Home made yogurt

CharityEaton

Anyone out there make their own yogurt???
I just tried it for the first time today and am very excited about the results.
I am just wondering how to get the increased amount of protein in it that the Greek yogurt has. I know it says you can strain it through cheesecloth to create a "greek style" yogurt, but that seemed a bit wasteful when I started to strain it.

I am thinking that maybe I should get an unflavored protein powder and stir that in.
Any thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated! My little fodd critics even loved the taste of the homemade yogurt so I really want to continue making it I just want the added protein that I get from the store greek yogurt.
Thanks!

AirCircleI

I love making my own yoghurt.

You can make it thicker by two ways:

1. strain the whey out with a cheese cloth - rather than getting rid of the whey, you can keep it and use it for loads of different things, from putting it in a shake, using it as liquid in batters like for pancakes or baking, to using it as a facial toner or putting it in your bath - it is good for your skin!

2. before you start incubating the yoghurt, stir in some non-fat powdered milk - a few tablespoons or so. This will help to thicken it up.

The unflavoured protein powder might work, but make sure it is a kind that you like and isn't too grainy.

jennalink807

You can also add powdered milk, and make sure you have a good starter. Stoneyfield farms works well. It will leak some whey, but simply stir in some powdered milk to mix with the whey. There's a lot of protein in that "watery stuff" so draining it off reduces the overall protein in the yogurt.

scubagoil

I love making yogurt - it just tastes so good!

I agree with others that suggest using powdered milk - helps to thicken it up a little.

I have never tried to add protein powder, so I don't know how that will work. I have tried adding other things over the years such as fruit or vanilla. The yogurt never seemed to set up properly... The fruit has moisture in it, so I think that may have had an affect, but the vanilla was a powder...

I would try the protein powder just to see if it would work because it can be very worthwhile to experiment a little!

XXXMinnieXXX

What's the recipe? X

bushidowoman

Wow, I was just mentioning within the past hour that this was something I wanted to try.

CharityEaton

when you strain it with the cheesecloth how many times did you layer the cheesecloth?? It seemed lik nearly all of the yogurt was running through it and leaving very little behind. Did I do something wrong???


For the person that asked for the recipe this is what I did:
1/2 gallon of non fat milk heated to 180 degrees in crock pot. Then let it cool back down to around 80 degrees(it was late so mine only cooled to about 95 degrees) Once it is cool, yu scoop out about 1 cup of milk into a bowl and add one container of plain (no flavors) yogurt. I used a container of greek yogurt that had 4 different live culters in it. Whisk the yogurt and milk together and pour back into the crock pot and mix it all together. Put the lid on it an wrap the crockpot with two big beach towels and go to bed! Let it do its wokr overnight. In the morning stir it and divide into smaller containers.
I flavored mine and added a bit of sugar for the munchkins( we will be slowly decreasing the sugar over time for them but this is a good start) I even added cocoa powder and vanilla to some of it to make a chocolate yogurt! It isooo delicious!
I wll be experimenting more for sure!
Thanks for the tips so far!