How to Make Yogurt - The Basics

Blackberry yogurt

Welcome to Yogurt Yogurt Yogurt! As you guessed, most posts are going to be centered on, well, yogurt!


The point of this blog is two-fold:

• Show how easy it is to make your own yogurt, because most instructions out on the web make it sound tough!
• Show off awesome ways to use yogurt in daily recipes. Using yogurt in cooking means tasty, healthy, and inexpensive!

Official Post № 1:

Yogurt Making Basics

• Boil milk.
• Add yogurt start.
• Incubate.
• Done!

That's it! OK, there are some specific temperatures, a need for a live bacteria, and certain durations. But, I try to keep it pretty simple so that I don't have to worry about all of that science-y stuff :)

You will need:

• 2% Milk (I use 7 1/2 cups, but this will depend on how much you will make)
• Other fat contents work as well. We'll talk about that at a different time.
• Yogurt start
• Plain yogurt with live bacteria. If you want a recommendation for a good start, I like Dannon Oikos plain Greek yogurt. It costs a little more than $1 for a small cup. Lets talk about different kinds of yogurt starts at another time.
• About 30 minutes
• Yes, I have it down to an art - milk boiled, cooled, start added, and dishes washed in under 30 minutes. I'm kind of proud of that one! :)

Kitchen items:

• Yogurt maker (optional)
• The yogurt maker helps, but all it does is keep a constant temperature. This can be done without one by wrapping a pot that contains your milk mixture with a blanket or two, then put it in the oven (don't turn it on!). Since ovens are insulated, this will keep its temperature fairly constant. A thermos will also work well because it is so well-insulated.
• Pot for boiling
• Tightly woven strainer
• Plastic fork or whisk
• Another small bowl

Instructions:

Boil milk: This gets rid of unwanted bacteria that can interfere with the good yogurt bacteria during the incubation process. It only needs to reach boiling (or close to it), and does not need to stay at that temperature.
Tips:

• Scalded milk makes the yogurt taste scalded. Ewwww!
• To avoid scalding my milk, I start warming it up in the microwave (10 minutes or so total), then I finish boiling on the stove.
• While your milk is warming up, place a scoop of yogurt in a separate bowl. I use about 1 1/2 tablespoons. This lets the yogurt start warming up to about the same temperature that you will cool the milk to. 
• If you have a yogurt machine, turn it on now to let it warm up.

7 1/2 cups of 2% milk

Our *awesome* stove, complete with "blender" buttons!

Cool milk: Cool the milk down to roughly room temperature.
Tips:

• Prepare a cold water bath to cool your milk quickly. Fill your sink with cold tap water and float the pot with milk in it. This takes roughly 10 minutes, depending on how cold the water bath is.
• Do the pinkie test - stick your pinkie in the milk once it is getting close to room temperature and count to 10. If you can count to 10, this means it is cool enough. Too hot of milk will kill the good yogurt bacteria that you are going to add. Too cold of milk will take a little longer to warm up and is not the end of the world.
• Strain milk through (preferably plastic) strainer to get rid of any inconsistencies.

Add yogurt start: Boiling the milk killed unwanted bacteria. Now it's time to add good bacteria. There are different kinds, and all make good yogurt.
Tips:

• I use about 1 1/2 tablespoons. Slowly whisk your cooled milk into the yogurt start until you have added a cup or so (a plastic fork works great - they say that metal isn't very good for the yogurt bacteria). Pour this mixture into the rest of your cooled milk and gently stir.

That's about a tablespoon and a half of yogurt start

Incubate: An actual yogurt maker keeps this part nice and simple. All this does is keep your to-be yogurt at a constant temperature
Tips:

• For the last couple years we have been incubating our yogurt for 8 hours and 15 minutes. This is something that can be changed depending on how thick or tart you want your yogurt.

Our magic number: 8 hours, 15 minutes.

Refrigerate: I'm not a big fan of warm yogurt. I found this out the first time I made my own yogurt - I was way too excited to wait until it was cool! Cool your brand new yogurt until it's, well, cold, then eat it!

Before you eat all of it...
Make sure to save a spoonful of this yogurt for your next batch. Yogurt cultures can last a long time. Some sources say to get a new start every few cycles, but it's not necessary. I have been using my current start for the past 6 months!

But what now?
So what do I do with plain yogurt? This, my friend, is the main question that we will try and answer in as many ways as possible through this blog. My first recommendation is to toss in some fresh fruit, a little sugar, and a little vanilla. A spoonful of jam and a little vanilla also make a very easy sweet yogurt.

The following is a list of future posts. We will add links here as we post recipes.

• Simple flavorings - Yogurt 'n fruit
• Yogurty Orange Julius
• Frozen yogurt
• Cheese balls
• Yogurt substitutes
• Super healthy (and more importantly, tasty!) yogurt ranch dressing
• Smoothies!
• Greek yogurt
• Lassi
• Baking with yogurt
• Muffins w/ yogurt
• Strawberry banana yogurt cake
• Pancakes
• Soup
• etc.
• etc.
• etc.

That's all folks! Please let me know what does and doesn't make sense. Also, feel free to send in ideas for future topics. Thanks!