Get yourself a yogurt therm, cultures at www.cheesemaking.com and discover just how simple and cost efficient it is to make your own yogurt. The yogurt therm and yogurt culture you purchase will give specific instructions but in my size therm and the type of yogurt culture I chose it's as simple as heating 4 cups milk on the stove to 185f (I like adding 1/4 cup organic powdered milk but you don't have to) let it cool to 112F then place in the yogurt therm (which I plugged in before I got started) then add the culture, let sit a few minutes and gently stir in and let it sit for 6-12 hours depending on how strong a tasting yogurt you like, then place in frig. If you don't want to purchase the cultures you can add a 1/2 cup plain yogurt since the cultures are still active. Save a 1/2 cup of your homemade yogurt to make the next batch. As long as you keep it plain you can reuse the yogurt about 10 times before providing new culture. If you already used yogurt for the culture reuse it about 5 times. The trick is to make sure it doesn't go bad before you make some more but the perk to homemade yogurt is that I've found that it lasts about a month or more depending on how cold your frig is and how you store it. If you wish to add favors to it set aside your half cup for reuse and then gently fold some blended fruit into it.
Yogurt Therms are about $25-$40 at any kitchen appliance store. The cultures are only a few dollars. Enjoy!
