas. This was maybe a bit out there, but the texture was still good and the flavour wasn’t too bad.

I’d really like to try some lemon biscuits if I could find some – that would really give the traditional English cheesecake hit.

Viral Japanese yoghurt cheesecake variations

While the Greek yoghurt absorbs the biscuit sweetness and flavours, you might want to pep up your yoghurt cheesecakes more. Especially if you’re treating friends as well.

You could set up a little toppings bar if you’ve got people over to serve these to.

2 types of 2 ingredient yoghurt cheesecake

Toppings suggestions

Try adding gingernut biscuits to the yoghurt, then topping with pear slices
Digestive biscuits with any slices peaches or berries.
Mix some cocoa powder in with your yoghurt (and a bit of icing sugar to sweeten it up a little), use Oreo cookies or even Bourbon biscuits. Then top with berry puree, cherries, fresh raspberries or even mandarin segments.
Add a little cinnamon to the yoghurt, add Rich Tea or digestives, then top with stewed apple and some sugar mixed in.
Use coconut biscuits then serve with some mango slices for a tropical taste.
Try drizzling with jam, berry coulis or melted chocolate.
Biscoff biscuits, then top with crushed pretzels.