[Rosemary]

Ideally boil the milk and then cool before adding the starter but you can get away with heating it to 86deg c.

VSS, what is the purpose of boiling / heating to 86C if the milk is pasteurised? Is this important to the yogurt making process or only required with raw milk to pasteurise?

Anyway, made yogurt - 1 litre of whole milk from the Co-op, 4 tablespoons Yeo Valley yogurt, milk heated to 43C and all put in the yogurt maker for 12 hours. It was like, well, milk. I put orange juice in mine and drank it.

Tried again, this time substituting some of the milk with a big can of Carnation (not really in the spirit of self sufficiency, I know) - it's fabulous. I'd call it a dessert yogurt - although we did have it for breakfast this morning over fresh raspberries and blueberries.

The Carnation option isn't really a go-er on a daily basis, so why was my yogurt so thin and what can I do? Add cream? Our Shetland milk should be creamier that shop bought whole milk.

[SallyintNorth]

I wonder whether the homogenisation has an effect?  Perhaps somehow stops the coagulation / setting?

Can you get unhomogenised (cream rises to the top) milk?  Good deli's and supermarkets around here sell Gold Top, it's Channel Islands milk and although it is pasteurised it is not homogenised.  There's also an organic milk, Acorn, we can get which is not homogenised.  I think Acorn is from Yorkshire but maybe there's a Scottish equivalent you can get hold of to try.

Has anyone tried adding rennet to yoghurt? 

[Crofter]

If you're using shop milk you don't have to pasteurise it's already done. We never had any bother using co-op organic whole milk for yogurt when the goats were dry. Added 2 tbsp of yeo valley to a litre at 43 degrees C and popped in a thermos flask overnight.
Did you use organic? Maybe there are traces of something in the non organic milk.

[Rosemary]

Can't get organic whole milk here. Now I didn't heat the starter, just poured the milk over it. Next time, I'll warm the starter and the milk. Thanks all.

[SallyintNorth]

Now I didn't heat the starter, just poured the milk over it. Next time, I'll warm the starter and the milk. Thanks all.

The recommended practice is to first mix the starter and some of the warmed milk, then mix that back into the body of the milk.  I get my starter out and let it warm up to room temperature while I'm heating up the milk.  A friend always did the 'pre-mix' in a jam jar, giving it a jolly good shake, then stirring it into the pan of warm milk.

Mind you, my yoghurt nearly always takes more than 24 hours to set, no matter what starter I use (Yeo Valley, Ascott, or my own home-grown one), how I incubate it (airing cupboard, slow pot, thermos flask, insulated box with hot water bottles) or whether I use skimmed or full milk, or pasteurise or not.  It's worth the wait, though!   

[northfifeduckling]

my first attempt making it with goat's milk failed...
I don't use a yogurt maker, just keep all the temperatures observed for 8 hours. This normally works fine with cow's milk but this time it seperated. strained it made nice cream cheese  Might have to invest in another appliance. Do you all use electric ones? 

[doganjo]

Must be something in the air  - mine was separated this morning too.  I'm sure everything was sterile before I started - scalded the wee glass jars and washed out the plastic container with dettox.  I'm off out to buy more milk, bio yoghurt, and carnation to try it again.

[nihicib2]

I've also had hit and miss attempts with goats yogurt, sometimes its lovely and thick other times its watery, all the times keeping to the same technique, just a quick question, what time of milk powder would you use when using goats milk, do you have to use evaporated goats milk powder or will any type do?

Brid

[northfifeduckling]

I didn't add anything else - milk and yogurt only. will be more experimental now 

[Crofter]

Hi Brid

I usually put a small tin of carnation evaporated milk in a litre of goats milk for yogurt. You can use powdered cows milk too. Powdered goats milk is available but it's a ridiculous price!

[nihicib2]

Hi Crofter,

thanks for that, go raibh maith agat, tapadh leat 

Ill try that out tomorrow

Brid

[doganjo]

My curdled yoghurt just turned into a really nice mild cream cheese!  Strained it all evening while I was at dog training. Had some on toast with a lovely cup of tea.  Feeding my cold.