Cultured dairy products have been around as long as there have been dairy animals. Fresh milk doesn't stay sweet for very long without refrigeration. After about a day it naturally begins to clabber. This just means the milk solids separate from the liquid. This natural tendency is useful to cheesemakers and cooks but makes it hard to drink out of a glass. Yoghurt (the original Turkish spelling) is a way to preserve fresh milk by adding specific cultures to gently heated milk allowing it to sour in a controlled manner with consistent results every time. Worldwide nearly every country has its own cultures used to preserve milk and each culture, made from beneficial bacteria, results in a different end product. From Russian countries we get kefir (see Recipes archives on the left for more about kefir), and also koumiss which is made specifically from mare's milk. From Scandanavian countries comes filmjolk which is thick, sour and used much like fresh milk is here in the U.S. poured over breakfast cereals and eaten every day. Amasi is a kind of clabber from South Africa, labneh is from the Middle East, and more familiar creme fraiche from France.

 

    Yoghurt was popular in the ancient world, too. Egyptians, Greeks and Romans all enjoyed it. Yoghurt traveled into Persia and down to India where it is an important ingredient in Indian cooking to this day. In a quote from History of Food cultured milk drinks were a "witness to the memory of ancient migrations: they are the beverages of peple who did not grow vines and whose only wealth was the flocks they drove ahead of them."

 

    My own experience with eating yogurt was limited to those small white cups with fruit on the bottom. A staple from college and into my early years of teaching, that changed when my husband and I took an impromptu trip to Turkey one spring. I will never forget the yoghurt we ate there daily and sometimes twice a day. Maybe it was the exotic location, maybe it was that so many meals were eaten outdoors, but their dishes of plain, creamy yoghurt were the most delicious I'd ever had.

 

    No discussion of yogurt would be complete without mentioning the great importance that cultured milk products have in our overall health. According to Dr. Thomas Cowan in his book The Fourfold Path to Healing, eating fermented foods allows the body to digest its meals with a minimum of energy. This allows us to free up that excess energy for other functions. Fermented foods give us enzymes and "friendly" bacteria, those popular probiotics you hear so much about. These things are important as they aid in the complex process of breaking down the food that nourishes us and makes those nutrients more immediately available to our bodies giving us more energy and vitality. Conversely when our bodies fail to completely break down our food into usable essential nutrients we become vulnerable to food allergies and serious digestive disorders.

 

    Beyond the valuable aid to our digestion, making yogurt at home offers several benefits. The greatest being the fresh, creamy taste. Homemade yogurt comes closest to that memorable Turkish yoghurt taste. Saving money is another benefit from learning to make yogurt. Buying a 4-pak of YoBaby organic yogurt will set you back about $2.60. That's four 4oz. cups. A gallon of YoBaby would be over $20. It also has a lot of added sugar and it's made from homogenized, pasteurized milk. I can make a gallon of yogurt from the delicious raw Guernsey milk I get from a local farmer for less than half the cost of those little cups. Homemade yogurt costs only as much as the milk you use. Homemade yogurt is free from questionable ingredients. Horizon's "Tuberz" yogurt marketed at children contains much more than just organic yogurt. Locust bean gum, carrageenan, tricalcium phosphate and a lot of sugar are included in those gems. Read on for how to get started with plain yogurt. For those who need flavors there are instructions on making your own vanilla and fruit-on-the-bottom varieties.

Plain Yogurt

 

    Gather together all of your ingredients and equipment before you begin. It is important for the starter to be at room temperature so get it out first. The remaining equipment needed is a quart sized wide mouth canning jar, medium sized saucepan, thermometer, long handled spoon, towel and incubating station. The incubation will be described in more detail below.

 

    The recipe

1 qt. fresh milk, preferably raw from grass fed cows

2 or 3 Tablespoons plain yogurt with live cultures

cream (opt.)

 

    Place the milk, and optional cream, into the quart jar. Place the jar into the medium saucepan. I find it helpful to place a bit of aluminum foil underneath my jar so that the bottom of the jar is not touching the bottom of the pan. This protects the jar and keeps it from cracking. Pour water into the saucepan until it comes about halfway up the sides of the pan. Insert your thermometer into the milk. Turn on the stove and allow the water to heat and begin to heat the jar of milk.

 

    The trick to making yogurt while still retaining the beneficial qualities of the raw milk is to be very careful with the temperatures to which you heat it. Conventional techniques say to heat it very high and then let it cool to incubation temperature but that would kill the milk. Instead, keep a watchful eye on your thermometer and once the milk reaches the correct incubation temperature of 112 degrees you remove it from the heat. Stir the milk frequently to keep it heating evenly. The raw milk enzymes are damaged at temperatures above about 117 so watch this part closely!

 

    Once the milk reaches 112 degrees you can carefully remove the jar from the saucepan and set it on a towel. Gently slide in the starter culture which is your plain yogurt and stir the milk vigorously to innoculate the entire contents. After this point you want to cap the jar and set it quickly in the incubation area. Allow the yogurt to sit, undisturbed for at least 9 hours or up to 12 hours. The yogurt is done when you open the jar and tilt it slightly and you can see it separate gently from the side of the jar as it has thickened. Chill the yogurt and it will become slightly thicker.

 

    Incubation

 

    Incubating yogurt needs to be kept at a constant temperature. This is what makes yogurt making more difficult than kefir which incubates at room temperature. Yogurt needs to be between 95 and 100 degrees for the entire time the culture is working. Warmer temperatures will make a more tart yogurt, too warm and you could kill the beneficial bacteria before they finish the job. Too cool and your yogurt will be very runny as the bacteria will be too cold to work well. The method I use most often involves a styrofoam cooler and an electric heating pad. I wrap the jar of warm milk in several towels, place it in a small styrofoam cooler along with an electric heating pad set on "low" and place the lid on to leave overnight.

 

    Another method that also works involves a large thermos and boiling water. Find a thermos container that will hold your quart jar. Fill the thermos with boiling water while you are heating your milk. When the milk is ready pour out the boiling water and insert the jar into the warmed thermos. Put the lid on and wrap it with towels to insulate. If you have an oven with a pilot light you can leave the jar in there. Sometimes the electric oven light provides enough heat to work as an incubator. One Indian friend of mine makes yogurt several times a week in a large glass bowl and incubates it in her oven with great success. If your have a slow cooker large enough to hold your jar then that can also be used with great care. Even the "low" setting on a slow cooker is too hot and will kill the culture so you will have to continually monitor the temperature and turn the cooker off when it gets too hot inside. Try one of these incubation area suggestions that works for you.

Flavored Yogurt & Greek Style

 

    It is easy to make flavored yogurt and to make that sublimely thick and creamy Greek Style yogurt in your own kitchen. Once you perfect the basic plain yogurt you can try one of these variations.

 

    Vanilla

 

    Making vanilla is nearly as simple as making the plain yogurt. To your jar of milk add 1/4 cup of real maple syrup and 1 Tablespoon of real vanilla extract. Stir well and continue as directed for making plain yogurt. In place of the maple syrup you could also use 1/4 cup of sucanat or rapadura. I find the maple syrup milder whereas the sucanat adds a darker molasses flavor. Use whichever you prefer.

 

    Greek Style

 

    There is a simple trick to making the thick, luscious Greek Style yogurt. Line a colander or large wire strainer with a large unbleached coffee filter or cheesecloth. Place your homemade plain yogurt in the colander and place the whole thing over a large bowl. Allow the whey to drip out of the yogurt for several hours until the yogurt has thickened to your liking. If you let it continue to drain overnight you will have made yogurt cheese instead of Greek style yogurt. Both are good, depends on what you want. Don't throw away the liquid that drains out into the bowl. Put that in a jar in your refrigerator. You now have fresh whey! Use the whey (it's good for a long time) in soaking rice, making oatmeal (see Recipes archives), lacto-fermented salsa or chutney, and lots of other uses.

 

    Fruit on the bottom

 

    You can make fruit-on-the-bottom yogurt in two ways. If you want individual cups you can put about a Tablespoon of your favorite whole fruit jam in the bottom of a half-pint jar and then quickly pour the inoculated milk mixture gently over the top, cap it and incubate the small jar just like you would a quart jar. This is a lot of trouble and it is just as simple to place a bit of jam in the bottom of your bowl before you spoon in the yogurt right before you are ready to eat it. Either way just stir and enjoy. The difference between the two methods? You get a slightly thicker end product if you do the little half-pint jars. The taste is same either way.

    You can find more delicious recipes in the Well Fed Family's Eating With the Seasons cookbook.