How to Make Yoghurt
To begin - what actually is yoghurt?
Yoghurt is basically milk fermented with a specific strain of bacteria (usually Lactobacillus acidophilus and Streptococcus thermophilis), that turns the lactose into lactic acid and so the milk into yoghurt.
This is a simple process in theory, milk is just heated to a warmish temperature, the starter bacteria culture added, and its left at a constant temperature for the bacteria to do their thing.
In practice, it might be simple, but there are lots of slightly different ways of doing it.
How I discovered this method
I’d been wanted to start making my own cheese for a while, and yoghurt making seemed the 101 place to start to get the hang of the very basics (ie it has three main steps in the process, instead of fifteen).
So I looked online for how to make it, and then got very confused by the millions of recipes and methods people used.
Some used powdered yoghurt strains, some used frozen, some mixed in milk powder, some used hospital levels of cleanliness with consistent results, some didn’t. Some people heated their milk, others didn’t.
Then there was keeping it warm - some kept it warm in the oven, others wrapped towels around it, put them on heating pads or hot water bottles, and yet others were put in a cosy bath in an esky and topped up with hot water.
Then there’s what seems to be the most popular method, a brand name set up called the Easi-yo. I’ve heard they work pretty well, but I wanted to try it without buying specialised equipment, thermometers or sachets etc (and I couldn’t find an Easi-yo for less than $30). So I combined bits of all the recipes to find the easiest way for me to make it.
Which starter to use
I use Jalna Biodynamic as my starter. I bought a 200g container of their yoghurt for about 4 dollars, and froze it up in ice cube trays to keep as a starter.
Some people say you can’t use frozen starter and its needs to be fresh each time, but it works for me. I think cleanliness comes into it - ie don’t handle the cubes with your fingers.
One jar of starter makes enough starter for me for about 10 batches of yoghurt, so it works out pretty economically. I worked out that it costs about $1.50 for the milk, 40 cents for the starter and 50c for the powdered milk, so you get a litre for less than $2.50, and you know exactly what is in it.
Yoghurt Recipe
- 1 litre milk
- 5 tablespoons of powdered milk
- 2 tablespoons of fresh yoghurt (or roughly 4 ice cubes of frozen yoghurt starter)
- Boiling water
- Double boiler (or a mixing bowl over a saucepan containing boiling water)
- Measuring jug (for pouring milk into the thermos)
- Thermos (preferably wide-mouthed)
- Towel (to wrap the thermos)
Method
- Take out the starter to defrost on a saucer if you’re using frozen starter.
- Fill the thermos with boiling water to sterilise it and pre-warm it.
- Use some boiling water to pour over the jug, and any saucers or utensils you’re using. Set them aside in a clean spot.
- Mix the milk and powdered milk. This is optional but I do it because I like thick yoghurt and it increases the calcium content. You can also use gelatine apparently.
- Put it over the double boiler. You can heat it directly but this way you don’t have to stir it constantly or worry about it burning, just check it occasionally.
- Heat it up to near boiling - ie once the milk starts steaming and collecting bubbles around the edges.
- Take the saucepan off the heat for a few seconds so you don’t burn your fingers with steam and transfer the bowl to the sink.
- Let it sit for 20 minutes or so to cool down. The technical temperate is 41 - 48 degrees C, but ‘comfortably warm’ is the non-technical temperature and the one I use. Just check the bowl now and then until it feels nice and warm - not uncomfortably hot or cold.
- Don’t worry too much if it cools down too much while you’re watching tv - just heat it back up again and let cool to the right temperature.
- Pour a bit of your warm milk into the measuring jug and add the starter. Mix well without frothing it up too much to get rid of any lumps.
- If using frozen starter - drain off the excess water from the starter - don’t mix it in.
- Pour the yoghurt-y milk into the rest of the milk. Mix well.
- Pour into the thermos to a level below the seal and close it up. Don’t let it touch the seal, they’re hard to clean and if it has any mould it will affect the yoghurt.
- Wrap it in a towel and leave it in a quiet spot without disturbing it for 6 - 12 hours. Times vary a bit depending on the temperature you added your starter - if it’s on the cool side it will take longer - and the amount of starter you used - if you use more it won’t take as long.
- You can tell if it’s done by the feel - it will have a more solid feel in the thermos.
- After that time it should be set. Scrape or pour it out of your thermos depending on thickness (if you bought a wide-mouth this will be much easier!) and put it into the fridge to chill. It will get a little bit firmer once it cools down as well.
That’s it. It’s a simple process but can take a bit of experimentation to find out how much starter you need balanced with the right amount of time and right taste.
Possible Problems in Yoghurt Making
Onto possible problems you might encounter with yoghurt making. The two major problems that I’ve found to cause failures are the lack of cleanliness and old starter.
This is because what you’re really doing with all this heating, cooling, and keeping warm is providing the right environment for the culture of the yoghurt bacteria to breed for a few hours - and not any other bacteria strain.
Cleanliness is REALLY important, as you don’t want to breed other strains of nastier bacteria in there with your lactobacillus. If you do, you get runny yoghurt or strange tasting yoghurt.
As for old starter - yoghurt usually only lives for ten days or so, so if your batch is old it isn’t going to work. You can also only use the same strain a few times before it gets contaminated, meaning you can only make yoghurt from your yoghurt a few times before you need fresh starter.
Leaving it too long can cause issues too - it will get too tangy with some strains, the whey will start to separate, or with the Jalna, which doesn’t have as strong a taste, will just form small chunky bits instead of being a really nice smooth thickness like custard.
Uses For Yoghurt
If you’re keen and have heaps of yoghurt, you can also make a yoghurt ‘cheese’ called Labneh, which is used a bit in Middle Eastern dishes and can be a dip or dessert or cream replacement.
All you need to do is have a fairly thick yoghurt and then draining it in cheesecloth over a bowl (to catch the whey).
This isn’t really like cheese in my opinion, but more of a heavy-cream with a yoghurt flavour and less of a fatty taste. It’s absolutely delicious with desserts and I’d guess a lot better for you than real cream.
Though you do lose a lot of the weight of the yoghurt in the whey (the liquid that drains out) and it makes a surprisingly small amount of cheese.
Anyway, there are a million ways to make yoghurt; this is just mine. Feel free to experiment and tweak the method to whatever suits your equipment and taste.
Other People’s Ways to Make Yoghurt (Or Yogurt)
Making Yoghurt Without a Yoghurt Maker - Recipe from About.com.
Homemade Yogurt - The Hillbilly Housewife’s method of making yoghurt.
How to Make Yoghurt - A brief primer on home-made yoghurt from cuisine.com.au.
Tags: how to, indoor gardening, yoghurt
October 12th, 2008 at 5:06 am
I, too, have been wanting to make yogurt from scratch with just obtaining the correct bacteria. I used to make it with a small appliance from Salton many years ago; but, as a person who’s taken so many science classes, I know there has to be a way to do it without buying the expensive starters that you just add to milk. I always thought as long as you got one starter going you could have a perpetual supply of yogurt as you do with those starter doughs that you can use for cakes, breads, etc. Anyway, I printed your recipe, but I don’t see an exact name of the bacteria you get and where do you order it from. As I said, the only ones I’ve ever seen are the ones that are the “easy to use” expensive starter culture. Thank you .
Barbara Wilkerson
October 12th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Hi Barbara. I just used a natural yoghurt from the supermarket for my starter, but CheeseLinks do sell starter cultures if you want the pure strain.
I’m not sure that either will provide you with a perpetual supply of yoghurt though - I believe the yoghurt culture weakens after a few batches - kefir might be better for that purpose.
December 28th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Thanks for sharing your experiecnes. I am keen to try making yoghurt from scratch too. I am not sure that I can get Jalna Biodynamic as I live in a small country town and variety is not forthcoming. Are there others you can use? Also is the milk just the normal homogenised variety?
December 28th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Hi Michele. I like the taste of the Jalna yoghurt, but you can use any natural yoghurt you like (as long as it has live cultures and is reasonably fresh). And yes, the milk I used is just the normal homogenised/pasturised variety.
January 3rd, 2009 at 5:23 pm
Hi,
Thanks for your recipe. It sounds really good and I am just about to try it.
I have been making yoghurt for a while, a different method and have been running into trouble after a few batches. Just one comment about your article, which puzzled me a bit initially was the temperature 41-48 degrees F. This should read 41-48 degrees C as 41 degrees F is about 8 degrees C and very cold.
Kindest regards,
Bart Lebbing
January 3rd, 2009 at 5:41 pm
Hi Bart, thanks for pointing that out, I’ve corrected the temperature. Good luck with your yoghurt making!
January 4th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Am looking forward to trying your recipe Kate, but would like to use light milk and skim milk powder. Do you think this will work just as well?
January 4th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
Hi Rosie, I haven’t tried making yoghurt with light or skim milk; but I have a feeling you may need to add extra milk powder to prevent the yoghurt being very thin. Let me know how your batch turns out!
January 20th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
Several comments were lost from this thread due to a server failure. Apologies if you posted one and it is no longer here!
January 30th, 2009 at 10:54 am
labneh is also delicious with cheese on a plain pizza base (without tomato paste or sauce on it). labneh & cheese pizza was one of the favourite take away meals we ate from bahrain when we lived there. there was a place just down the road that did fresh pizzas in an oven which looked like a wood fired one, but which was run on gas. they were so tasty.
April 10th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
HI,
Just came across your site again. My Yoghurt making has improved 200%.
I bought an easy yo yoghurt maker for $20 or so new. In the jar I put 6 tablespoons of the last batch. Originally I started with Paris Creek Biodynamic Yoghurt.
Add milk straight out of the fridge till full. Pour boiling water in yoghurt maker till top of red insert. Put in jar and leave for 12 hours or so. the yoghurt does not need addition of milk powder. It does not require heating, and it comes out thick and creamy. I do still freeze the original yoghurt, but hardly need it. I just use the last batch and with sterilization of equipment I have had no trouble with the quality deteriorating. Happy yoghurt making.
April 10th, 2009 at 11:08 pm
Hi,
Me again. I forgot to mention that after the milk is added to the yoghurt, it has to be stirred, so it is all mixed up, before it goes in the yoghurt maker.
July 12th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Hi, Your advice and site I revisit from time to time. I have a Breville electric yog.maker,which I’ve had for more than 20 years. I am using fresh milk straight from the cow, scalded, full cream powered milk, I am sure the jars are sterile. The last couple of batches are very mild in flavour and slimy,stringy mucus like . Any advice please
August 4th, 2009 at 8:50 am
Thank you so much Kate. I made my very first batch of yoghurt yesterday and it turned out perfect. I matured my yoghurt wrapped in a towel sitting on top of a hot water bottle then wrapped in my doona in the bed. It sat happily there for 10 hours and produced lovely cheap yoghurt. Now that I am flushed with success I shall continue making and experimenting. Yoghurt these days are so expensive so making my own ensures I can indulge in this lovely food whenever I have the urge. Thank you again for making it simple and also the troubleshooting one might encounter when making yoghurt.
October 12th, 2009 at 2:39 pm
hi, I too have bought an easy go yogurt making, but i want to use skimmed milk for my yogurts. has anyone else done this? i was thinking of adding some powered milk with the skimmed milk????? any advice welcome.
thanks.
November 5th, 2009 at 12:55 am
Just a comment on the longevity of the culture. I got my culture from an Indian lady at work who has used the same culture for 15 years. She, in turn, got it from someone who had it for 7 years, so the culture is around 22 years old that we know.
If you can keep it from being contaminated (keep your equipment clean), and make fresh yoghurt regularly, it should last a long time. Oh, and the yoghurt I made from the culture turned out perfectly.
December 12th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Hi all!
Question to Bart Lebbing:
I tryed your cold milk recipe. I used:
1lt Pauls Parlamat Organic Unhomogenised Full Cream;
1 cup of Jalna BioDynamic Full Cream Yoghurt;
I mixed them and placed them to set as you suggested in a jar and thermos from the yoghurt making kit from EasiYo. It set mostly at the top, but on the middle I can see through the plastic jar that the yoghurt looks runny. After 12 hours I put the jar in the fridge. The yoghurt looks even more set at the top, but still runny at the lower part of the jar.
Do you think this is normal? Would it eventually set?
I gave it a lot of thinking and realised that the heating part of the preparation of the traditional yoghurt is to speed up the other wise slow process of fermenting. After all, in olden times no-one had the cooking termometers, the sterilised pots and jars, they would not have so many gadgets we are using now and their yoghurt always turned perfect. I bought the EasiYo thermos and jar, so I don’t have to worry any more about the unpredictable weather in Sydney…
Please, any one - send advise or comments.
Thank you,
Sophia
December 18th, 2009 at 9:37 am
Co-incidentally, I have been experimenting with the easy-jo maker when I stumbled across this website. Sophia, think you will find that the runny substance is whey, and you simply siphon it off. In the old days, they didn’t have pasteurised milk. I have been using Unpastuerised milk (Cleopatra brand - legally they label it as cosmetic milk). I mixed the milk and a little bit of the easy-yo packet yoghurt product. Used a bit too much of this powder to begin with - but it is amazingly delicious. Pasteurising was developed because, without refrigeration, milk quickly went bad. Unpasteurised milk is full of nutrients and natural minerals and vitamins. Since the inception of the pasteurising process, many people have developed allergies. It has been suggested that they is a link between pasteurised (which is Milk that has been heated to very high temperatures) and allergies.
Happy yoghurt making.
Pamela
December 18th, 2009 at 9:35 pm
Just found this site and am interested in how others are making yoghurt. I have the easy-yo and have found that it works best with the prepared easy-yo mixes. I have substituted UHT milk for water to get a much creamier result and that worked well. I have also tried the easy-yo with commercial yoghurt as a starter, mixed with regular and UHT milk, without any real success. I don’t think it keeps it warm for long enough. I have had great results with the bring to boil, cool (so you can keep your finger in it for more than 10 seconds), add starter, wrap and let sit. The easy-yo maker is designed to start with a cold mixture and uses a specific amount of hot water to create the right temperatures, if you vary from this you won’t have the right temps for the bacteria to flourish.
P.S. Given the discoveries of the role that IgE plays in allergies, science is on the path to explaining why food and environments devoid of parasites and other “bad bugs” is causing allergies. Therefore it stands to reason that allergy sufferers who consume unpasteurised milk may be consuming enough parasites to keep IgE busy and unable to react to the simple things that cause allergies.
December 21st, 2009 at 10:21 am
Enjoyed your message John and your explanation re the link between unpasturised milk, parasites IgE and allergies. Could you please explain what IgE is. I have never heard of it. Pamela
December 25th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
You are right David. In Northern India almost every family makes its own yoghurt everyday. The same culture is used for years and years. I am not sure what bacterias are present in the Indian yoghurt because it has a very different consistency and taste from any of the store bought yoghurts. I love its taste and consistency.