Homemade yogurt is easy to make, and full of beneficial microorganisms. It's different in texture than store bought, but once you make it yourself and adjust to the taste and texture of real yogurt, you will notice the purchased stuff texturized with gums and gelatin to have a really unpleasant, fake texture and taste.
To make your own yogurt:
1 quart of milk-whole, 2%, 1%, whatever you want. More fat makes it more tasty, but health concerns sometimes prevail.
1/4 cup nonfat dried milk (optional), it will give you a thicker, creamier yogurt, esp. if you use lower fat milk
1 heaping tablespoon live culture yogurt, you can buy this at a health food store or use a purchased yogurt culture
thermometer-I use a laser thermometer because I have one and it's easy, but any accurate thermometer will do
large thermos that'll hold a quart of milk plus a bit extra
Heat the milk carefully to 185 degrees. This denatures the proteins a little, and kills any oddball bacteria that may be floating around in the milk, which could impart an odd flavor in the yogurt. It also will kill most yeast and mold spores, bad for obvious reasons. If you object to pasteurized milk, skip this step, heat to 110 degrees and proceed. I pasteurize.
Let the milk cool to 110 degrees, stirring occasionally. You can use an ice bath if you want, I just leave the milk out to cool while I do other things, or set it in the refrigerator for 20 minutes. Stir in powdered milk until it's well-dissolved, then add your yogurt or culture.
Pour hot water through your thermos to warm it up a little, then wash and dry. If you can't reach the inside of your thermos to dry it, don't sweat it, just shake the water out. Pour the milk/yogurt mixture into the thermos, and cap it. I wrap mine in a beach towel, and leave it on the counter overnight, or for 8 hours. The longer the yogurt sits, the tarter and thicker it gets--more lactic acid develops. You can leave it out for up to one day, I do about 12 or 15 hours, it depends on the ambient temperature in the room and your individual batch. You'll have a little green whey, which looks yucky but is normal. Pour it off, some people stir it in, but I find this thins the yogurt.
Now is the time to sweeten or flavor the yogurt; add crushed fruit, vanilla or other flavor extract, and sugar, honey, whatever. Lots of people use jam or pie filling, which is too sweet for me. Refrigerate, and expect it to last for a week.
Frozen Yogurt
The key to getting a rich texture with frozen yogurt is to strain the yogurt; this makes it more calorie-dense, but it also removes some of the water that crystallizes and gives that icy texture rather than a creamy-smooth texture. When you strain it, expect to lose about half the volume, so strain twice as much as you'll need for the recipe.
1 quart strained yogurt
1 cup sugar (or sweetener of your preference)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
seeds from one vanilla bean, scraped into the yogurt (optional)
Prep your ice cream maker however you need to do--the ones that need to be frozen for a day before use require a little planning, but they make better frozen yogurt, IMHO. Stir together the yogurt and flavorings, and adjust to taste. Add the yogurt to the ice cream maker, and process according to directions until the yogurt has the texture of soft serve. That's all the harder it'll get in the machine, so scoop it out and put it in the freezer to harden completely.
You can flavor the yogurt however you like--I use essential oils for mint, citrus flavors, and star anise flavors, extracts for maple, vanilla, and almond. You can add fruit, but make sure it's crushed, or you'll get large icy bits that aren't terribly pleasant. I use herbs sometimes as well--lemon verbena, lemon balm, rose petals, holy basil, etc.--just use a fine chiffonade of the herb.
I add the fruits and flavorings at the beginning of the mix, except chocolate bits or anything I don't want to get smooshed up, which I add later in the mixing process.
Yogurt Recipes
What do you use to strain the yogurt?
I use a metal strainer, lined with a piece of old, clean bedsheet. I just cut them into squares for this, no hemming or anything fancy. I find that cheesecloth, even when it's doubled, is still not quite fine enough. I let the yogurt drain overnight, or 8 or 12 hours.
What brand of ice cream maker do you use Celene?
Ric
Cuisinart. I love it. You freeze the inside container for 24 hours, then make ice cream. No ice, no salt, no mess. I got it at a yard sale for $5, new in the box.
We have the Cuisinart ICE-20 so we're on the same page.
Do you or anyone else have a favorite source for Mexican Vanilla?
Tip from 'Good Eats' for iced cream, so I'd assume it would work w/ frozen yogurt....
Make sure your ingredients sit mixed in the fridge for at least 4 hours before churning.
Longer is better. The flavors marry and gain complexity.
Plus the colder the mixture the finer the grain (smaller ice crystals).
You can use Vanilla Sugar for better flavor in any flavor Ice Cream.
You can substitute equal amounts of preserves for sugar.
So if the recipe calls for 1 cup sugar....
you can add say 3 Tbsp of Strawberry Preserves just reduce the sugar by 3 Tbsp.
And cold numbs the tongue.... your mixture SHOULD taste too sweet before freezing.
We tried churning regular commercial peach yogurt and it was too bland.
Ric
Yes to all of the above; though it's pretty good if you just mix it, depending on the flavor. I am not a Mexican vanilla girl, I'm all about the Indonesian.
I never use sugar, I use honey, preserves, agave nectar, or palm jaggery, at least when I'm making it for myself. Some people really want the plain jane sugar, though. My mother and sisters do.
Ric, last Mexican vanilla I got was on e-bay. Couldn't beat the price even with shipping...
Celene, you have a very finely written recipe there. You should publish it. Thanks for sharing it.
I want to try both the regular and frozen yoghurts this weekend.
I wonder if it will work with Splenda? I know that sounds awful, but we are on no sugar diets. (Would love to use some of the more interesting honey from the farmer's market.)
We have the Cuisinart ice cream maker too and have never used it so this is our chance!
Oh, and why do you prefer the Mexican vanilla, Ric? Just wondering.
Judy, you might want to read these:
http://www.wnho.net/splenda.htm
http://www.scientificblogging.com/small_world/splenda_may_not_be_so_splendid_after_all
I have used Splenda, but sugar does help with the texture, so you'll have more ice crystals. I'd recommend a swig of corn syrup--maybe two tablespoons per quart? and then Splenda to taste.
Vanilla taste is like Olive Oil taste Judy.
You like what you like. (I use Greek Olive Oil BTW)
Mexican Vanilla has more true Vanilla flavor to me.
Smoother and fewer outside flavors.
In fact all the world's original vanilla orchids came from Mexico.
Most people grew up w/ Bourbon Vanilla.
Now I'm talking Beans here.
For extract I use Madagascar.
Though we want to start making our own.
For Cinnamon try Ceylon Cinnamon sometime.
Ric
I use Stevia to sweeten our homemade yogurt. Have not tried freezing it tho. I have a Cuisinart one too that was given to me by a DD who had one. Jack & I liked the finished product so well we wanted one too. Since he was diabetic it worked great for us. He didn't like Stevia tho so I had to use Splenda for the frozen desserts. He didn't care much for unfrozen yogurt but ate a lot of the store bought frozen kind.
I have a 1 qt. yogurt maker that came thru the thrift store where I work. I make ours with only nonfat dry milk( 1 3/4 cup per qt. of water) and add some dissolved plain gelatin because we(DD Sheila & I)like it thicker and more firm. I use plain yogurt from WM as a starter. It has live cultures and no additives.
Yes, 'Splenda' probably isn't the greatest choice and we recently bought some 'Nectar of Agave' to try as a cane sugar substitute, although I haven't read the label yet.
I am going to pay more attention to the Vanilla taste in our baking (although we aren't baking much these days because of our 'healthy living' campaign)! Recently we made brownies for a party and used a 'bourbon vanilla' from the Sonoma Syrup Company and we could really taste a difference.
http://www.chow.com/pick/6586
I don't know exactly why it is called 'bourbon' vanilla~~will have to research that.
Will have to get back to making our own yogurt, especially now that such yummy fruit is in the farmers' market.
The first Mexican cuttings were grown on the Ile de Bourbon.
Now called Reunion Island.
I prefer the Mexican Beans.
I get them here t.
http://www.bostonvanillabeans.com/
Ric
Thanks, ric. Will check it out.