The recipe is as follows:
The Ingredients.
--8 cups (half-gallon) of whole milk--pasteurized and homogenized is fine, but do NOT use ultra-pasteurized. (Debbie recommends starting with whole milk until you get the hang of yogurt-making)
--1/2 cup store-bought natural, live/active culture plain yogurt (you need to have a starter. Once you have made your own, you can use that as a starter)
--frozen/fresh fruit for flavoring
--thick bath towel
--1/2 cup store-bought natural, live/active culture plain yogurt (you need to have a starter. Once you have made your own, you can use that as a starter)
--frozen/fresh fruit for flavoring
--thick bath towel
--slow cooker.
The Directions.
This takes a while. Make your yogurt on a weekend day when you are home to monitor.
I used a 4 quart crockpot.
Plug in your crockpot and turn to low. Add an entire half gallon of milk. Cover and cook on low for 2 1/2 hours.
Unplug your crockpot. Leave the cover on, and let it sit for 3 hours.
When 3 hours have passed, scoop out 2 cups of the warmish milk and put it in a bowl. Whisk in 1/2 cup of store-bought live/active culture yogurt. Then dump the bowl contents back into the crockpot. Stir to combine.
Put the lid back on your crockpot. Keep it unplugged, and wrap a heavy bath towel all the way around the crock for insulation.
Go to bed, or let it sit for 8 hours.
In the morning, the yogurt will have thickened---it's not as thick as store-bought yogurt, but has the consistency of low-fat plain yogurt.
Blend in batches with your favorite fruit. I did mango, strawberry, and blueberry. When you blend in the fruit, bubbles will form and might bother you. They aren't a big deal, and will settle eventually.
Chill in a plastic container(s) in the refrigerator. Your fresh yogurt will last 7-10 days. Save 1/2 cup as a starter to make a new batch.
This takes a while. Make your yogurt on a weekend day when you are home to monitor.
I used a 4 quart crockpot.
Plug in your crockpot and turn to low. Add an entire half gallon of milk. Cover and cook on low for 2 1/2 hours.
Unplug your crockpot. Leave the cover on, and let it sit for 3 hours.
When 3 hours have passed, scoop out 2 cups of the warmish milk and put it in a bowl. Whisk in 1/2 cup of store-bought live/active culture yogurt. Then dump the bowl contents back into the crockpot. Stir to combine.
Put the lid back on your crockpot. Keep it unplugged, and wrap a heavy bath towel all the way around the crock for insulation.
Go to bed, or let it sit for 8 hours.
In the morning, the yogurt will have thickened---it's not as thick as store-bought yogurt, but has the consistency of low-fat plain yogurt.
Blend in batches with your favorite fruit. I did mango, strawberry, and blueberry. When you blend in the fruit, bubbles will form and might bother you. They aren't a big deal, and will settle eventually.
Chill in a plastic container(s) in the refrigerator. Your fresh yogurt will last 7-10 days. Save 1/2 cup as a starter to make a new batch.
**NOTE FROM JESSICA**
Don't open the lid extraneously, or you will have lumpy milk the next morning, instead of yogurt! It seems like most organic milk is ultra-pasteurized, and Stephanie says not to use it, but I did and it did produce yogurt. This is a very easy process, with delicious (though thin) results! If you want thicker yogurt, you can strain the finished product through cheesecloth or a coffee filter in a colander.
Nice, Jessica. There are number of things you can do to get thick yogurt without straining. One, add about a half cup of dry milk powder before you heat the milk. Two, heat the milk in the microwave in a glass bowl and use a thermometer to make sure that it gets to around 180F. For me, with my current microwave, 5 cups of milk takes 14 minutes on high. Three, cool it to 130F in the refrigerator. This could take around 35-40 minutes, just start checking every five minutes from the 30 minute mark. When you pour the 130F milk into the crockpot it should cool pretty quickly to just the right temp. You'll have to check this temp as well. Four, wrap it in even more insulation then a towel. A sleeping bag is very good. Double thickness. This probably sounds like an insane amount of work but really once you measure temps and found out how long everything takes you never have to measure temps again. And this process is much quicker then waiting the hours for the crockpot to warm up and cool down! I've done it that way as well.
ReplyDeleteIf you do decide to try it, let me know how it goes.