This doesn’t have a lot to do with cycling, but it fits with the general idea of better health and living in a more independent way. Yogurt has come up on Misanthrope Cyclist and Oil is for Sissies lately, so it seems like as good a time as any to share a technique for making your own yogurt.

Why bother? It does require a bit of effort, so you’ll need some type of motivation. I like it for a few reasons. The yogurt tastes better. You choose the ingredients so if you like lots of preservatives in your yogurt, you can put all you want. You can make the yogurt so it’s as sweet or sour, creamy or firm as you like. You can save a little bit of money since you basically pay the price of milk instead of yogurt. This is a bigger deal if you’re trying to use organic dairy. If you like the idea of buying locally, you just need to find a local dairy source that sells milk. Also, it might mean you’ll eat more yogurt, which is good for your colon, and therefore your immune system (I’m no doctor, but there seems to be a pretty wide consensus on this). Another reason: it’s satisfying to learn about a technology that’s been passed down for centuries in most parts of the world, yet somewhat forgotten in this time and place. Even though I can’t milk my own cow, it’s a small step closer to self sufficiency.

As for that effort, it really isn’t that hard. You’ll probably make some mistakes the first few times. After you figure out what you did wrong, you’ll have a reliable system for making yogurt on a regular basis.

This technology, passed on through the ancient civilizations of Bulgaria and India (thanks Rad and Raj!), I now pass on to you.

This will be based on 1 litre of milk which makes a tiny bit less than 1 litre of yogurt. This is how I do it, but you’ll figure out how you can vary it with the equipment you have available.

You need:

1 medium sized pot, probably 2 litres (to boil the milk)
1 big clean jar or 2 of those 750 g yogurt tubs (for the yogurt to go in)
1 dollop of plain yogurt (to start the process) (1 dollop is about a heaping tablespoon). This must be real yogurt. It should say on the package “Contains Live Culture”.
1 litre of milk
1 wisk
1 big mixing bowl
1 jar of warm water
1 cooler
1 towel

The process:

1. Bring the milk to a boil on the stove. Watch it carefully because when milk boils over, it makes a big mess. Let it boil for long enough to kill any bacteria in the milk (say 1 minute?).

2. Let the milk cool down to just above body temperature. This is the part I found the hardest to learn. A thermometer would have been useful, but I never bothered. Take a tablespoon of milk from the pot and put it in your mouth. It should feel a little warmer than your mouth, and definitely not scalding. The main thing to keep in mind is that your going to be creating a comfortable environment for a bacteria to grow. If you make it too hot, you kill the bacteria. If it’s too cold, the process doesn’t get kickstarted.

3. Pour the milk in the mixing bowl. Add the dollop of yogurt. Wisk well. I don’t recommend mixing in the pot since the inside surface of the pot may still be hot enough to kill the bacteria in the starter yogurt.

4. Pour the yogurt milk mix into the clean tubs or jar.

5. Put the tubs into the cooler and put the jar of warm water beside them. Cover them with a towel and close the cooler.

6. Wait.

7. I usually leave it overnight at this point. 6 hours will give you a reasonably firm tart yogurt. After 3 or 4 hours, the yogurt will be more creamy and sweet.

8. Put your new yogurt in the fridge. This stops the bacteria from growing any more. It's ready to eat.

Variations:
- Instead of the cooler, you can use some other warm place, like the inside of an oven. In the winter, I sometimes rest it on top of my radiator with some towels wrapped around. In the summer, a counter top in a warm kitchen will work. I’ve used an oven too, which allows you to rewarm it if you think the growing process has stopped, but you have to be careful not to overwarm it and kill it. And you might want to use a ceramic container instead of a plastic tub!
- Add more starter yogurt. This will make the process go faster.
- Different containers. Ceramic, glass, plastic. It’s all fine, as long as you keep it covered so you don’t get dust in it and don’t spill it.
- If you think it’s not working after a few hours, restart. You can re-boil the milk yogurt mix and start again. (I don’t know when milk becomes unsafe after sitting in a warm place. I'd recommend visiting and asking your doctor, as long as you have a private health care system.)
- 1%, 2%, homo milk (as we call it in Canada; You may called it 3.25%.) They all work.
- I’ve heard you can use a microwave to boil the milk, but never tried it.

It’s much easier than all those words let on. Give it a try. If it doesn’t work, feel free to ask me questions and I’ll try to help.

What to do with all this yogurt? I like to have it plain, put it on toast and jam, mix it with cereal, or add it to just about any dinner.

One more benefit is that yogurt has less lactose than milk. If you add some water to your yogurt, you’ll find you can use yogurt as a flavourful replacement to milk. The lactose gives the milk its sweetness. The longer you let the bacteria grow, the less lactose and the greater the tartness.

Enjoy!

Next I’d like to learn how to make cheese and beer, how to clean a fish, and maybe some day, how to slaughter a pig, a deer or at least a pheasant (based on where I live a recipe for pigeon casserole would be more appropriate). OK, I’d probably learn how to be a vegetarian before I’d start slaughtering.

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