Well, to heck with what anyone else thinks. I have, on my own, decided that making yogurt in one's crock pot should be the mark by which all homemakers are measured. Whatdoyouknow, coincidentally, that is because I, for the first time, last night, made yogurt! Would you like to join my *highly exclusive, VIP* club? If so, I'll tell you how. (It's actually remarkably easy. All it really takes is time.) But don't tell too many people. Then it won't be nearly so special. ☺
Pour 1/2 gallon of milk in your crock pot.
(I used raw milk - I think you're not supposed to use "ultra" pasteurized.)
Cover and cook on low for 2.5 hrs.
Unplug your crock pot and let it sit for 3 hrs.
After 3 hrs, scoop out 2 cups of the warm milk and whisk in 1/2 cup of a store bought yogurt.
Dump mixture back into the crock pot.
Stir.
Put the lid back on and wrap a heavy bath towel around the unplugged crock pot.
Let sit for 8 hrs.
Wala!
Warm, fresh yogurt will be ready and awaiting you.
(The texture will not be as thick and gel-ish as store bought yogurt.)
This morning we added honey, a smidge of brown sugar and bananas.
This afternoon, we mixed with organic sugar and berries.
The kids DEVOURED it.
I was happy because we usually do not buy yogurt other than for smoothies -
(In the fruity sweet kinds that the children like, there is loads of sugar and high fructose corn syrup,
unless you shell out for Stoneybrook Farms or something like that.)
Not to mention fact that I've joined the ranks of Homemakers United.
Bringing healthy dairy products to our families and smug satisfaction to ourselves....
one delicious serving at a time.
☺
If you don't like it warm you can cool it before you eat it.
I think you can add sugar to the milk in the beginning instead of adding it after the yogurt is made.
I will try that next time. **
11 comments:
dang it. you win.
does making it one time in the crock pot about three years ago make me 'in' though?
'cause then I would be 'in'!
oooo...unless it actually had to turn out decent, then I might be back out again.
this is stressing me out (not the yogurt...)
but you said you made it from scratch... then you used store-bought yoghurt.
i thought i was going to get a new recipe for yoghurt. we can buy the store-bought stuff if we drive to mwanza or rwanda -- just not here in geita.
but i don't mean to poke too much fun. i've never made yoghurt. i'd definitely call you a true homemaker, ma'am.
Well, I actually didn't say I made it from scratch. Really, I didn't. :)
Without a culture starter, you can't get yogurt. After you've made it with some store bought yogurt as a culture, you can save some of your homemade yogurt to use next time so you no longer need to buy any. I actually doubled the recipe so I made 1 gallon of yogurt with a cup of yogurt, if that makes sense.....so, that's *pretty* homemade. :)
I'm thinking sweetened condensed milk boiled into caramel is pretty good too...
:-)
You win. You always win.
I've heard rumor of this homemade concoction, but never seen the recipe. I would love to join this new private club of "Real Moms Make Yogurt".
I have the recipe for homemade laundry soap on my blog. At our house, though, that is Papa's job. Yes. "Real Men Make Homemade Laundry Soap" at our house.
Thanks for NOT telling me that real mamas sew their little girl's dresses. Nope. Ain't happenin' here. I can make bread, and my husband can make laundry soap, but we go to the store for little girl dresses.
blessings,
Laurel :)
alright, tisha, i went back and looked. i was very wrong. you never claimed to have made it from scratch. [i must have been looking at the part about bread from scratch -- all of ours is.]
and thanks for the recipe and advice. we can buy a little yogurt (apparently i spelled it wrong many times in my last post -- i thought it had an 'h') in mwanza and then use our "homemade" yogurt to make the next batch.
here's my question: the yogurt you make doesn't stay good nearly as long as the store-bought. does that mean if we're going to save some of what we make to make the next batch we have to make it every week?
Brett, that's a great question. I have no idea! I probably would start the next time with another 1/2 cup of store bought yogurt. But, living where you are, with your family of 3, it is hard to imagine that making yogurt would be a priority to you. :) I really wanted to give it a shot since there are 9 of us and it is a more cost effective, healthier version of what we could buy at the store. 1 gallon of yogurt for the price I pay for a gallon of milk + 1 cup of store bought yogurt, is a really good deal for us! That's probably not as much of an issue to you.....
you're right, making yogurt's not a priority to us, but we like it. and it's a 6-hour roundtrip to buy it. and then we can only buy the small cups at a time (at $1.25 per) if we could buy it once and then use from our homemade stuff every time we made more, it'd be helpful.
and secretly i'm hoping making our milk into yogurt would make it taste better. then i could eat and drink it more easily. i love milk, but ours just doesn't taste good. we get it straight from the cow and pasteurize it ourselves but it always has a strange flavor. maybe it's what the cows are eating? baylor likes it fine, but i have to either add coffee to it or put it in cereal to be able to drink it.
plus we're making everything else from scratch. why not add one more "homemade" item?
thanks for the recipe.
Maybe homemade yogurt is right up your alley then!
Funny, we switched from regular milk to raw milk (straight from the cow - no pasturization) almost a year ago, and my husband feels the same way. He can't drink it. Only likes it in coffee and cereal. Our kids love it. I don't drink milk.
I hope you like it if you go through the effort to try it out. A sour dough starter you can keep for a really long time. Maybe the yogurt starter is the same way?
I just don't know....
When do you go on furlough? My family would like to send you a care package.
i think i'll give it a try after our next trip to mwanza. i suppose i should buy plain yogurt (not flavored) to use as the starter?
we leave tanzania on july 31 for the u.s. i can't wait. i think 2 years is a great span for being in country before furlough. 2 1/2 seems to me to be just a little long....
and thank you for thinking about our family; we're flattered, or honored. or both.
I am from Ethiopia, and we don't have store bought yogurt (well, at least didn't when I was growing up).
If you let milk sit out for a couple of days it will turn into yogurt. This has to be organic milk though.
The bitter watery part will collect at the bottom and the top is the tick yummy yogurt. You pour out (or drink in my case) the watery bitter part.
We also didn't put fruit in our yogurt but rather garlic and some type of leaf (I don't know the name in English) for it to have a nice fresh flavor.
You add salt and Mitmita (spicy stuff) and wala! you have yummy yogurt to eat. I still eat it like that to this day :)
But a big Kudos for being inventive!!
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