Organic "Raw" Yogurt

I made the most wonderful discovery at Whole Foods last week. Milk. Yes, I've seen milk at the grocery before, but not raw, unpasteurized milk. It's sooooo good. I just had to see how it translated into yogurt. Wow! It rocks.

There's a school of thought that heat denatures the quality of food such that it loses vital nutrients so some prefer to eat only "raw" foods. That makes sense. Heat certainly affects the flavors of food, sometimes for the good and sometimes for the worse.

Making yogurt is a balancing act very dependent upon temperatures. Too cold and the yogurt cultures go into hibernation, too hot and they die. Different bacteria thrive a different temperatures. If you don't cultivate it long enough, the yogurt is thin and runny, if you let it cultivate too long it is many more beneficial bacteria, but it can get quite bitter. Definitely a balancing act.

So, for my newly found raw milk, I chose the "raw" method of making yogurt which involves close attention to temperature, but never goes over 110 degrees F (not even before the cultures/starter is added). The results were nothing short of fantastic.

Raw Yogurt Recipe
1 quart raw, organic whole milk, (I used half whole milk and half skim milk in mine and it turned out lovely)
1 - 8 ounce container best quality organic plain yogurt or 1/4 cup homemade yogurt reserved from the previous batch (as a starter).

Take the yogurt starter out of the refrigerator for 1 -2 hours, to bring to room temperature.

Warm a 1 qt glass jar by rinsing with hot water.

Gently heat the milk in a pan to 110°F, then remove from heat immediately.

Gently whisk in the starter culture.

Pour the mixture into the warm glass jar and place the lid. Make sure to leave a bit of space at the top of the jar so the culture has some space to grow (less than an inch is fine). Wrap the jar snugly in a blanket or kitchen towels and store in a warm place overnight. The oven with just the pilot light on works well. Or, to more closely regulate the temperature, use a yogurt maker. I put mine in a yogurt maker for about 5 hours and just as Goldie Locks found Baby's Bear's bed, it was ... just right.

In the morning, put the yogurt in the fridge. (It will continue to thicken a bit as it chills.) And, viola, rich, creamy, decadent "raw" yogurt!

If you're interested in reading more about making yogurt, here's a nice explanation of the yogurt fermentation process that was prepared by Nam Sun Wang of the Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Maryland.