EASY Homemade Yogurt

What you will need:

Large pot used to heat 1 gallon of milk (sterilize by first boiling water with a lid on, then empty)

4 quart jars that have been pre-sterilized by dipping to boiling water and emptied

1 gallon of organic milk (preferred)

1/2 cup of fresh PLAIN yogurt Unflavored and unsweetened.

Directions:

In your pot, you will scald the milk on medium heat just until the milk is hot enough to form small bubbles (do not let boil).

Then let the milk cool to a warm temperature that is no longer hot to the touch.

Add the yogurt to the milk and stir completely, making sure there are no clumps and the yogurt/milk is evenly mixed.

Pour into the jars and seal with the lid. (It is not necessary to get a "seal", in fact you can use other containers, but the jars work nicely and you can use them over and over)

Turn oven to 300 for 1-2 minutes then turn OFF.

Place the jars in the oven, close the door and leave undisturbed for 8-12 hours.

Remove the jars from the oven and refrigerate. Keep the lids on till you are ready to eat your homemade yogurt.

Your yogurt will keep for several weeks due to the natural preservative of the cultures in the milk.

Now you are ready to enjoy. Try adding in a little vanilla and agave nectar to sweeten, or some fresh berries. This is fantastic when added to your smoothies or granola.

Fun Dehydrator Yogurt Rollup Recipe:

Mix your homemade yogurt with your favorite purred fruit. If the substance seems too thin, you can mix in small amounts of ground chia to obtain the desired consistency that is spreadable.

Use your Excalibur dehydrator and cover each tray being used with a paraflexx sheet.

With yogurt at room temperature, empty approximately 1 1/2 - 2 cups of yogurt onto each sheet.

With a spatula smooth the yogurt onto the sheets leaving approximately 1 inch on the sides.

Dry at 110F for approximately 8 hours. When dried, yogurt will be shiny and non-sticky when lightly touched.

Cut to desired sizes, cover each with plastic wrap, roll up and store. You can also use cookie cutters to create fun shapes

Running low on yogurt?

Save a cup of your plain yogurt to start your next batch.

You now will never need to buy yogurt again!

Almond milk cost comparison

I wanted to find out how economical it is to make my own almond milk, which I have been doing over the last year, though I didn't really know how much it was costing me. I was pleasantly surprised.

Raw Almonds - $4.00 per lb (this is VERY affordable - could cost more depending on where you buy them)

1 lb = 5 cups of sprouted/soaked almonds (just more than 5 cups actually)

Making sprouted almond “mylk” (see recipe):

1 cup of sprouted almonds

4 cups of water

16 Cups = 1 gallon

1 lb of almonds make approximately 1 ½ gallons of almond milk (Or 6 quarts)

The cost is approximately $2.66 per gallon of milk using 4 cups water, 1 cup almonds.

Less water makes a creamier milk, more water could be added to make a consistency more of that of skim milk.

Then it depends on what you can purchase your raw almonds for. I still have about 20 lbs for $4 per lb.

$2.66 per gallon is much less than organic milk, but nutritionally speaking, they are much closer than pasteurized milk that has other ingredients that are not considered healthy.

You can even reduce this cost more by making a mixture of 1/2 almond milk, and 1/2 rice milk. You'd make brown rice and then blend it with water using the same recipe as for the almond milk, just using rice instead of almonds. Not 'as' healthy, but still better than consuming cows milk in any form.

If you are interested in the almonds, give me a call at 623-332-2262 or email shanna.dave@gmail.com