I was first introduced to home making yoghurt from an orange and white plastic contraption in our family kitchen in the 1980’s. The yoghurt maker came after the orange plastic stacking mung bean sprouter, but before the orange plastic electric carving knife. I remember nothing of the taste, just the confusingly huge number of parts, and a lot of movement – and milk spillage – between stove and machine. In my mind pointless.
More recently Eastern European friends have reminisced about homemade yoghurts – milk, lemon juice, a radiator and a damp towel – through the simplicity of which I became a convert. This is a slightly longer winded version, but it does make the richest, creamiest, gentlest, loveliest yoghurt I’ve tasted. There is none of the sharpness that I was used to from bought yoghurt, and – though a great lover of honey – it really isn’t needed when serving.
The richness comes from evaporating half of the milk at the start, which also means there is no watery liquid to pour away when the yoghurt has set. I have called this a recipe, but as there are only two ingredients added together in fairly rough proportions, perhaps ‘method’ would be more appropriate?
Recipe
4 pints of whole or semi-skimmed milk
150g pot of bio-live plain yoghurt
1. Bring the milk to boiling point. Turn off heat. Milk solids will have formed on the base of the pan, which may burn when you continue to evaporate the milk.
2. Pour milk into any other container that it’ll fit in, and scrub and rinse pan thoroughly. Pour milk back into pan, and start to heat again.
3. Keep over a low to medium heat until the milk is at a steady boil, and is reduced by roughly a third to a half. This takes well over an hour, however make sure you set a timer to check it every 10 minutes. A forgotten half hour, and there’ll be a deep orange, unrecoverable, sticky mess (I have done this twice already this week).
4. Pour milk into a bowl, and leave to cool.
5. Stir in small pot of yoghurt, and cover with clingfilm. Place in a very warm airing cupboard, or by a radiator, for 12-24 hours until set. It may need longer if it isn’t very warm. Move to the fridge when ready.
I enjoy the yoghurt with a banana, and home made muesli mix: oats, cashew nuts, raisins, mixed seeds, almonds, and lots and lots of cinnamon. When you have just a little left, the remaining yoghurt can be used as the ‘starter’ for your next batch.
Morning Nicola! Beautiful breakfast !
This explains the burnt milk the other day? I have never thought of reducing the milk first, what an interesting way of doing this.
I am wondering whether yoghurt made from evaporated milk would be interesting or disgusting? Currently I use full fat uht milk and a spoon of dried milk powder and one of various yoghurt cultures that I have floating around. Sometimes I throw in a pot of cream if I want a richer yoghurt. If you are after a mild flavour the other way is to explore the different cultures you can use as they give quite different tastes. In France you can buy dried yoghurt culture in the supermarket, here you can get fresh ones from various online sources. I like matsoni which is very mild and I quite like the piima one which is runnier but very good as a grain soaker for including in a bread.
It was indeed what the burnt milk had been earmarked for. Managed several times with no problems whatsoever, then a spate of burnings. It is worth it though – do try it – love the simplicity of fridge ingredients.
Yes! Yoghurt cultures! I had completely forgotten we used to use those or even that they existed. I will try them – thanks for that. Looking forward to trying the flavours. Why specifically UHT?
I would be tempted to try with evaporated milk, but – as you say – has slightly icky connautations. And i suspect I’d be tempted to make puddings with it instead! Not sure why. For now I’ll probably continue to moan about burnt milk on Twitter
nice one.
when I say evaporated milk above, I mean the tinned variety of course, not your lovingly tended home made one…
There is a much easier recipe I know but I haven’t done it in a while (If I would, it would certainly need some tweaks) and it goes like this:
Get 1 litre of milk and 70g of plain natural yoghurt, both at room temperature. Mix the yoghurt with half of the milk in a 1 litre thermos flask (shake the flask with both the milk and yoghurt inside). Boil the other half of the milk in the microwave (or just until boiling, so it doesn’t spill). Add to the flask.Mix . Wait overnight. Yoghurt ready. Place in the fridge. The amount of creaminess of the final yoghurt will depend on the amount of yoghurt used in the first place. The main tweak here is in the temperatures of the milk but I remember managing this recipe lots of times without ever using any thermometers or timers.
Yes – definitely possible to do it without reducing the milk – I just prefer the richness from the reduced milk. No thermometer required. Timer only if you’re away from the kitchen and forgetful (like me!). Although it may be possible to get a similar effect by adding skimmed milk powder as Joanna said. Again, I enjoy the simplicity here: reduce some milk, add a spoon of yoghurt, and leave it somewhere warm.
The yoghurt quantity in the above recipe is more than you need to set the yoghurt (1tbsp would prob do it), but then you may need a slightly more consistently warm airing cupboard, and a little more time…