My Big Fat Greek Homemade Yogurt…

 

I think it looks like ice cream

OH MY WORD.  This is so tasty.  I have a yogurt maker, which makes this immensely easier.  However, there are a lot of sites that give directions on how to make without the yogurt maker.

For example,you can use your slow cooker or a  food dehyradator.  The key is to allow the yogurt to incubate at the same temperature for several hours.

I am so happy that this recipe turned out, giddy that it was skim milk!  I had recently moved from Boise, ID to Northern Virginia and had failed making yogurt several times.  I wasn’t sure why my yogurt wasn’t setting up.  I decided to try again, by reminding myself the necessary steps, temperatures, and taking my time to produce thick and creamy yogurt.  I bought a half-gallon of skim milk and no one was consuming it, which is why I used skim milk.  You can make it from skim, 1%, 2% or whole milk.  There are post of people who make it from soy, tofu, and more.  A recipe with so many changes.  I just ♥ possibilities.

Ingredients:

5 cups of skim milk

1/3 c (about 2 scoops) of Trader Joe’s Vanilla Whey Protein Powder (as an afterthought I realize this is ironic since that is what is filtered out, but its okay.  I use the Whey also, see link below.)

1/3 c of Trader Joe’s European Plain Yogurt (any plain yogurt will work.  Need for starter, if successful, you can use this yogurt for your next batch)

Directions:

Heat the milk till it reaches a temperature of 180 degrees F.  I used my microwave and did it in 4 minute increments.  I did not want the milk to boil over.  It took about 10-12 minutes total to reach 180 degrees F.   Once the milk has reached that temperature it needs to cool to 110 degrees.

ice bath to speed up cooling process

I am impatient that I use an ice-cold bath.  I stir occasionally to help cool it off. Once it is 110 degrees mix in the ingredients till well incorporated and pour into jars.  Place into yogurt maker and set timer for 8-12 hours.

Yogurt Maker

Once it has incubated, pour yogurt into a coffee filter lined sieve, wrap with plastic wrap and let sit overnight. The next morning eat up.  The stuff that filtered through is Whey, which is ironic that I used whey powder to make this, I am not sure if any stayed in the yogurt. It did give it a nice vanilla taste. Regardless, I think I will repeat. One of my favorite mix-ins is canned pumpkin, cloves and all spice.

I mentioned above that I use the leftover whey.  I have used it in this recipe just a Tablespoon.

Here is a link for a lot of other ideas to use leftover whey.  One suggests just drinking it.  I tasted it and this particular whey is pretty good because of the vanilla.