Making Home Made Yogurt

I never knew that homemade yogurt requires very little special equipment. When I did, I started it quite regularly.

There's this sense of pride knowing that you made it yourself, you know? I wasn't even sure how it worked when I started ( I didn't start reading about all the bacteria and good germs that you need until later), I just knew I had to have yogurt to be able to maintain my health.

A little over two years now, I mainly do this to try cut down on how much I spend on imported yogurt. The Scandinavian high protein one is still my favourite, and I still buy commercial yogurt when I feel like indulging.

Managed to buy this electric yogurt maker at Nottingham Lakeland during Christmas sale of 2016 with superbly great deal of 10 pounds!

But little did I know how easy it is to actually make this scrumptious little thing.

So...really...how easy is it?

We can get technical about the type of milk to , or a non dairy alternative. Lucky for us, the electric yogurt came with a recipe suggestion, so mainly I just followed that.

I only dairy so far, so I can't yet comment on the non dairy alternatives. Its mainly about rial and error.

I have used both UHT milk and fresh milk and they both work but it depends on your taste.

INGREDIENTS

1 litre of Milk ( Fresh is best, UHT is ok too, milk powder is ok too)

2 tablespoon of culture /old yogurt/ tablets of probiotic

TOOLS NEEDED

1 thermometer ( to slowly heat the milk to about 70degrees celcius)

1 big pot ( preferably a stainless steel pol or glass)

Ladle to stir and scoop the milk/whey

A container with cover ( a glass jar is good)

*Another covered container (bigger than the one above as you need to place them in this one)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Pour milk into pot in low to medium heat. DO NOT RUSH this process.

2. Let it simmer slowly, stir to prevent milk from burning at the bottom.

3. Let it heat up until reaching 70 degrees where it starts to bubble, take it off the stove.

4. let cool slightly, stir in culture/leftover yogurt into the heated milk

5. Pour into glass Jar and cover.

6. You can either leave this jar on the counter ( if you live in places over 26 degrees C like I do) for 8-10 hours, or place them within another contained covered in warm water for several hours.

7. This step varies where you live and how the weather changes,, this why havinga yogurt maker helps, as it keeps the yogurt at even temperature until it sets.

8. Check on the thickness according to your liking.

9. After 10 hours, keep jar in Fridge overnight , only to serve in the morning.

9 steps seems a lot.But really, a lot of these fermentation recipes do not require much "active" time. I tend to do this 5 to 10 minutes and head back to whatver it is I was doing.

Oh yes...I find the thickness of the yogurt DOES depend on the type of milk. The powdered milk gets the thickest while using the UHT is more runny. I like them all for different things-drinking, with my trukish eggs or part of my salad dressing.

Goodluck!