Saturday, March 1, 2014

Homemade Yogurt in a Crock pot (using powdered coconut and regular milk)

I have been making my own yogurt from powdered coconut milk and powdered regular milk for over a year and my family loves it!! I make a gallon of yogurt at a time, but even though that sound like too much yogurt I am often making it twice a week. Try it you will be amazed at how many things you will put yogurt in!!
Please excuse my horrible picture taking.. it was on my old iphone3 which isn't known for its quality photos.

1. Start with your 6 qt. crock pot and put it on low heat. I measure out 2 cups (heaping not flat) of powdered coconut milk and 2 cups (heaping) of powdered regular milk. (both can be bought at our Sourdough Girls store or from Azure). Place in the crock pot.

2.Pour 8 cups of warm water in your crock pot and stir with a whisk the powdered milk and water until dissolved.

3. Next at the remaining 8 cups of water and mix again.

4.Then place lid on crock pot and stick a thermometer in the milk with the reading showing with the lid on.

5. I let it get to about 130 then turn off crock pot (you can do a higher temp but I figure I don't need to pasteurize the milk just get it heated to make sure all powder is dissolved). Once I turn off the crock pot
I check on it every hour until the thermometer reads 105-110. When close to the temp, remove lid and use the thermometer and swirl around milk, to make sure there are no hot pockets of milk. If it still reads 105-110, then you are ready to make yogurt.

6. All you need to do is add 8 oz. of starter (This is just an organic yogurt from the store in whatever flavor you want, I usually do vanilla), mix with the whisk. Once mixed, put lid back on crock pot and put a towel over the crock pot and leave overnight. (make sure crock pot is unplugged!)

7. Next Morning, open up lid and you have YOGURT!! Package in whatever size you want, add a dollop of homemade jam on the bottom of a dish and put yogurt on top for "fruit on the bottom," and refrigerate. Make sure you put an 8 oz. container of yogurt in the fridge to use as your "starter" for the next batch.


If you want a thicker more like Greek yogurt, just place a tea towel lined colander with a bowl underneath to catch the whey and leave on counter for the day. Then package once whey has dripped out. I use that whey for some the water when I make bread or add to a smoothie or feed your pets. :)

That's it...I can make this in a few minutes and have yogurt ready for the week. If you want a sweeter yogurt add some maple syrup or add a little organic sugar in the warm milk to sweeten (or scrape a vanilla bean into the warm milk). I have found I don't need to sweeten at all any more as they are used to a not super sweet yogurt now, but I do try to start with vanilla or some fruit flavored starter.