Trust me Lurky, if I can make it you can make it. LOL I was amazed and quite proud of myself!
It is so cool to be able to do stuff like this. I don't know that I would have had time when I was working as I was gone thirteen hours a day but I have the time now. I am playing with it now to make it sweet enough without it being too sweet.
Making homemade yogurt is like having our own eggs instead of the store bought...think of it that way.
Thanks so much, Miss Priss for the recipe!!!
This was awesome!!
Ok Miss Ozark...you have convinced me!!! I will be home tomorrow most all day.......i will read the post again and see if i can get to the store today and buy up some stuff. I just re-read the post and it sound odd. Like why a cooler heated and why a jar of water? What is all that about?
Hi Lurky, good girl. I made my second batch after reading your post this morning. ha ha I am sure MissPrissy will tell us why the hot water bottle but I can only assume...heat/humidity? I fill my cooler with very hot water from the sink and let it set in there until I am ready to fill my jar with yogurt. Then the water I used to sterilize my jar has been kept at a slow boil so I pour it into the other jar. cap both and wrap in towels, drain cooler and place jars in the cooler. Now I added my sugar and vanilla flavoring to the yogurt when it got down to 110 degrees. I have also read that you can add instant pudding to the 110 degree mixture for your favorite flavor. once you do it Lurky, then play with it. No mistakes just "different" flavors. ha ha
Now how cool will you be when you tell everyone you make your own homemade yogurt??
I wasn't real happy with my first batch, not sweet enough, so I put more sugar in this batch. It may be too much, I will have to find the right amount that suits us. You do the same.
The cultures in the yogurt have to incubate 10 -12 hours in order to grow and reproduce (the process by which milk is turned to yogurt). Your hot cooler and jar of insulated water is your incubator and heat source. After 10 hours my jar of water is still very warm.
We make it plain. I do not mess with a good thing in the process. LOL
When I serve it the girls (and I) will drizzle local honey or add preserves that we made or simply strawberries from the freezer that we had added a little sugar to. We top it with a crunchy organic granola.
My kids are always hungry soon after breakfast. Since I started making the yogurt and serving it with a dollop of fruit and a sprinkle of granola their appetites are satisfied longer now than ever before. It is really good stuff.
i had a cool yoghurt maker thing in new zealand...havent seen it here..i ate TONS of it back home. The "maker" was nothing more than an insulated plastic tub that you filled with hot water. The yoghurt culture was added to milk and mixed together cold then the sealed jar ( 1 Litre) would be put inside the "maker" sitting inside the hot water for about 10-12 hours...freakin awesome! If you can get this kind of thing here let me know. There was also a company at home called Easy-yo which sold premixed packets of powder to make the yoghurt with.