Anyone use Yogurt Makers?

[OakLeaf]

180 is scalding.

105-115 F or 40-45 C is incubating temp. Much hotter than that will kill the cultures - I've done it.

It's hard to really screw it up. Worst case, you just have a partially cultured or uncultured liquid to put on your cereal.

[Becky]

I've made a couple of batches lately, and had good luck with the following temperatures:

185 for the scalding, 115 to add the starter, and incubation at 105-115. I tempered the starter with a ladle of 115 degree milk before adding to the rest of the milk.

I've been using the instructions and recipes at http://www.ianrpubs.unl.edu/epublic/...licationId=525.

[badger]

Grog, I think you should look into Kefir. You don't need too much - just kefir grains, milk, and room temperature.

[WindingRoad]

OK! The cardboard orange box and heating pad method works like a charm. It was very easy to do. It was a little on the runny side but part of that was I incubated the jar on its side then stood it up so the whey mixed in with the yogurt. Solution: turn box on it's end this time (why didn't I think of that last time, geez). I'm going to add a little powdered milk to see if the next batch comes out thicker. I'm eating the last of it (aside of the bit I saved for culture) so it turned out very tasty too!

Oh..and I did let the milk cool to lukewarm before I added the yogurt culture, thank you.

[badger]

if you want thicker yogurt, the instrction booklet said to boil the milk first (then cool to room temp). And it works, I use 2% and it comes out like full fat yogurt.

[Becky]

Mixing in powdered milk works really well to make thicker yogurt. Something about increasing the concentration of solids... I suppose that you could reduce the milk volume by heating and achieve the same thing.

[WindingRoad]

Oooooooh yeah! It turned out thicker and creamier this time! Quite awesome, thanks for all the tips!

[ZenSojourner]

Mixing in powdered milk works really well to make thicker yogurt. Something about increasing the concentration of solids... I suppose that you could reduce the milk volume by heating and achieve the same thing.

I do this when I'm making paneer, a soft cheese. If I have to use grocery store milk, they've stripped a lot of the milk solids out in the processing. The powdered milk helps to replace some of that.

Of course, if I can get 5% fat unpasteurized unhomogenized Jersey Milk, I don't need to do that, but I can't get it here.

Oh how I miss Young's Jersey Dairy!