3 Carb Homade Yogurt

[Grace]

For those who can't buy Hood's yogurt I want to share my recipe for homemade. It's delicious, easy and only 3 carbs per cup. I heat a half-gallon of Hood's Carb Countdown milk to 180 degrees (to kill any bacteria). Since I like mine a bit thick I dissolve a package of Knox gelatin in a few tablespoons of cool water, microwave it till boiling and add this to the cooked milk. Then let the milk cool to 115 degrees (2-3 hours). After it has cooled add one small carton or 2-3 heaping tablespoons of plain yogurt that has active yogurt cultures - be sure to read the carton to make sure it has active cultures! You could use powdered culture but I can't find it here. I pour this into quart mason jars but any containers would work as long as they are very clean. Put them down into an ice-chest and fill it to the neck of the bottles with the hottest tap water available - not boiling. Let these sit 6-12 hours. The longer it sits the more tart it will be. I usually remove half to 3/4 of the water after 4-5 hours and replace with hot tap water again. You'll know when it's yogurt because you'll see a solid core kinda' pull away from the sides of the jar when you tilt it. After refrigerating it I add a package of Clight (Mexican form of Crystal Light) because it comes in such great flavors like Mango, Pina Colada and Peach with Jasmin. I suppose a tub of Crystal Light would work the same but I'm not very familiar with that. Davinci syrups would work as would any liquid flavorings plus sweetner. I also use unsweetened strawberry Kool-Aid and add sweetner and some crushed frozen strawberries. I have strained it through cheesecloth and it came out very thick like a gorgeous Greek yogurt. I make granola for it with several kinds of nuts, a little bit of bran bud cereal and some textured vegetable protein which I have mixed with melted butter, Davinci French Vanilla syrup, cinnamon and Splenda and toasted in the oven. Makes such a great breakfast right now when it's sooooooo hot!

[Laura in Arizona]

Thanks for the "how to" Grace. I used to make yogurt a long time ago but it has been years. I was thinking about starting again but did not want to go buy a bunch of stuff. I like your idea of using mason jars and an ice chest. I will give it a try this weekend!

Exactly how do you strain yours to make thicker? You mention cheesecloth - how many layers, do you use a strainer as well? Thanks for the help!

[Grace]

Laura, I used 2 layers of cheesecloth inside a colander. I really loved the thick velvety texture but I didn't enjoy "squeezing" it out of the cheesecloth. From the full quart jar I ended up with only about a half quart of thick yogurt so I haven't done it again since we're perfectly happy with the thinner texture. I hope you enjoy making it this weekend!

[MarblesLongGone]

Thanks for the recipe! Saved, and may try soon!

[Grace]

I just tried something and wanted to pass it along. Before refrigerating this batch I unscrewed the two piece top, covered the top of the jar with a paper coffee filter and screwed the ring part of the lid back on. Then I could turn the jar upside down and shake it a little to drain some of the water off - probably a couple of tablespoons. If you try this be careful not to shake too vigorously or leave it upside down more than a minute or so or the paper will break and all your hard work will go down the drain! But I really liked doing this a whole lot better than the cheesecloth. It won't be nearly as thick but it'll be a little thicker than normal.

[MarblesLongGone]

Originally Posted by Grace

I just tried something and wanted to pass it along. Before refrigerating this batch I unscrewed the two piece top, covered the top of the jar with a paper coffee filter and screwed the ring part of the lid back on. Then I could turn the jar upside down and shake it a little to drain some of the water off - probably a couple of tablespoons. If you try this be careful not to shake too vigorously or leave it upside down more than a minute or so or the paper will break and all your hard work will go down the drain! But I really liked doing this a whole lot better than the cheesecloth. It won't be nearly as thick but it'll be a little thicker than normal.

That "water" is whey, the protein! Don't pitch it!

[Grace]

Thanks for the input about the whey. From an article by Dr. Miloš Kaláb "The unique microstructure of yogurt means that all the liquid (whey) is immobilized within its body. Of course, no consumer would like to buy yogurt from which whey separates easily. This would be a sign that the yogurt is susceptible to ‘syneresis’, and that there was something wrong in the yogurt manufacture. If, for example, the milk is not heated at about 90°C for a time long enough (about 15 min), larger pores may develop in the yogurt body in some areas and larger clusters of casein micelles may develop in other areas. The whey then starts showing in the containers during storage". This would mean that I'm not heating my milk hot enough or for long enough. Next time I will try heating to 194 degrees Farenheit and letting it heat for 15 minutes.

[luckiangel]

Wow this sounds so easy. I'm gonna have to try it as i love yogurt and would be MUCH better when I am wanting something like pudding. I also love the fact that you TVP for granola. I never thought about that and I can't wait to give it a try. Have any other great recipes????

[Laura in Arizona]

Originally Posted by luckiangel

Wow this sounds so easy. I'm gonna have to try it as i love yogurt and would be MUCH better when I am wanting something like pudding. I also love the fact that you TVP for granola. I never thought about that and I can't wait to give it a try. Have any other great recipes????

I tried something for dessert that was really good. It was in another thread talking about lemon extract (my favorite). She said she put some lemon extract and some sweetener in plain yogurt. I tried it and it was soooo good. I used about 1/4 tsp lemon extract and 1 splenda packet. It would be perfect for when you want something sweet. My mind immediately started going through the extracts - coconut, raspberry, orange, maple....

[luckiangel]

Thanks Laura! I will have to remember to try that!! Do you just put it in regular plain yogurt? Or is there a particular brand that is better than others??

[Laura in Arizona]

Originally Posted by luckiangel

Thanks Laura! I will have to remember to try that!! Do you just put it in regular plain yogurt? Or is there a particular brand that is better than others??

Hi Luckiangel,
Everyone here talks about Fage yogurt but I live in a smallish town and can't find it anywhere. What I found is the Brown Cow brand and yes it is plain. I can barely afford its carbs (it has 9 per 7 oz carton). I understand the Fage has less and also why I am interested in making my own low carb. The Brown Cow brand is found in healthfood stores and in grocery stores with health food sections. It is made with milk with no rBGH and the only ingredients are milk, 4 kinds of live bacteria and pectin. It is full fat and very rich tasting, it even has a layer of cream on top. I love yogurt and am willing to donate some of my carbs to it. I have eaten it plain which is Ok but when I put the extract and a splenda packet in it, it turned into a very tasty dessert. It is the kind of treat that could save me from eating something I shouldn't.

[luckiangel]

Thanks laura! I will keep my eye out for it.

[ragtopwife]

Kids and I made this recipe yesterday. I love and miss yogurt and my kids consume quite a bit every week. This was GREAT!!!! I was dubious about my ability to make yogurt in a styrofoam cooler but it is very, very good.

I used the Hood Calorie Countdown milk, held it at 195 for 15 min and then let cool to 115, added small carton of plain greek yogurt (5 active cultures), put in 4 16-oz jars and stuck in cooler 7 hours (swapped hot water twice). My family prefers a thicker yogurt so I put coffee filter in a mesh strainer and dumped the yougurt in (one jar at a time) and let drain for 2-3 hours. Then in 1/2 of it I mixed SF Vanilla Torani and a packet of stevia. 2nd half got SF rasberry Torani and packet of stevia. Every body absolutely loved it. I will never buy yogurt at the store for anything but fresh starter again!

It was just a bit grainy (which did not bother anybody) at first but after 24 hrs in fridge I noticed the texture was smoother. It lost about 1/3 volume in the draining so I figure it at 4.5 carbs per cup. Simply wonderful!

If I can make this then certainly anyone can!!!

[ragtopwife]

Originally Posted by MarblesLongGone

That "water" is whey, the protein! Don't pitch it!

I'm curious, "don't pitch it" as in mix it back into the yogurt instead of draining, or is there something I can use the drained whey for? I saved to watery liquid in case there was something I can do with it....

[Kazakiwi]

In the past when I made yoghurt I noticed that that grainy texture was typical with the first 3-5 batches only and it would get better each time. I thought maybe it had to do with slowly working past the original store bought yoghurt starter. But just a guess.

[Kazakiwi]

Someone on another thread mentioned that the best yoghurt she made was with full fat cream.

I just bought a litre to trial it out this weekend. Has anyone done this? Is there a tip for us? Do we have to bring the cream to the boil first too?

[Grace]

I do believe you would need to bring the cream to a boil also. At least when I was researching how to make my own yogurt the ones using cream brought it up to temperature. I like using the Hood's milk to save calories but I'm sure the taste will be fabulous with cream! Let us know!

[ragtopwife]

I like using the Hoods to save carbs....

[Kazakiwi]

Alright I am definately going to make this today. So looking forward to it. I will let you know the results. I will have to watch my portions though, but I suppose it will so rich that I won't need a lot to satiate.

[Kazakiwi]

Ok, full fat cream yoghurt made. I used 200ml of greek yoghurt (milk based) as a starter, and added this to 800ml of sterilized full fat cream. I left it for 15hrs, before putting it in the fridge. It is VERY thick, no separated whey at all.

How do I rate this? Do I just count it as cream?

[Soobee]

The cultures are supposed to eat up the lactose. Most low carbers got by The GO Diet authors. One of the doctors did a study in his lab. He said regular plain yogurt ended up at 4 carbs per cup, because the bacteria kept eating the lactose after packaging. And my Greek full fat yogurt is even less, because the whey has most of the carbs, and it has less whey. I would count your yogurt at 1/2 the cream carbs to be safe, but I'll bet it's even lower than that.

[ragtopwife]

Kids have completely scarfed every bite of yogurt so will make more tomorrow!

[Kazakiwi]

Apparently 1 cup of cream is 8g carbs, so maybe the full cream yogurt is 4g at the most and probably only 2g (considering milk yoghurt is 4g). I am going to try it desert.

Have to go - Deadliet Catch is on. I love thins show.

[Kazakiwi]

Divine!!! Why would I ever want ice-cream again when I can eat this. It was so thick that it stuck to the bottom of the bowl and didn't move when tipped upside down, yet it was creamy and soft. I only had 100g and it was plenty.

[Laura in Arizona]

Originally Posted by kiwikid

Divine!!! Why would I ever want ice-cream again when I can eat this. It was so thick that it stuck to the bottom of the bowl and didn't move when tipped upside down, yet it was creamy and soft. I only had 100g and it was plenty.

Thanks so much for reporting your experiment. I will try making some this weekend using cream. I love yogurt!

[gumdrops]

sounds great, thanks!

[ragtopwife]

Kiwikid did you add gelatin to yours? I did last week as I try to follow directions the first time at least... but I did not add gelatin today, wanted to see how it would turn out.

Also I used some yogurt set aside from last batch for active starter... I figured I would get a small Fage every 3 or 4 batches to "refresh" my cultures... It's keeping warm in the cooler now... I'm so excited!!!

[Kazakiwi]

No, no gelatin. It is so thick, and creamy. I am definately NOT having any today, as I do not want to start a habit and expectation in my mind for daily deserts. Once I move to owl, I can add it to mornings with some melon or berries, but I am a long way off from that.

I never really thought about refreshing my cultures, in the past I found using my own yoghurt as a starter sufficient and less grainy over time. Although this cream yoghurt has none of the graininess of some homemade milk yoghurts. Natural yoghurts are not available in my city, I have to order them, so i usually only get a new starter when returning from a trip overseas. I make it last.

I had one idea though. I could freeze this in popsicle holders as a frozen yoghurt - yum.

[feather319]

Can this really work? This makes me question whether HOOD milk really has 3 carbs because milk lives off of the sugar in the milk. Is there really enough sugar in HOOD to keep the bacteria alive or do you think that there are really more carbs in hood milk than it says?

[Kazakiwi]

I don't know what HOOD is?