I Made My Own Yogurt This Week

I realize that there are people out there who make their own yogurt (and cheese, and sauerkraut, etc.) without even giving it a second thought.  But to a newbie like me, successfully making yogurt is one of the most exciting things to happen to me lately!  I used instructions for making yogurt in a crockpot, because it sounded like the easiest and least involved way of doing it, and because I don't really use a crockpot all that often; it seemed to help justify it taking up space in my diminutive kitchen.  In the recipe I used, she sweetens at the beginning to end up with sweet, vanilla yogurt.  I wanted to master plain yogurt first, and since I knew I'd end up with quite a bit, I thought that it would be good to make plain and just sweeten it myself later.  That way I'd know just how much I liked, and I could use the plain yogurt for making savoury dishes.

It is so easy that you really should all do it.  All you need is a little patience, and a lot of time.  I know I never really want to buy pre-made yogurt again!  This is so simple, and with so few ingredients, that it seems like the very best way to get that fix of probiotic goodness into your belly.

In general, we've been eating Activia vanilla-flavoured yogurt, which costs $3.99 for 650 grams.  To make my yogurt a few days ago, I used a two-litre carton of milk ($3.49) and some of a 500 mL container of PC brand organic plain yogurt with active bacterial cultures (usually $3.99, but I got it on a great sale for $1.29!  Woohoo!).  I only needed a 1/2 cup of the yogurt, so the rest was eaten by me or went into a yummy recipe of raspberry yogurt muffins.  I ended up with 1.25 L of yogurt, about twice the amount of the Activia container, for $3.81, so saved quite a lot of money.

The necessities.

*Note that I used organic yogurt, but not organic milk.  This is because for the astronomical price of organic milk, you don't get any real, substantial difference in the quality of what you are purchasing.   In Canada, quality controls are so high on milk that there are no traces of antibiotics or any hormones in conventionally produced milk at all.  See this post for a great, quick summary of why non-organic milk is just as good for you.  Also, I think ADL is a super company that I want to support (and considering it is literally right around the corner from my house, you can't get much more local) and I know a number of dairy farmers on PEI who are all awesome people that I would like to support as well.

So as I take you through my yogurt making process, I'm going to give you the time details that I used this time, because it took me a long time to make this and this is something you might want to consider when you decide which day of the week you'd like to give yogurt-making a try.

7:00 am


Put your 2L carton of milk in the crock pot, cover, turn it on low, and leave for two and a half hours.  I used 2% milk to get a creamy but not full-fat version.  I thought it was a compromise between not wanting to get chubby myself, but wanting to feed the kids a hearty yogurt to help them (especially Susannah) put on weight. Apparently you can use whatever milk you like, including skim.

Did you really need this photo?  Probably not, but it adds colour to the post. :)

Another unnecessary but illustrative photo of my hot crockpot, filled with milk, and turned on to the low setting!

9:30 am


Your milk should be good and hot now.  Turn off the slow cooker, unplug it, and leave it without opening for another two and a half hours.

12:00 pm


Come back, take about a cup of milk out of the crockpot and whisk in 1/2 cup of plain, organic yogurt.  Make sure that it has active bacterial cultures in it!  That's what you need to do the work for you of converting your milk into more yogurt.  Stir that milk-yogurt combo back into the milk in the crockpot (make sure it is cool enough so you don't kill the bacteria, it should be between 100 F and 115 F or so, or so that you can comfortably keep the tip of a very clean finger in the hot milk without discomfort).  Once it is all mixed together, put the lid back on the crockpot and wrap a thick towel (I used two) around the whole thing, tucking it in as much as you can to keep the whole shebang as warm as you possibly can.  Leave it like this (no peeking!) for 8+ hours.

9:30 pm


I left mine a little longer than 8 hours, because I had a very important function to attend--our weekly ladies coffee date at Samuel's on Friday evening.  So when I got home, I unwrapped and opened my crockpot to find:

Success!

Yogurt!!

So at this point, you can package it up however you desire as is and stick it in the fridge, or strain it to make it thicker.  I decided to strain mine.

I lined two colanders (one big and one little) with coffee filters, put them over bowls, spooned the yogurt into them, and put them in the fridge for a couple of hours (not too long or it will turn into yogurt cheese, which I have read is lovely but not what you want in your smoothie or on your granola).  

Craig and I watched a (mind-numbing) movie while I waited for this to strain.  When it was done, I came upstairs and...

12:30 am

Took the colanders out of the fridge, scooped and scraped the yogurt out of the filters into clean Mason jars, poured the whey (don't throw it out!) into additional clean mason jars, and ended up with this:

Thick, creamy white yogurt on the right, whey on the left.

Whey can be used for all sorts of things, and I hope to try a bunch of them out and post about it in the future.  I'm planning on using this batch to enrich smoothies and make them probiotic, to substitute for buttermilk in baking, such as pancakes and biscuits, etc., and to substitute for water in bread, which I have heard has great results.

The yogurt, on the other hand:

I tried it on top of homemade granola, sweetened with some honey and a drop of vanilla, and topped with raspberries.  It was really good.  The yogurt itself was pretty tangy, which may be because I left it longer while out with friends.  I never eat plain yogurt, always sweetened and flavoured, so I think it might take getting used to.  But if you sweeten with honey and vanilla, you won't notice any difference except that it is fresher, thicker, and yummier.  And, you'll know exactly what went into it.  I don't think I'll go back to purchased yogurt.  This is less expensive, healthier, fresher, full of probiotic goodness, and very satisfying.

Don't forget to keep a little yogurt to make your next batch!

Growing a Sourdough Starter from Wild Yeast

I should say before I write anything else that I am NOT a sourdough expert.  I have not yet baked a loaf of sourdough bread.  My sourdough journey is in its initial, tentative steps.  But I have successfully gotten a sourdough starter going from wild yeast, and I am quite proud of it.  I can get you at least that far, and then hopefully if you return to my blog I will have had luck with the baking step--if not, I'll be pointing you to other blogs and websites for further reference!

I have seen recipes for sourdough online, and in my favourite cookbooks, and most of them start with a "cheater" starter using commercial yeast.  That's ok, if it turns out for you and you like it, but being a biologist I thought it would be a lot more interesting to start my own.  When I read that you could "capture" wild yeast to develop your starter, it sounded infinitely more exciting to me!

It is so easy to do, and I am glad that I tried.  I even abused my poor starter a little bit, and it is still going.  It needs to get a little stronger before I attempt bread again (my first shot at it was pretty miserable) but even the fact that it is living on top of my fridge seems amazing to me.  I got the instructions/recipe for one technique of getting a starter going from this post on The Fresh Loaf website and followed the directions with the ingredients that I had.  It takes time to develop a starter, it is certainly not closely related to instant or even regular active dry yeast.  It takes patience, clean dishes and hands, and a lot of love.  But you can totally do it in your kitchen!  All you need is some whole grain flour and pineapple or orange juice.  So let's get started:

As you can see, I used regular Robin Hood whole wheat flour.  I think if you can get organic stone-ground rye, like I have since purchased from the Bulk Barn, it would be better.  However, mine worked with the flour I used.

Day 1
Combine 2 tablespoons of whole wheat or rye flour with two tablespoons of juice. Mix well, and cover lightly (I used a piece of cotton dishtowel held in place over a mason jar with the screw band).  Keep it in a warm place, like on top of your refrigerator.

Day 2
Add another 2 tablespoons of w.w. or rye flour and two more tablespoons of juice.  Mix well again, and re-cover.

Day 3
Add yet another two tablespoons of both flour and juice.  Mix it up, cover it up, sing it a little song.

Day 4
Open up your starter, stir it all up, measure out 1/4 cup and then discard the rest.  Wash out your jar, and return your 1/4 cup of starter to it.  Then add 1/4 cup of unbleached all-purpose flour, and 1/4 cup of warm filtered water.  Stir it all up nicely, cover it back up, and put it back in its warm little nook.

After Day Four
Continue the Day 4 steps of stirring, discarding, and adding flour and water to it until you start to see some really bubbly action, the starter begins to expand, and you smell a characteristic yeast scent when you give it a sniff.  I'd keep it going for a while.  I noticed my starter took off in the evening of day 5, but I am now at day 15 and still have it on my counter, feeding it at least once daily and sometimes twice if I think it seems hungry.  You want to get it strong enough to to really be able to leaven your bread when you use it to make a sourdough loaf, and it takes a little while to get there.  Some people recommend at least two weeks.  Trust me, you want it strong.  I would show you a photo of my horrible first attempt at loaves if I hadn't been so ashamed of them that I threw them out to the birds and didn't take a picture!

My sourdough starter on Day 7, ready to be fed.

According to SourdoLady (the user who posted the procedure on The Fresh Loaf), when you feed it you can actually keep less starter than even a quarter cup, for instance 1-2 tablespoons.  I personally keep holding onto 1/4 cup because I am worried that something will happen and I will have thrown it all away and have to start over again.  But you should give it more water and flour in order to feed it properly.

To feed your sourdough starter, it is basically the same as the Day 4 step.  You discard most of your starter, mix it up with flour and water, and let it go crazy eating and growing.  From what I have read, you should feed it equal portions by weight water and flour, which comes out with a quantity of almost double the flour if you measure using cups.  Basically, when you mix it up, it should look like thick pancake batter.

When your starter stops expanding, starts to sink back down, begins to smell more like alcohol than yeast, and gets a layer of clear or yellowish liquid near the top, it is hungry and really needs to be fed.  After your starter gets going and becomes strong, you don't have to keep it at room temperature anymore.  You can feed it, put it in the fridge, and leave it.  Weekly feedings are recommended but if it's strong, it can go even longer than that and still be revived when you take it out to get it ready for baking.  I really should have taken before and after photos to show you the difference in volume from where it starts before a feeding and ends up later; I may edit this later and add one in. :)

Starter on Day 10, ready to be fed.

The way I have described feeding it, you'll never really have more than about 3/4 cup of starter, and when you bake, you'll probably need at least a cup plus some left over to keep your starter going for the next time.  If you want to increase it, the feeding before you plan to use it (say the night before), just give it a bigger feeding.  That will increase its volume to what you will need.  And when you feed it, the quantity that you discard can be put to use; it doesn't absolutely have to be thrown away. You can give it to a friend to start his/her own starter, or you can use it in a recipe like sourdough pancakes (note: I haven't made these yet, they're on my to-do list and if anyone is interested I'll post the results up here when I do it).

Good luck!  I am still learning, and my starter has in the last couple of days had a couple of near-death experiences.  If you check out the post I linked to earlier where I learned how to do this and have a look at the enormous comment thread, you'll get loads of help.  Also check out this post by Tamatha at A Flock in the City; she is amazing and knows all sorts of things about baking and fermenting and looking after various cultures.  She actually posted a sourdough bread recipe today, than I plan on trying as soon as my starter seems a bit more hearty!

This post is shared with Simple Living Wednesdays, Frugal Days Sustainable Ways and Homestead Barn Hop #58.