Making Yoghurt in your Thermomix

I recently went to one of our Thermomix branch meetings where Kirsty gave a talk about yoghurt making and shared her tips for getting perfect thick creamy yoghurt. You can find her blog and posts on that topic here. There has been a bit of discussion on my Facebook page about yoghurt making so I thought I should share that info here.

I use the yoghurt recipe from the Indian cookbook. There is also a popular coconut yoghurt recipe here on our Recipe Community.

Ingredients

1-1.5 litres full-cream or hi-lo milk (not skim milk) 2 to 3 Tbsp natural live yoghurt – this is your “starter” culture. Use the best quality one you can find.

• Heat milk 10 minutes/80°C/Speed 2. (Milk that reaches 80°C for 15 seconds is pasteurised.) Leave milk to cool until 37°C
• Add yoghurt starter to the milk. Mix 5 seconds/Speed 3.
• Heat 10 minutes/37°C/Speed 2. As soon as the yoghurt is finished, pour it into the pre-warmed  thermoserver, put the lid on and leave to set for 6 to 14 hours.
• Once the yoghurt is set, it can be used immediately or refrigerated (remove from thermos first) for up to 5 days.

The most important things to remember are:

• When you are cooling the yoghurt, wait until the 37 degree light goes OFF, as if you are watching the temperature drop and see the 50 degree light go off and the 37 degree light come on, that actually means the temperature is 49 degrees and this will kill your live cultures. So wait till the 37 light goes off and then you add your culture and warm it back up to 37 for 2 minutes. 
• Pre-warm your thermoserver before you pour the yoghurt in. I put my oven on the lowest heat while I am heating my milk, with my thermoserver inside. Then when the milk is ready to rest after you have added the cultures and mixed/heated it again, pour it into your warmed thermoserver, then wrap the thermoserver in a nice warm towel/tea towel (an old baby blanket works perfectly!) and place into your cosy warm oven. Turn the oven off though...you just want a nice warm cosy environment, not too hot or you will kill the live cultures

You can let your yoghurt sit in here for 6-14 hours. It will thicken up a little more once you chill it in the fridge. You can also drain the whey from the yoghurt to thicken it up, by lining your varoma dish with some cheesecloth or a clean chux cloth, putting your yoghurt on top and sitting the varoma dish on top of your Thermoserver until the yoghurt has thickened up to your liking. Or let it drain overnight and the result will be yoghurt 'cheese'.

Keep the whey you drain away....that lovely, thick, golden liquid can be used in many ways. Have a read here at The Prairie Homestead for ideas on how to use whey.

I flavour my yoghurt with either a vanilla bean paste and honey mix, or with a teaspoon (per serving) of any home made jam or lemon butter. This way we can have a different flavour yoghurt each time we eat it, plus I know what is in the flavouring as I made it myself. It also means you have lots of plain natural yoghurt to use for cakes, dips, curry etc

Making your own yoghurt is one of the best money saving features of owning a Thermomix and if you go through a few litres of yoghurt a week you can save around $8/week just on yoghurt!

Don't be scared! Give it a go!! My first yoghurt batch was quite runny but still edible, but when I tried again with the above two tips I found it has been perfect every time.