Crockpot Yogurt
I got this recipe for crock pot yogurt at Nourishing Days. If you are interested in nourishing foods and wondering how they will fit into your life, this is the blog for you! Shannon makes healthy cooking easy and has great recipes.
Here is how my yogurt turned out:
It was thinner than store bought yogurt because it’s without any extra thickeners. I usually sweeten it with unsulfered molasses, pure maple syrup and pure vanilla extract. I also add a little water in it and we drink it like keiffer. I used these sweeteners because of their high iron and calcium content.
We only use cultured dairy and a little organic cheese. I just buy organic, lightly pasteurized milk at the store and make our own yogurt. I’d rather be using raw milk, but the culturing process adds back most of the enzymes and vitamins lost in the pasteurization process.
This is SO easy! You’ll have a lot of fun making this. I’ve made about 4 batches and it’s turned out great every time!
This is the time schedule that works well for us:
3:30 pm- pour the milk into the crock pot and cook it on low
6:00pm- turn off the heat and let it sit covered with the lid
9:00pm- stir in the 1/2 cup of yogurt and cover with towels
9:00am (the following morning)- take out 1/2 cup of yogurt to use next time, stir and and enjoy!
I also made yogurt cheese with one batch. It was so good that the kids and I dipped our veggies in it. Yum!
I laid a piece of cheesecloth over a mesh colander, put the colander into a large bowl and poured the yogurt over it. The whey drained out in a few hours and I was left with the yogurt cheese…so easy!
For more yogurt info be sure to stop by Kelly the Kitchen Kop’s blog. She just did a great post on yogurt and the comments people left were very informative and helpful.
If you’d like to learn more healthy recipes go to Fight Back Fridays at Food Renegade.
If you try making your own yogurt or have some tips to share, please comment below. I’d really like to hear what works for you!
Tags: dariy, Frugal, Healthy Living, organic, recipe, tips, yogurt
April 10th, 2009 at 10:06 am
How about a taste test? Looks yummy. I know of a little one that asked for and enjoyed it just before her nap!
April 10th, 2009 at 10:36 am
I only ever tried to make raw milk yogurt, and I used my oven with the light on to keep it “warm.”
It was NOT successful. Watery, clumpy in patches. Very discouraging to me — the person who makes *everything* from scratch.
Then I tried out the raw milk villi yogurt cultures from Cultures For Health. So easy! They culture right on your countertop and room temperature.
I hope to do a post about it soon to show everyone how awesome they are!!
Thank you for participating in today’s Fight Back Fridays carnival.
Cheers,
KristenM
(AKA FoodRenegade)
April 10th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Thank you for the kind words. So glad you liked the recipe. I am working on a raw milk yogurt recipe that actually keeps the enzymes intact. My site is down, but hopefully will be back up by early next week.
April 10th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
Isn’t it great to be able to make your own
Years ago I used to make it in a very different way. I used only non-fat milk powder and MAN was that stuff thick!
Now-a-days I like to use our raw milk, but I still add about 1/3 cup of the non-fat milk powder (the non-instant kind from the health food store) and that seems to help thicken it a bit.
April 11th, 2009 at 8:07 am
Sounds great! One suggestion: there is a local mid-Tennessee farm that presses their own sorghum and their product is available at Whole Foods. I would suggest using it instead of molasses as molasses is actually a combination of corn syrup and sorghum. Also, the sorghum doesn’t have that sharp finish to the taste that molasses has. Jeremy uses the sorghum to sweeten his morning oatmeal and really enjoys it. You can check out the Guenthers and their operation at http://muddypondsorghum.com/ For non-Tennesseans who read your blog, they also sell their products online!
April 11th, 2009 at 8:23 am
Thanks Sarah! I had no idea about molasses having corn syrup, yuk! I’ll be switching for sure.
April 14th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Thanks for the easy recipe and for checking out my site! If you don’t mind, I’ll leave the link here: http://kitchenstewardship.wordpress.com/2009/04/13/monday-mission-homemade-yogurt-the-easy-way/ My post describes another way to make homemade yogurt, in case you don’t have a slow cooker or want to make a smaller batch or use different kinds of milk (skim for adults and whole for toddlers, for example) at the same time. I’ve loved making the yogurt cheese, SO simple. My son loves yogurt cheese and jelly or honey sandwiches, and I found a yummy veggie dip recipe at Nourishing Days called “yogurt ranch dip”. Thank you!
May 19th, 2009 at 3:20 am
nice attempt
November 22nd, 2009 at 10:04 am
I stumbled upon your website after googling crockpot yogurt and I’m so excited to try this recipe. I really like how you’ve included your timeline for the various steps.
May 29th, 2010 at 8:58 pm
One of the most ignored points in yogurt making is that you must mix the culture into the warm milk VERY THOROUGHLY! I do this by using a blender and blend for 5 – 10 seconds. It has never clumped on me that way.
http://mryogurt.info/
Bill