How to Make Homemade Yogurt

Fresh Homemade Yogurt

I love yogurt and a few years ago saw a yogurt maker at a garage sale and bought it.  It had the directions and everything and so I started a batch and waited in anticipation - and the next day all I had was warm, runny milk.  I never tried it again and the yogurt maker was sent to the local thrift store.  This was quite depressing not only for me, but for my children as well, as they would devour yogurt in great quantities if I allowed it.

About a month or so ago I was on Pinterest and saw a link to a site that stated they had a recipe for fool-proof yogurt and I thought maybe I should give yogurt making another try.  The recipe called for you to heat the milk in a crock pot with some powdered milk thrown in to make it thick like Greek yogurt.  Into the crockpot went the milk and I waited for it to reach a temp of 180 degrees.  A few hours later I had milk burnt to the sides of the crockpot, the rest of the milk was a nice yellow color due to the burnt milk and the temp never did get even close to 180 degrees.  I thought to myself, "Great, another yogurt failure!"  But I figured I would try to salvage it and so I poured it into a pot and heated it up on the stove to the required 180 degrees and then following the rest of the directions.  And, miraculously, I did end up with yogurt: though a strange yellow colored yogurt, but yogurt none-the-less.  And even more miraculous was it tasted fine!  So I tried it again, but this time just heated it on the stove and again I had success.  Well, after a few more batches I wondered if I truly needed to add the powdered milk and so I left it out and what I ended up with was amazing:  it was some of the best yogurt I have ever had.  And so here is the recipe.

Ingredients for Homemade Yogurt:
4 C Whole Milk
1 T. Yogurt (If purchasing from the store make sure it has live cultures, but after you make your first batch you can just use your homemade yogurt.)

Heat the milk in a heavy duty pot on your stove to 180 degrees Fahrenheit stirring constantly.  This takes about 20 minutes.

The warm milk gets a bit frothy after 20 min. of stirring.

Pull off the burner and leave uncovered until the temperature drops to 110 degrees.  Remove a bit of the warm milk and add the yogurt to it and stir until dissolved and then add back to the pot and stir well.

Then transfer to your container.  I use wide mouth quart jars.  Leave uncovered and place in a warm oven (I turn the oven on for a minute or two to get it warm) with the light on for 12 hours.  I do this the night before and the next morning I have yogurt.

I set my jars in a warm oven right next to the light overnight.

After 12 hours in a warm oven.

My favorite way to eat it is with some strawberries and a bit of sugar.  One of my children loves it with blueberries or with bananas and a bit of honey.  Even my husband who isn't a fan of yogurt has come home from work and requested it.  It really is that yummy.

Some Extra Advise On Yogurt Making:
If your yogurt fails, don't despair.  You may have had the milk too warm when you added your yogurt starter or your starter does not have live cultures.  Just start over by reheating your milk to 180 and let drop to 110.  Add your 1 T of yogurt starter (if you think it failed due to a "bad" starter use a new one) and let sit in a warm place for 12 hours.  You should have yogurt this time.

I usually double or triple the batch, but the ratio is always 4 C of milk to 1 T of yogurt starter, but if you like your yogurt extremely tart or sour add more yogurt starter.  I have seen recipes for up to 1/4 C of yogurt starter to each 4 C. of milk.