Homemade Yogurt

Recently, in Montego Bay, we met a young couple, Hannah and Louis, (and their two young toddler children) cruising full-time for the past 18-months. Besides being incredibly kind and interesting humans, they are, hands down, the most self-reliant souls I’ve ever met in real life.

Seriously.

They fix things and make things and barter and trade for things. They know which trees produce which foods and can confidently point out which weed-looking things on the side of the road can be made into a tea that will cure a bladder infection within hours. I can’t make this stuff up.

If COVID-19 brings down the world, you definitely want to find yourself anchored near these two.

Though she’ll likely never see this webpage, giving credit where credit’s due, Hannah — in gifting us a portion of her own homemade yogurt and convincing me of its ease to make — was the final push I needed to attempt to make my own.

Let me begin by saying, if I had believed, even for a minute, that making my own yogurt was, in fact, easier, cheaper, and more delicious than buying it from the store, I would’ve might’ve started years ago.

The satisfaction level of making our own yogurt is next-level.

To those of you who don’t already know the joys of homemade yogurt, welcome to the show. (To those who do, shame on you for not convincing me sooner to give it a whirl!)

It should probably be noted that there are like 7,000 different ways to make yogurt: in a bread maker, in the InstantPot, on the stove, not-on-the-stove, with soy milk, with non-fat milk, and on and on and on — and every person with a different way to do it, seems to swear by their own way.

I don’t swear by this way.

My goal is simply to be your “Hannah” — to convince any of you who, like me, might think yogurt making is out of your league (or too hard or too complicated or not worth it) to give it a go.

I’m guessing the bread maker or InstantPot versions are by far the easiest, but power is always an issue for us on board Ruby Vi, so this is a good ol’ fashioned on-the-stove version (inspired largely from a New York Times Cooking recipe that’s floating around online somewhere).

For real though, if you happen upon an easier way, for the love of yogurt, TELL ME ABOUT IT!

OK — onward we stumble…

What to Gather:

1 )Some milk -- you need as much milk as whatever container(s) you intend to store your finished product in the fridge will hold. I usually use about a quart because that's the size of my reused instant coffee jar.

I also add a fat splash of heavy cream or half and half if I have it on hand.

2) 2 to 4 spoonfuls of mass-produced store-bought yogurt -- just this once, I promise.  

I use roughly 2 heaping cereal spoonfuls of vanilla Yoplait per rough quart of milk/cream mixture

What to Do:

1) Decide which container you’ll store your yogurt in after it’s ready to go in the fridge and decide how much milk it can hold.

2) Put that much milk in a saucepan 

Currently, I use boxed whole milk (about a quart) with roughly 1/4 c of heavy cream added (I don’t measure — it’s unnecessary). 

You definitely don’t need to add cream, but I've had it so that’s what I’ve been doing. 

3) Heat the milk or milk/cream combo on the stove until a ring of itty bitty bubbles form around the edge of the saucepan. (No lid.)

I stir constantly to make sure it doesn’t boil.

4) After you get to the edge-bubbles stage, remove it from heat and stir occasionally until it cools enough that you can keep the tip of your pinky finger dipped in it without tearing up from the heat. 

(It should cool to "comfortably hot," if we can pretend that's a thing.)

5) Once it’s pinky-finger hot-warm, pour about a cup of the heated milk into another cup so you can whisk in your *yogurt. Then pour that mixture back into the saucepan and ***cover. 

*Most recipes recommend using a big name store brand (like Yoplait) bc they have more **live active cultures (I think, but surely didn't fact check). Quite frankly, you could probably use any yogurt you please as long as it has "active live cultures." 

**Side Note: you can also buy the cultures themselves to add instead of using pre-existing yogurt, but I don’t have access to those... 

***I put a paper towel over the top of the saucepan and then put the lid on top of that (so condensation doesn’t collect on the lid and drip down into the yogurt. 

6) Find a nice warm place to let your yogurt rest and become yogurt. 

Just set it in the sun or on/near your stove’s pilot light (or top of the fridge / anywhere warm). 

Here aboard Ruby Vi, I just keep moving ours around so it's always sitting in the sun.

7) Let your yogurt baby sit for 8-12 hours (most gurus recommend waiting the full 12).

I usually make it to about hour 10, but only because I'm lazy (or tired and ready for bed).

You can check on it, stir it at hour 8, and see if it needs more time to thicken. If so, let it keep sitting. 

8) Once it seems thick enough (or you're done waiting or you have to go to bed), stir it, pour it into your chosen container, and put it in the fridge. 

It will continue to thicken in the fridge while it chills. 

9) Once your yogurt's cold, it’s ready! Add anything you like to sweeten, top, etc! 

Favorites here include: 
~ a heavy sprinkling of dry cereal (corn flakes is our current go-to; presumably, you have something more delicious on hand)
~ a larger-than-seems-acceptable "drizzle" of honey
~ muesli or granola
~ coconut flakes (the sweetened crunchy ones are the absolute best, in my opinion, but the regular bag of dried sweetened shreds are what we have onboard and they seem to do the trick just fine.)
~ a blob of jam

It should be noted that we'd also be quite keen to add things like berries or chopped fruit, but the only fruit we have these days is apple and we save those to eat whole.

When to Do it

We like to make our yogurt sometime in the morning (preferably before 10:00 a.m.) so it’s ready to be put in the fridge by bedtime and is chilled and ready to eat by the next morning.

TIP: Save enough of your homemade yogurt to be your starter yogurt for your next batch.