Evilsciencechick’s

And no, I don’t mean THAT kind of fun.

So I have been very much enjoying the new yogurt product known as Activia. But hooo boy, is it a little on a pricey side. Also, have you seen the sugar content? Something like 17g per cup. Yeouch.

Something must be done!

I know you can make yogurt at home. I saw it on the teeeveeee once. So, if you can make REGULAR yogurt at home, can you make this new fangled fancy yogurt with the Bifidus regularis in it? How hard can it be, really?

I’ve never made yogurt before in my life. Obviously, it was time to try something totally untested. For SCIENCE!!!

I’ve heard of several different ways of making yogurt - some say you just mix the milk and yogurt starter and plop in the fridge for a day. Some say leave out overnight. But since I am a scientist (ok, a grad student) AND a food geek, I decided to go with the strategy proposed by everyone’s favorite mad scientist foodie, Alton Brown. His recipe can be found here.
I assembled the players. Milk, powdered milk, honey, volunteer yogurt culture, very clean hardware.

I made sure EVERYTHING was very clean - pot, spoon, plastic container, and probe thermometer. And…there’s where things broke down.

My thermometer was reading 123F…130F..134F…141F…what the hell? I hadn’t even gotten the stove turned on yet? OK…I was going to have to wing it. AB’s recipe stated that I needed to bring the temperature to 120F. Since I already scanned other recipes, I knew that the milk had to be “scalded,” but not boiling. (this is why it helps to read several recipes before you try something new). So I heated the milk until steaming, with tiny foam bubbles formed on the sides, but NOT to boiling.

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STIR OFTEN! Even with much stirring, I still got some spooge on the bottom of my pan. Make sure you soak that shit, or you’ll NEVER get it off.

Here’s the “voluteer” culture. There is no “plain” flavor, so I used vanilla.

Then into the container, and ready to go! after lidding, of course.

OK, I’ll cop here. AB’s recipe calls for a tall cylindrical container. I do have something similar to what he used. It’s a bagle keeper. Right now, it’s Sadie’s travel food storage. I don’t think I’d ever be able to get the smell of dog food out of there. So I nixed that idea and went with this container. The recipe also said to wrap the container with a heating blanket set to medium and placed in a wine cooler. Who has a wine cooler? NOT ME! I do have a big plastic storage bin, though.

I covered with a folded up tablecloth and left it for the night. About 9 hours incubation. This morning, I had this:

Some solidification, you can see where the whey has separated out. But still pretty liquidy. Hmmm…into the fridge for the day!

A little more firm. But still pretty runny. Damn. Maybe I didn’t add enough milk powder? Or maybe I need to start with more culture. Or maybe my improvisations with the temperature and the container were more critical than I though. Humph.

But the TRUE test…does it taste OK? And…more importantly, will it kills us?

As usual in these kinds of test, the scientist NEVER uses herself as a guinea pig. I have a perfectly good victim…er…volunteer nearby!

Weeellllllll????

He likes it!

It’s actually good! Runny, and tangy. And it might need a little more sweetening. Maybe I’ll add some splenda. And it would probably be better with some fruit mixed in.

Next time I hit target, I’ll get a new thermometer. And I might try to up the powdered milk a bit (according to the recipe, the powdered milk adds more protein and makes the yogurt more solid).

All in all, a rousing success. And I have a whole quart’s worth of homemade activia for less that it costs to buy a 4-pack. Hooray!