Home Made Yoghurt 1

Home made Yoghurt is very easy to make and you produce in quantity for a relatively cheap price compared to what you may pay in a supermarket. Plus what you are making is natural yoghurt which means you choose how you use it. Yoghurt is good for you it helps to keep the right bacteria in your gut so that your system digests your food properly. It is especially good for people who have ongoing stomach conditions suc as Diverticulitis and IBS. Helps to soothe the gut and make sure that the right bacteria is being encouraged, as in some conditions this is the main reason for so much discomfort. A regular dose every day does the system good. It certainly helps me with my immune system problems.

It can also be used in a multitude of ways;you can use it in main meals, as a dessert with the addition of a fruit puree, you can freeze with the additon of a fruit sauce to make home made ice lollies for the children - plus you have the added knowledge of what has gone into it. Plus if you buy a set of small jam jars from Lakeland you can do individual pots for the family for pack ups. The beauty of using these is that they can easily be sterilised and the screw caps available can be as well which means you can re-use time after time And if if you have some strawberries or raspberries apples or bananas going over you can use them up by making them into a puree to put in the bottom of the jars and then topped off with the yoghurt - much cheaper than buying from the supermarket.

You can also cook with it - the addition of some slaked cornflour helps stop the yoghurt splitting if you wish to cook with it.

I have made yoghurt on and off for years - it started when my mum bought a yoghurt machine and it was part of me earning pocket money to make the same for the rest of the family. Mum's little machine was an electric 6 pot maker (Plastic pots with reusable polythene lids). I bought a similar machine after I was married. I then read about the no-electric version of utilising a vaccuum flask. I then found the Easiyo yoghurt kit and I use this vacuum flask for doing the yoghurt as above - I very rarely buy the Easiyo sachets as they have got extremely expensive although the flvours are wonderful and the mixes do produce a very creamy yoghurt and it produces about a litre (I use more milk with the Easiyo than stated above and fill the plastic jar to the neck with the warmed milk. You then pour a kettle full of boiling water into the vaccum flask after you have put the polythene pot into the flask on what is known as the baffle. The water is usually filled to the shoulders of the jar, the top lid is put on and then you literally leave it overnight somewhere out of a draft. Open up the next morning wonderful home made yoghurt that just needs chilling.

The only things that you must remember to do by making yoghurt this way is that every time you make a batch of yoghurt you must remember to take at least two teaspoons of the natural yoghurt from the batch to be used as your starter for the next batch. Every third batch buy a new small pot - this keeps the active ingredients at their best - problems can occur if this is not done regularly i.e. the yoghurt being thin and not setting properly.

If you buy yoghurt in pots more often or not it is flavoured and you are restricted to how you use it. You can use yoghurt in smoothies, in cooking as the base of a sauce. You can make home made cheese from it.


Ingredients

1 pint/600 ml standard pasteurised milk
2 heaped teaspoons bought natural yoghurt preferably with the word "live" on it
1 heaped tablespoon of dried milk powder

Method

Heat the milk to boiling, then cool in a bowl of cold water until temperature drops down to 112 degrees F/60 degrees C - hot bath temperature. Put the yoghurt in a bowl with the milk and then whisk in the dried milk which helps to stablise the yoghurt.

Cover and put in either an airing cupboard for 12 hours or in a wide mouth vaccuum flask for 6 hours or use a yoghurt making kit

This is the Easiyo kit - you can often get offers on in places like Lakeland for these kits and they have also in the psat been featured on QVC.

The polythene flask and lid


Inside the flask


The Baffle


The Baffle fits inside the flask and is used for balancing the plastic internal jar with its lid. Boiling water is then added up to the shoulders of the jar, the lid is then placed on and left overnight.



The beauty of using this set is that it is very easily cleanable - I use baby sterilsing tablets to clean out the internal jar and also the outer equipment. Best of all it uses no electricity just a kettle of boiling water.


POSTSCRIPT

I popped into Lakeland today as you do - they have an offer on for the basic Easiyo making kit - it is normally around £13 - On offer on sale at the moment for just over £6 - that is a cheap enough investment for something that is going to do long term service in the kitchen. Just thought I'd mention it.

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