Yogurt (Recipe and Instructions)

Hi Friends :)

Today I'm going to show you how easy it is to make yogurt at home. (Printable Recipe Here) Though yogurt is not a cheese, it is a cultured milk product, which means it's been fermented with lactic acid bacteria - so it definitely belongs here!

By the way, a new feature of my blog is that I've made printable recipes available! In each recipe post, I'll include a link; and on my side bar, there is a gadget with all of the posted recipes and another gadget with the printable recipes that you can also download.

So back to the yogurt! My recipe makes 1 liter (4 cups, 1000 grams) of plain yogurt and costs me $1.90. The yogurt at the grocery store costs about $4.99 on sale for 650 grams. If you eat a lot of yogurt, it's so much more cost effective to make it at home - and of course, homemade is always better!

These are your ingredients:

- 1 liter (4 cups) of the milk of your choice

- some leftover yogurt to act as a starter culture

Directions:

1. Heat your milk to 93C or 200F, whisking often.

2. Place your pot into a sink of cold water, whisk often and bring the temperature of the milk down to 40-45C or 105-110F. You can let it cool on the counter, but it goes so much faster in a cold water bath. Keep your eye on the milk at this stage, it takes less than 5 minutes to hit your target temperature.

3. Put about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of your leftover yogurt into a bowl. Add one ladle-full of the warm milk and whisk well. Pour the yogurt mix back into your pot and whisk well.

4. Pour your yogurt into jars. I use Mason jars.

5. Incubate for 8 hours. There are several methods to incubate your yogurt. If you have a yogurt maker, well, it's a no-brainer! I don't, so I use a heating pad on medium heat. I wrap the jars in tea towels to keep them warm. You could also wrap them in towels and leave them in the oven with the oven light on. Eight hours later, put your jars in the fridge overnight to allow the yogurt to set.

I make myself a Strawberry Yogurt Shake every morning. Not all yogurts automatically contain probiotics and I'm sure that mine doesn't. I did use Activia as my starter many moons ago and I know that particular brand contains probiotics. But I've been using the leftover batches over and over continually for years and honestly, I'm quite sure there are no probiotics left so I add a little probiotic powder to the blender too.

Jack and Leo, a.k.a. Hound Dog and Hound Cat - the two pigs of the pack - LOVE yogurt!

For video instructions, please check out my video How To Make 2-Ingredient Yogurt From Home!