Where/how do you incubate your yogurt?

[ChickenPotPie]

I've read recipes online but they are vague about where and how to leave your yogurt for the 6 - 12 hours it needs to develop. My digital gas oven won't let me set it for lower than 175 degrees F - way too high for yogurt.

Any ideas or tips? Where and how are you incubating your yogurt?

 

[Mackay]

I would put my yogurt in a double boiler like set up. see this page.
http://www.makeyourownyogurt.com/make-yogurt/what-you-need
Then I would put it all in a cooler cause it keeps the water warmer longer.

under notes click on "smaller pot needs to fit into larger one"
My girl friend use to put an electric heating pad in a cooler.

 

[keljonma]

I heat my quart canning jars and some kitchen towels in a warm oven while I'm heating the milk.

Then after filling the jars with the yogurt starter/milk mixture, I wrap them with the warm towels and put them into one of those hot/cold bags that you can get at your grocer's. (The kind that says it keeps food hot/cold for up to 3 hours.) I put one warm towel on the bottom of the bag, one around each quart jar, and one on top of the jars before I seal up the bag. ETA: The hot/cold bag will hold 4 quart jars.

Then I leave it on my kitchen counter for about 6 hours. Sometimes, I leave it over night. Most recipes will tell you not to let it sit that long, because the yogurt can become too tart. Since the majority of our homemade yogurt gets fed to the chickens, I'm not worried about how tart it gets.

 

[jambunny]

I heat it on the stove, put hot water in a cooler, put the yogurt in glass jars and put the jars in the water. Then about 12 or 13 hours later I have yogurt. My friend uses a thermos. Its a pain to clean.

 

[miss_thenorth]

I use a yogurt maker, but some ppl put their canning jars filled with yogurt in a cooler with warm water.

 

[freemotion]

I do the cooler method, canning jars for the yogurt and fill the space around them with 120 degree water (my tap water is exactly 120 in the kitchen.) I preheat the cooler with tap water, which I then dump and refill with fresh warm water. Then I put the cooler in a big cardboard box and surround it with all the blankets and pillows from the couch. In the winter, our house is quite cold at night. I won't bother with all the insulation around the cooler in the warmer weather.

Do a search on byc and you will find lots of info by Miss Prissy. Also, www.fiascofarm.com has some great instructions with several methods detailed.

 

[big brown horse]

The thought of using all of the couch pillows etc made me giggle!!

We are a crazy bunch aren't we!!

 

[VT-Chicklit]

I use a cooler method. I warm a small hard sided cooler with hot water, then empty it. I then place the warm yogurt into a quart canning jar and wrap it in a kitchen towel. I place the wrapped yogurt in the cooler. I fill another quart canning jar with hot water and wrap it in a kitchen towel and place it in the cooler also. I put the cover on the cooler and place it in an out of the way corner in my kitchen for 12 hours (over night). Voila! Yogurt.

 

[freemotion]

The thought of using all of the couch pillows etc made me giggle!!

We are a crazy bunch aren't we!!

The yogurt is the only thing that is warm in this house in January! DH seems comfortable, but I end up with both cats and the dog on me until spring! I now understand the expression, "three dog night!"

 

[ChickenPotPie]

Ah, a cooler! Thanks. I'll try it.