100 Recipes - #82 Yogurt
I follow crockpot365 and recently she posted this procedure for making yogurt in the slow-cooker. It seemed pretty easy, so I gave it a try.
The first time, it completely failed. At the end of the process I had...warm milk with a very slightly sour taste and a few lumps at the bottom. Not yogurt.
Undaunted, I tried again. After consulting some other yogurt recipes, I decided to try using the temperature probe on my slow-cooker to be sure I was getting the temps right and discovered that it takes my slow-cooker over four hours to get a half-gallon of milk to 185F. Then it took about 3.5 hours to get down to 110F, by which time I was very excited to go to bed.
But the next morning, when I unwrapped the towel, I had...YOGURT! I was interested in seeing how straining it would work, so I did that and found that while it works just fine if you really need solid, Greek-style yogurt, the unstrained stuff is just fine after a night in the fridge. So I probably won't bother most of the time. It tastes really good, even unsweetened, and we have plenty of honey and maple syrup if we want it sweeter.
Next time I want to try using the temp probe and cooking it on high. This was a bit of a hassle, but once I figure out the timing for my equipment, the actual work is amazingly simple and I'm hoping to make this a habit.
The first time, it completely failed. At the end of the process I had...warm milk with a very slightly sour taste and a few lumps at the bottom. Not yogurt.
Undaunted, I tried again. After consulting some other yogurt recipes, I decided to try using the temperature probe on my slow-cooker to be sure I was getting the temps right and discovered that it takes my slow-cooker over four hours to get a half-gallon of milk to 185F. Then it took about 3.5 hours to get down to 110F, by which time I was very excited to go to bed.
But the next morning, when I unwrapped the towel, I had...YOGURT! I was interested in seeing how straining it would work, so I did that and found that while it works just fine if you really need solid, Greek-style yogurt, the unstrained stuff is just fine after a night in the fridge. So I probably won't bother most of the time. It tastes really good, even unsweetened, and we have plenty of honey and maple syrup if we want it sweeter.
Next time I want to try using the temp probe and cooking it on high. This was a bit of a hassle, but once I figure out the timing for my equipment, the actual work is amazingly simple and I'm hoping to make this a habit.