Making Homemade Yogurt



Yogurt is extremely easy to make, once you figure out a good place to make it.  If you have an oven that can maintain a yeast proofing temperature, you are in good shape.  I have a small oven with an analog dial (versus my large oven that has a digital controller with the lowest temperature setting of 170 °F, which is too hot).  I make my yogurt in my small oven, which can hold 16 jars at a time - thus I make 16 pints of plain yogurt per batch about every 2 to 3 weeks.

 

My method of making yogurt is unconventional.  Most people (particularly businesses) heat up the milk to at least 180 °F, thus pasteurizing it, prior to adding their yogurt culture.  This allows for a very consistent product in terms of flavor and texture, which customers in today's society expect. 

I do not heat my milk first because I want raw milk yogurt; I do not want to harm any of the beneficial aspects of the raw milk in making my yogurt.  Of course, each batch turns out a bit differently, typically the texture, but it is always delicious unless I get it too hot and kill the bacteria.  Very mild and smooth, thus I usually eat my yogurt topped with just fresh/frozen fruit, though adding raw unfiltered honey is fine too.

Ingredients:

1 - 2 gallons raw milk

1 quart good quality plain whole milk yogurt*

 

A must for making yogurt (unlike kefir), is being able to maintain a constant temperature of 95 °F to 100 °F.  Start to finish it takes about 6 to 12 hours (it takes awhile for the cold refrigerator temperature milk and yogurt to get to incubation temperature so it is not at the incubation temperature that whole time).

 

 

First sterilize 12 to 16 pint size glass jars.  I run my dishwasher on a sanitize cycle with heated dry.  Once the jars are ready, line them up on your counter and place 1 - 2 Tbls of plain yogurt into each jar.  I don't measure this, I just drop a blob off the spoon into each jar.  Since I do not heat my milk first, I always start with new yogurt (versus using some of my own yogurt as my starter). 

 



Next skim the cream off your raw milk (and use the cream to make butter).  Then fill each jar with fresh raw milk.  Gently stir, lifting the yogurt into the milk.  Once stirred, loosely screw the lid onto the jar.  Place the jars in a warm location where you can maintain a temperature of 95 °F to 100 °F for several hours.  I place a electric temperature probe, with a high temperature alarm, in my oven to monitor the temperature.  If the measured temperature of my thermometer exceeds about 108 °F, the yogurt will not thicken.  Using the thermometer probe, I determined the setting (well below the lowest temperature marked on the dial) to place the dial to achieve this low temperature.  I still use the probe for each batch because I sometimes have to tweak the dial a bit depending upon the room temperature and if I am using the stove top.  I have found I cannot use my big oven when making yogurt because it transfers too much heat into the little oven.

 

Allow the temperature to slowly rise to 95 °F to 100 °F.  I usually start my yogurt late in the afternoon. Then first thing in the morning, about 12 hours later, I screw the lids on tightly and put the jars away in the refrigerator.  Use your plain yogurt to make fruited yogurt, smoothies, yogurt cream cheese, etc.

 

* I have found that most commercial yogurts found in the store do not have enough live bacteria to use as a starter.  Thus these yogurts are not a good choice, either for making yogurt or to eat for their health benefits.  For years I used Stoneyfield plain whole milk yogurt as my starter (when it was sold as plain whole milk yogurt with cream on top), but I have now switched to a local more natural yogurt as the quality of the Stoneyfield yogurt began to drop.  After Stoneyfield was bought out by Danone, who makes Dannon yogurt, they have changed the yogurt 'recipe', have added pectin, and have added Vitamin D.  Be leery and suspicious when big companies take over small natural foods companies because the quality almost always is reduced as they work to maximize their profits.

Making Butter

 

 

 

There are many ways to make butter; I will share my quick, easy method with you.  I make butter from the cream I skim off my fresh, raw milk about once a week.  The butter I make is sweet cream butter.  I make it while cleaning up the kitchen or cooking a meal.  For my method, one needs a mixer in which the beater rotates rather than the bowl (such as a Kitchen-Aid).  Of course, you can also churn butter by hand if you want to get some exercise and you have the extra time!

 

Place skimmed cream into the bowl of the mixer and wrap with plastic wrap to prevent the liquid from slopping out of the bowl.  It works best if you don't fill the bowl more than about 1/3 full. 

Turn on the mixer to a medium speed (I start at a setting of 6) and whip cream until it fluffs up and then starts to break down.  Stop the mixer and scrape the sides of the bowl. 





Continue beating on a slightly slower setting (I use a setting of 4) until you hear liquid developing.  At this stage you need to turn the mixer to the slowest speed and stay close by.  Turn off the mixer immediately when the butter forms into a ball and the liquid starts to slosh. 

 

If you forget about the butter and leave it on a high speed you will end up with liquid splattered all over the kitchen even with the plastic wrap in place.  I have done this once or twice over the past 10 plus years that I have been making butter.  What a mess!





Once the butter is formed, pour off the liquid.  I use this 'sweet buttermilk' liquid to make oatmeal or for baking. 

The take the ball of butter and rinse it under cold water while squeezing out all liquid. 

 

 

When all signs of white liquid are gone, dry the butter ball with paper towels or a cloth. 

It is important to get all of the liquid out of the butter so it does not go bad quickly.  If you look closely, there is some liquid on the front edge in the photo above.  I typically turn the pressed butter pat over to wipe up any liquid on the bottom.  I make unsalted butter and keep it stored in the refrigerator or freezer.  You can add sea salt at this point, if you wish.  I wrap the butter up in brown natural wax paper and place it in a Ziploc bag.  



If you are going to use it within a couple weeks, place in the refrigerator or you can place it in the freezer and it will last for months.

Storing and using fresh milk

 

We only drink fresh, raw milk and when it is not available we don't drink milk (*see below for more information about why we don't drink man-processed milk).  From my raw milk, I make butter, kefir and plain yogurt (which I use to make fruited yogurt and fruit smoothies and yogurt cheese).  I use the liquid left from making butter to make my oatmeal - nothing is wasted.  One day, I hope to also make my own cheese, but I think that will need to wait until I am no longer homeschooling.

 

If cared for properly, my raw milk lasts easily 2 - 3 weeks before souring.  Sometimes, I don't make my butter before the skimmed cream sours, but this 'soured' cream makes great lemon poppy seed muffins.  But careful, however, that your 'soured' cream is still usable for cooking - that is does not smell off or have any discoloration, typically reddish color on the surface.  If so, toss it out.

 

My milk comes in plastic gallon jugs. I do not have my own cow, which takes a lot of time and commitment, but I am blessed to have a close source of raw milk.  If you live in the North Texas area, Lavon Farms, in Plano, sells raw milk or there are several farms a bit outside of the area that sell raw milk at their farms. 

 

Handling raw milk properly:

 

1.  Be sure that you bring a pre-chilled cooler with you when picking up your milk.  It is very important to keep your milk cold at all times for it to last 2 - 3 weeks before going sour.

 

2.  I transfer my milk from the plastic jugs into glass jars.  The morning that I am going to get milk, I sanitize my already cleaned glass jars in my dishwasher, using the sanitize and heat dry options.  (After a milk jar is emptied, I clean it in the dishwasher and store it until ready to use again.  Be sure you store your clean jars with the lid off so they can air.)  I transfer my milk into half gallon wide-mouth glass jars when I get it home.  These large jars are available at Elliot's hardware in Plano, sometimes at other stores that carry canning jars, co-ops like Azure Standard, and on-line.  A word of caution:  you MUST let your glass jars cool to room temperature before pouring your cold milk into them or they will crack! 

 

3.  I then place my milk on the top shelf of my 'cold' refrigerator.  Find the coolest spot in your refrigerator to store your milk if you have only one refrigerator, and turn the temperature colder while still being able to store your produce in your refrigerator without damaging it.  I let the milk sit for a day in the refrigerator to settle before I start using it (unless we are completely out of milk).

 

4.  When I am ready to use a jar of milk, assuming it has had at least one day to settle, I skim the cream off the milk to make butter.  This leaves a natural milk that is comparable to about 2% milk.  I purchased a small metal soup ladle at Target that I use to skim off the cream.  As shown in the photos, you need to gently submerge the level ladle into the cream.  Watch carefully and you will see when you have all the cream skimmed.  I place the cream into a small glass container and then place it back into the refrigerator until I have enough to make butter.  Typically I like to have the cream from 1 to 2 gallons of milk for a batch of butter, which yields about 1 pound of butter and 3 to 4 cups of sweet 'butter' milk which I use to make oatmeal.  DO NOT skim the cream off your milk, until you are ready to use the milk.  If you skim several in advance, the milk will start to sour within a few days.  The cream layer keeps the milk from souring.  Once skimmed, the cream will last about a week (sometimes a little longer) before starting to sour.  We like 'sweet' cream butter, but you can make 'cultured' butter also if your cream has soured.  I prefer to make lemon poppy seed muffins with my slightly soured cream.  If I am making yogurt, which uses a gallon or two of milk, I get enough cream to immediately make butter with the cream.

 

5.  I never set a jar of milk out on the table or leave it out on the counter.  I pour what we are going to drink into glasses or measure it out for my baking and then immediately put the jar of milk back into the refrigerator.  The only time you would want to leave the milk out at room temperature (or slightly warmer) is when you are culturing it, or you want it to sour. 

 

Using these methods, my milk stays fresh for two to three weeks, minimum.  We use our milk to drink, for baking, and to make:

 

butter

yogurt (post coming soon)

fruited yogurt and fruit smoothies and mango lassis, etc.

kefir

yogurt cheese or sour cream

lemon poppy seed muffins (from old cream not used for butter)

oatmeal

 

* Why we don't drink commercial milk:

 

Milk that has been pasteurized or heated to kill off all bacteria in it, no longer contains the many beneficial aspects of raw milk.  In fact, it no longer contains any of the good bacteria that keeps it from being unsafe.  If you are interested in learning more about why the pasteurization of milk began, you should read the book, The Untold Story of Milk by Ron Schmid.  A brief summary is that it was considered too expensive to improve the conditions in which the cows were being raised and what they were fed (resulting in unhealthy raw milk) thus the solution was to pasteurize the milk.  Milk was needed in the cities and it was difficult to transport fresh milk for the large masses of people who had migrated into the cities during the Industrial Revolution.  It was decided a good compromise would be to pasteurize the poor quality milk, rather than requiring better quality.  Because people did not like this option, selling raw milk was made illegal forcing everyone to buy pasteurized milk.  However, the officials making this decision, allowed one children's hospital to continue to use raw milk from cows out on pasture because they admitted that the children in the hospital would not survive if forced to drink the unhealthy pasteurized milk.  I personally think we have now raised a generation of people who are all too unhealthy to continue drinking pasteurized, homogenized milk.

 

The second and just as unhealthy practice that was adopted was homogenization of the milk.  Homogenization changes the particle size of the milk, so then the cream does not rise to the top of the milk.  Unfortunately, this practice came about and was readily accepted as people got more and more modern conveniences in their homes.  It is definitely much easier to pour milk directly out of a jug than to first skim the cream off.  So this second practice is more associated with laziness.  But there is a price to pay for this 'convenience'.  The smaller particle size of the milk is unknown in a person's gut and causes many digestive problems because it can leak through the gut undigested. 

 

Even worse, they are now adding vitamins to milk.  These vitamins are man-made vitamins that are not absorbed by our bodies (which is why I do not recommend eating anything that is 'enriched').  Rather than buying foods that are enriched by man, one should look for the original unadulterated foods that contains the natural vitamins and minerals and co-factors and other things we don't even understand yet in just the right combination and balance. 

 

"God saw all that He had made, and it was very good." Genesis 1:31a 

Homemade Pumpkin Puree

Easy to do, inexpensive, and you can taste the difference.  Pie pumpkins grow great in Texas, but you need an area about 10' x 10' or larger to grow them.  The year before my pumpkins grew up the fencing around my compost bin.  I always keep my compost bins in my garden, and then move them from spot to spot each year to help improve the garden soil naturally. 

 

 

Instructions:

1.  Cut the pumpkin in half, and pull out seeds and most of the 'strings'.  I have found what works best for me is to pull out the pumpkin seeds with my fingers, and then scrape out the strings with a metal spoon that has a sharp edge.  This is the most difficult part of making pumpkin puree, so don't get frustrated and stop at this point!  The seeds can be saved, soaked in sea salt water, and dehydrated to make edible pumpkin seeds.



2.  Next place the pumpkin halves face down in a glass baking dish (or on a cookie sheet) and bake in preheated oven at 375 °F for about 1 1/2 hours or until very soft.



3.  Remove from oven and allow to cool so you can handle them.  Then turn over and scoop out the flesh with a fork or a spoon.  It separates nicely from the outer skin and is very easy to remove.  Place in a large glass bowl.



4.  Sometimes there is a darkened ring around the edge of the pumpkin that was touching the glass pan.  Using a knife, carefully cut off this darkened edge before scooping out pulp. (This is what the above half looked like prior to cutting off the darkened edge.)



5.  Be sure to cool the pumpkin pulp in the refrigerator for several hours before freezing, if you will be freezing it in plastic.  Remember to never place hot or even lukewarm food into a plastic dish or bag or you will leech plasticizers into your food.



 

6.  Once the pulp is chilled, I measure out 1 1/2 cup increments (you can package up any amount that works best for you), and place it on a piece of saran wrap.  I then gently fold the saran wrap around it and place the package into a Ziploc bag.  Four packages fit into a gallon size Ziploc.  Mark the Ziploc so you know what you have in your freezer (I wrote the date, pumpkin puree and 1 1/2 cups on mine), and then place Ziploc bag in the freezer.  It can be kept for 6 months to over a year, depending upon your freezer.



 

 

7.  Don't puree the pulp until you are ready to use it.  I thaw the package fully in the refrigerator (place in a dish or it will leak) and then pour off any juice before placing in my food processor.  I have found that if I puree it before freezing, it does not age as well and results in very watery stringy mush when I thaw it.



Cooking beans



Cooking your own dried beans is extremely easy, tastes so much better than canned beans, and is much less expensive.  Unfortunately, it took me many, many years to realize this and learn this skill.  Hopefully I can help you master it overnight.  It is just that simple.

THE KEY:  Don't attempt to cook beans that are over a couple months old!!!

My problem was that I would get motivated to try cooking beans, buy a variety at the store, and then wait six to nine months (or longer) before actually trying.  The beans I cooked would turn out terrible, and I would wait another several years before trying again.  This went on for close to twenty years!  The beans would turn out terrible for two reasons.  One, they were old and thus as they cooked they would get crumbly while still hard, rather than soft and delicious.  The other problem, I created bland dishes with them (I had not learned the importance of using spices).  But I have a good friend, Lorena, who would have me over for lunch and always had incredible home-cooked beans.  She was my inspiration to continue trying.

 

The perception and innocent truth the comes from the mouth of a child can open our eyes wide at times.  That is what happened to me to finally convince me just how important cooking my own beans was.  Let me tell you one last story about cooking beans that will hopefully motivate you to try and experience the difference. 

On our homeschool trips, we got into the habit of opening a can of refried beans (good quality ones), and having eating them with chips, salsa and cheese for lunch.  A quick, easy meal on the road.  During one of our breaks at home, I finally was successful cooking pinto beans and making our own refried beans.  We loved them and made them several times during the two month period at home.  We then took off on another trip, and I bought more cans of refried beans for lunches.  When I was getting our second lunch of refried beans and chips ready, Jon said to me, "Mom, it isn't fair that we can't have canned beans anymore."  I was just getting ready to open the can, so I laughed and said, "Jon, I am opening a can right now for our lunch.  I just want to cook our own beans when we are at home.  We can have canned beans on our trips."  Jon, who was about 10, looked very seriously at me and said, "But we can no longer enjoy our lunch with canned beans because they don't taste good anymore after eating homemade beans."  He was so right. 

Instructions:

1.  Buy fresh beans.  It is good to start with something easy.  I would recommend buying pinto beans to make refried beans (recipe coming soon) or garbanzo beans to make hummus (recipe coming soon).  If you have old beans, give them to me or someone else who wants to make their own soy-free chicken feed, and let them feed those old beans to their chickens.



2.  Place dry beans in a glass bowl and cover with filtered water, at least two inches over the top of the beans.  They will soak up a lot of water, so use more than you think you will need, especially when first starting.  Let sit over night or for at least 6 hours (up to 12 hours). 

3.  Drain the beans and rinse well with cold water.

4.  Place beans in a heavy pot (I like to use my glass soup pot that I make broth in) and again cover with filtered water.  They will not soak up as much water, but the water will boil off a bit during cooking so make sure it is at least an inch over the top.  I like to add a dry chili pepper when making refried beans, but this is not necessary (I often forgot to add it).





5.  Turn to medium-low and bring to a simmer (I removed the lid of the pot for the photo to show you what your simmer should look like).  Always cook beans with the lid tightly on the pot as you do for broth.  I stir the beans ever 5 minutes or so at the beginning (it takes about 20 minutes to get to a good simmer).



6.  After bringing to a "heavy" simmer, turn heat down to the point that will sustain this simmer.  Continue cooking covered (stirring every 20 - 30 minutes) until the beans are soft.  For pinto beans and garbanzo beans, this takes about 3 to 4 hours, depending upon your cooking temperature.  If you cook at too high of a temperature, you will burn the beans on the bottom of the pot. 

7.  When soft, remove from heat and remove lid.  Allow to cool, drain off some of the extra liquid, and place in a clean bowl, and store in the refrigerator if not using immediately.

It is that easy.  The reason I recommend starting with pinto or garbanzo beans to make refried beans or hummus, is because both of these dishes are so forgiving.  The first several times I cooked beans, I forgot about them, and the were falling apart by the time I realized they were done.  Since the beans are pureed for both of those dished, it doesn't matter if you overcook them. 

Soy-free Homemade Chicken Feed



My chicken feed recipe works for free-range chickens, who have access during the day to plenty of grass and bugs and other plants and roots.  The feed mixture varies slightly from year to year depending upon what is available.  There are a few essential core ingredients though, and a method of preparing the feed (sprouting the grains) that is critical.  The quantity of feed depends upon the season.  I don't like to feed them more than needed for a consistent egg production.  Chickens will not forage but will gorge on feed if it is provided to them all day long.  Though some feed is needed for chickens, I want my chickens to also forage so that they receive the most natural, optimal diet.

Core Ingredients:

2 parts hard red wheat berries (wheat with highest protein content, 15%)

1 part organic whole corn

1 part black oil sunflower seeds

1 part field peas (or other whole peas or small beans)

1 - 2 tsp kelp powder

oyster shells

I use organic wheat and organic corn.  It is sometimes hard to find organic feed ingredients.  Possible sources I have used over the years include:  Wheat Montana, Countryside Naturals, Coyote Creek, Tractor Supply or other local feed stores, and Azure Standard.  Feeds are very expensive - often the shipping cost is the biggest problem since we do not have good sources of local organic feeds here in the DFW area.  This is another reason to let the chickens supplement their diet through foraging, especially during the growing season when nature is flourishing.



Currently, I purchase my wheat berries, organic whole corn, and green peas from Azure Standard.  They also have soy-free mixed-grains scratch feed that I have been purchasing and using since last May.  I will explain below how I use this in the feed.  I purchase my black-oil sunflower seeds and oyster shells from Tractor Supply or Ag-Mart or other local feed stores.  Kelp powder lasts a long time if you buy in bulk and I get it from a variety of places - my last bag was from Frontier Wholesale.  We store our grains in plastic buckets with gamma lids (which screw on and off easily).  Storage in buckets helps eliminate the spread of bugs - larvae are always in grains so you will have bugs occasionally.  It is fine to still feed the grains to your chickens, but be careful you don't let bugs from one bag spread to all your grains.

The quantity of feed that we give to our chickens varies with the time of year.  They do not have access to the feed all day long.  Instead, we mix up a batch and toss it out to them in the morning when we let them out of the chicken coop.  It gets them out in the grass foraging.  When there is lots of green grass and plenty of bugs, we cut down on their feed.  In the dead of winter or summer, when there is little outside food for them, we increase the feed slightly.

Chickens molt in the fall and their egg production decreases as the amount of daylight decreases.  During this time period, they do not need as much feed.  This is why we only slightly increase the feed during the winter.  We never put artificial lights in our chicken coops to extend daylight hours because though this keeps up egg production, it is not healthy for the chickens.  It does not allow them a rest time during the year, and it will affect the long-term health of the chickens.

 



Also, we try to eat with the seasons, not just our produce but all our foods.  This is healthiest plan for us, it is as God intended.  Eggs are plentiful in the spring and early summer, and thus we enjoy more egg dishes during this time of year.  In the fall and winter, when egg production is down, we use our eggs in baking and have only an occasional breakfast of eggs. 

Blending your chicken feed (amount for about 20 - 25 chickens):

Soak together in water overnight:  2 - 3 cups whole wheat berries and 1 - 1 1/2 cups black oil sunflower seeds.  Fill water level a couple inches over the grains because they will absorb a lot of water and you want them to still be immersed in water in the morning.  In the morning, drain off the water and place the wet seeds back in your bowl. 



Stir or re-rinse again in the evening.  We always have two mixes going at once since they are allowed to 'sprout' for 24 hours after soaking.  At night one bowl is soaking in water, and one bowl is drained and sprouting (wet but not sitting in water).  Sprouting the grains increases their protein content and nutritional benefits.

  



In the evening (24 hours after you started your first batch of wheat/sunflower seeds) soak: 1 - 1 1/2 cups of corn and 1 - 1 1/2 cups of peas or beans.  You can soak them together. 

In the morning, drain the corn and peas and place in your feed container.  Add the wheat/sunflower mix that has been soaked and then sprouted for 24 hours.  Stir. 

Sprinkle in kelp onto the wet grains, stir again.  Sprinkle in oyster shells and other additions such as old grains and flax last.  Stir to combine. 





Each morning, drain the previous night's wheat/sunflower mix that is soaking and start soaking another batch.  If I am adding soy-free scratch mixtures (I have been purchasing these from Azure Standard since they are available and contain field peas), I stir one cup into the wet mixture with the kelp.  Since these scratches are ground pretty fine, it is important to add them to the wet mixture so they 'stick' to the larger sprouted grains and don't get lost on the ground when you toss out the chicken feed.





Optional ingredients (other things I add, if I have them) include:

old peas and beans from my kitchen

old grains or grains that have become buggy from my kitchen

flax seeds

other sprouting seeds if I find them cheap (such as radish seeds, mustard seeds, clover seeds, sesame seeds, etc)

soy-free scratch feeds (from Countryside Natural or Azure Standard)

Fertrell's in place of kelp





After mixing everything together, we let the chickens out and toss the feed to them.  We go to a different spot in the field each day, and standing in one spot, toss it out radially in a circle using a large spoon.  The chickens go to roost at night in their coop and we lock them in at dark to protect them from predators.  Thus, we let the chickens out of their coop in the morning and feed them then.



We can see and taste the difference in the quality of our eggs.  The eggs served at hotels and restaurants for breakfast are such an inferior quality, it is difficult to eat them.  Find a source of good quality eggs and encourage your supplier to eliminate soy from their feed.  Unfermented soy is a cheap source of protein that is not good for chickens (or people).  In addition, almost all soy and corn produced in the U.S.A., in genetically modified, which is not only a serious health concern but it is a serious food production concern since all seed sources are being contaminated.  The quality of the foods you eat affects your health.