My First Attempt at Yogurt (And some stuff about kombucha)

My kombucha brewing made me somewhat brave and I decided to try making my own yogurt. I had been gifted a yogurt maker roughly 6 years ago and kept telling myself I was going to do it. But before I had learned about kombucha, I didn’t really understand why I would need to buy yogurt to make more yogurt. Kombucha, however, has schooled me somewhat in the art of fermented foods. I now understand that, similar to kombucha, the milk in yogurt is used to feed the bacteria we put in there. The bacteria eat the lactase sugars in the milk, rendering the milk mostly safe for those who are lactose intolerant (me) and allowing us to eat the healthy probiotics. Sound like kombucha, right? 

Well, kombucha is a little more fool proof. The milk for the yogurt needs to be heated. My thermometer lied to me and told me it was still under 212 but it started boiling. So I took it off the heat and went for it. I cooled it off to 110F and put it in my little yogurt maker with the starter I added from some Fage Greek Yogurt (one of my favs!) After about 4 hours, the yogurt looked ok. It was a bit runny and I wanted something more dense, so I left it a bit longer. I woke up around 330 in the morning and unplugged my maker. I went to put it in the fridge and it smelled delicious. However, in my groggy state and squinting in the light of the refrigerator, I noticed that there was quite a bit of whey in the jug. In fact, the 1 quart container now held 3 cups of whey and about 1 cup of yogurt. I tried to salvage it by straining it through cheesecloth but that didn’t help. I now have a sort of cheese-like substance reminiscent of ricotta. Perhaps I can use it in some blintzes or stuff some pasta with it but it is definitely not yogurt. I’m going to try again and hopefully not boil the milk this time.

In any case, kombucha has been teaching me a good deal about food preparation, fermented foods, and friendly vs foe-like bacteria and yeasts. Ahh, kombucha.