Homemade Greek Yogurt Recipe

I admit it, I have jumped on the Greek yogurt bandwagon. It is low in carbs, delicious, full of good for you cultures....and expensive. I found myself going through a $5.00 container every 2-3 days and had to finally admit that I had a problem.

Only I didn't want to give up my daily fix! So, I decided to try and make my own.

I am quite happy to report that the results were quite delicious :).


 Ingredients/Supplies:

• 1/2 gallon of 1% or higher milk
• 2-3 Tbsp of yogurt with active live cultures
• kitchen thermometer
• blanket/large towel
• oven with a light/thermos
• heavy bottomed pan or double boiler
• mixing spoon
• glass or ceramic bowl
• coffee filters/cheesecloth
• 2 Tbsp heavy whipping cream of buttermilk

Pour entire 1/2 gallon of milk into heavy saucepan or double boiler with the heat turned to medium. Stir occasionally until the thermometer reads 180 degrees, then remove immediately from heat.Transfer your heated milk to a glass or ceramic bowl and set out on a counter until it reaches 105-110 degrees. Make sure to leave this uncovered so as to not inhibit the healthy bacteria.

When the milk has cooled, turn on your oven light to warm the oven. Mix together the 2-3 Tbsp of yogurt with the heavy cream/buttermilk until smooth. 

Add the yogurt mix to the milk and stir well to combine. 

Wrap the bowl in a blanket or towel and place inside the over for 7-8 hours. Make sure that no part of the cloth touches the light bulb. 

Take off the cloth and voila, you have yogurt! You can stop here if you wish, but in order to make Greek yogurt follow these additional steps: 

Remove the yogurt mix and place a strainer on top of a bowl. Line the strainer with coffee filters or cheesecloth.

Pour yogurt mix into strainer and place in the refrigerator for a hour. Drain whey from bottom of bowl. Return to refrigerator for another hour and again pour out the whey.

If done properly, it should come off in a sheet from the strainer.

Put in a container with a tight fitting in your refrigerator and enjoy for up to six days...although mine does not last more than three :).

Green Eggs and No Ham

            
              
                    Our weekend was so busy! There was pink eye (don't ask), the flu, sports practices, a baseball game, yard work, a TON of spray painting (pics tomorrow....promise!!!), and grilling. The sun was out and we were outside almost all weekend. With the weather being gloomy and rainy the past, oh, million years, the sun's rays were like prozac for all of out moods. I wanted to share with you all a cute cookie project I did for my son's class last week. They were talking about influential  authors for children in their literature class, and I wanted to bake a treat for them. I love baking so this was as selfish as it was kind, rest assured! My son and I brainstormed over what we wanted our baked good to represent, and we decided that some sort of tribute to Dr. Suess was in order. We are huge Dr, Suess fans in this house, and I must say that his are one of the few books I did not mind reading repeatedly when they were smaller.

                  The angle we took was green eggs. These were very simple to make, and take no more time than a batch of chocolate chip cookies to prepare. I got quite a few calls/emails from moms in Joseph's class thanking me for the cookies, and letting me know how cute and yummy there were. So it is not only me stating that these are a hit :).

Materials needed:
* fun-fetti cake mix
* 2 eggs
* 1/3 cup vegetable oil
* Green food coloring
* Cooking spray
* Aluminum foil

                   First, preheat your oven to 350.  Mix your cake mix, eggs, and oil in a large mixing bowl until combined.

                      Next, you will want to set aside about 1/3 cup of mixed dough and place in medium sized mixing bowl. Add green food coloring a small squirt at a time until the desired color is achieved. Your green egg centers should now look something like this:

                      Now, the fun begins. At this point is where I called in Mason, Claire, and Joseph, and we all set about making these tasty treats. I tried a biscuit cutter, muffin tins, and other methods in order to get the most realistic egg shape, but in the end free-forming them turned out to be the method that gave me a look that I liked. They turned out looking like a fired egg, and also the most realist of the methods we tried.

                   I took a little over a tablespoon of dough for each cookie and placed it on a cooking sheet covered in aluminum foil and sprayed with Pam (did I mention I have no dishwasher and hate dishes?).
Press down with your fingers until you get a shape you like. Remember, if you don't like the end result, you can always roll it into a ball and start again. Also, remember that there is no perfect fried egg shape. The more imperfect the better in this case. Hence the use of children brings the best results here :).

                         While the kids are working on these I got the teaspoon out and made as many small round green balls as there were cookies. After the cookies were formed, I let each kids press them in different spots in the cookies. It was neat to see some in the middle, some at the edge, and all different sizes. While these eggs were obviously  not real, it added a certain air of egg authenticity.

 After all the eggs have the yolks placed you are ready to bake Pop them in for 8-10 minutes, or until very slight golden brown edges begin to appear.

                         Allow to cool for a few minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack before either scarfing them all down or packing them away.