How I make yogurt

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I told @andriaperry I would tag her in this post. We use a lot of plain yogurt at our house. I like to make my own. First, you do not need a fancy machine. You can do this if your oven has a pilot light, or if you have an insulated cooler chest or you can use a dehydrator. Ideal incubation temperature is about 90 degrees F. Buy the milk of your choice. I use some from a regional dairy called Braum's. It has no hormones or antibiotics and has had the protein "concentrated" . I use whole milk but have used as low as 1/2% milk from the grocery. I start with two quarts of milk at a time, because we use so much. You can easily cut it down. In the 2 quarts of liquid milk I stir in 1 full cup of powdered milk solids.This helps it become thicker without using gums, starches or gelatin. Stir well then scald your milk. I put mine in a glass measuring pitcher and heat about one minute per cup, so for my quantity that is nine minutes. Stir afterwards to prevent a film from forming. When your scalded milk cools to 90 degrees or so F. you are ready to put it in glass containers. Canning jars or recycled jars are perfect. This is when you add your starter. I have been using Oikos brand Greek yogurt because it has nothing in it but milk and yogurt cultures. I believe Greek Gods is another good one, as is Stonyfield. Read the labels. I use one cup of Oikos for my two quarts of milk. In clean glass containers add about a tablespoon of commercial yogurt, then pour your heated milk in. Or add the yogurt to the milk then pour it up. Put the lids on the containers. Place the jars in a warm place to incubate until the yogurt becomes firm in appearance. That would be a dehydrator on lowest setting, or in a water bath in the oven with pilot light, or in the "cooler chest" with 90 degree water to about the middle of the jar. The time varies, but it takes several hours for the cultures to grow. When thickened you will refrigerate, in jars with lids. Lots of variables in this, but it comes out good for me. I use wide mouth quart mason jars filled about half full. then I can put my fruit, etc. in and use an immersion blender to blend into a smoothie . So for those who want to know, that is how I do it. I have not tried to culture from my own yogurt. I know it gets weaker each time. I just read recently that if you purchase heirloom cultures to start with you can make about sixty batches before it is too weak. I have not tried it. This costs about three to four dollars for my 9 cup batch. That is a little cheaper than commercial kind, plus it has nothing added. I have control. Costs also depend on what is on sale.