Crockpot Greek Yogurt

On our journey to saving money, I made crockpot greek yogurt over the weekend. It's not the first time I've done it so I'll share some tweaks I've made to the original tutorial I found at One Good Thing by Jillee. Most of the tweaks have to do with 1)My inability to get things done in a timely manner, 2)Chronic laziness (it's a disorder, I swear).
Here we go!

You'll need
1/2 gallon pastuerized milk (not ultra-pastuerized)- I used 2% because that's what we had
1/2 cup plain yogurt (I have homemade yogurt already, so I used mine)
Crockpot
Cheesecloth/teacloth/unbleached coffee filters
Strainer

1. Pour the 8 cups of milk into your crockpot& turn it on for 2.5 hours. Cover.

2. After the 2.5 hours, take the yogurt out of your crockpot and let it sit for about an hour or so. You're waiting for it to cool down a little, I test it with my finger to make sure it's touchable (but barely), if so, you're good.

3. Scoop about a cup of the yogurt out of the crockpot and mix it with the 1/2 cup premade yogurt. Stir them together and then put the mixture into the crockpot with the rest of the yogurt and mix it together. This is for the live and active cultures.

4. Put the top back on your crock pot, wrap the pot in a towel and put it in the oven. Now time for bed! The yogurt needs to sit for about 8 hours. I left it for about 10.

5. In the morning, check to see if it's 'yogurt'. Smell yogurty?

6. Line a large strainer with cheesecloth/teacloth/unbleached coffee filters (whatever you have that's lint& scent free). I used 4 layers of cheesecloth.

7. Put the strainer over a bowl, and pour the yogurt into your lined strainer.

8. Watch the whey drip out into the bowl! I leave it in the fridge for about 6 hours or until I notice there is no more whey dripping out of the strainer. This step is what makes it "greek".



no whey



yes whey!







9. Now, my yogurt always looks a little "clumpy" for lack of better words. I take about half the mixture, give it a few pulses in the food processor and then mix it with the remaining yogurt. I like that smoother texture. It makes about 3 cups of yogurt.

chunky



smooth



I used to buy a quart (4 cups) of plain greek yogurt for approx $4.59-$4.99.

I pay $2.49 for a gallon of milk at Wegman's, 1/2 is used to make the yogurt = $1.25 for about 3 cups of yogurt.

Only about $0.40 per cup as opposed to about $1.25 per cup! That's about $0.85 savings per cup!