Making your own yoghurt is easy – and much cheaper than buying ready-made

As long as your yoghurt has live active cultures, the end of your yoghurt tub can be scraped out to use as culture for your own homemade yoghurt. It’s so easy to make and is much cheaper than buying ready-made.

Cook 15 mins
Set time 4-6 hours
Makes 250ml

1 litre whole milk
2 tbsp yoghurt scrapings (the last in the tub)

Pour the milk into a casserole dish or heavy-based saucepan with a lid. Heat over medium heat, stirring gently, to bring the milk almost up to boiling point (around 94C). Remove from the heat and leave the milk to cool until itʾs just warm to touch. Stir the milk occasionally as itʾs cooling to prevent a skin from forming.

Place the yoghurt scrapings in a small bowl and add about 120ml of the warm milk. Whisk together so that the yoghurt thins and warms to the temperature of the milk.

Add the thinned yoghurt into the rest of the warm milk and gently whisk. Cover the pan and transfer it to a warm place.

I slightly heat the oven and then turn it off once I start to heat the milk; it will stay warm this way.

Leave your yoghurt to set in the oven for 4-6 hours. The longer you leave it, the thicker it will become. Remove the pan from the oven, whisk any whey that has separated on top of the yoghurt back through and store in tubs in the fridge.

You can continue to use this yoghurt to make fresh batches as you need it. After a few batches, if the culture is not setting as quickly as before, it may be time to use a shop-bought pot to re-boost your homemade version.

Tip: You can strain the yoghurt through a muslin cloth for a further 4-6 hours if you prefer a Greek-style yoghurt.

This is an edited extract from No Waste Kitchen: Hachette Healthy Living ($19.99, Hachette Australia) by Amelia Wasiliev. Next week, beef scrap jerky

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