Homemade Yogurt

While it does not grow in our container garden, I thought I'd share some exciting news: I made yogurt at home yesterday!

This process has taken me a year. It began with French Women Don't Get Fat by Mireille Guiliano. I really enjoyed this book and after reading it, I quickly began making my own bread using Mireille's recipes. I also made an attempt at yogurt. But, it was a disaster. After all the waiting, it was nothing more than smelly, soupy-looking milk. I was very disappointed and vowed to try again. But I waited, and waited. I was too scared to do it.

About a month ago, I was over at my friend's house and he told me to go look into his fridge. There, I saw the yogurt that he had made. I was jealous. Very jealous.

So, he offered to help me try again. And after a year, I was finally able to do it! I'm not sure what went wrong the first time, the method we used was very similar to the French Lady's. My friend thinks I may have jumped the gun and added the yogurt while the milk was still too hot. Possible, very possible.

Here is what we used:

1. 1 quart milk
2. 1/4 cup dry milk
3. 3 tbs plain yogurt
4. Thermometer
5. Jar
6. Towels

Here is what we did:

1. Pre-heat oven to 200.
2. Place one quart milk, room temperature, into a pot on medium heat and add 1/4 cup dry milk.
3. Continue stirring milk as it heats to 180 degrees.
4. Once at 180 degrees, remove milk from heat and let cool to 115 degrees.
5. Shut off oven and keep closed, this is going to be where a lot of the magic happens.
6. Once cooled, add some of the milk to a bowl (1/2 cup to 1 cup will do) and then mix in the 2-3 tbs of yogurt (we used three).
7. Pour this mixture back into the rest of the milk and mix.
8. Pour entire mixture into jar.
9. Wrap jar with towels to insulate and put somewhere warm, in this case our pre-heated oven.
10. Let sit for 8 hours without peaking!
11. YOGURT. Enjoy and don't forget to leave 3 tbs at the end to make the next batch.

It felt so good to made yogurt at home, I am posting it to Cheeseslave's Real Food Wednesday, celebrating healthy, real food.