Making yogurt ...or cottage cheese, and lots of questions

[cindyleigh]

Has anyone here made yogurt or cottage cheese?  I made yogurt the other night for the first time.  I used skim milk and for the starter some strained yogurt with active cultures.  The end result was tasty but not quite tart enough (need to ferment longer, I suppose) and it was a bit grainy.  It was also a bit watery - so too much whey, and what I really want to make is creamy and smooth greek-style yogurt.  Apparently greek-style yogurt is just regular yogurt with the whey strained out (who knew?!).

so now I have a million questions ...like:

(1) there are so many "how to" instructional videos and blogs on the web.  Some instruct to boil the milk, others say do NOT boil the milk.  Which and why?  I boiled the milk in the microwave.  Is this why my yogurt was grainy?

(2)  Today my fancy strainer arrived from Amazon and so I strained what little I had left.  Lo and behold ....it tasted like cottage cheese (which I abhore)!  Why?  One hypothesis is that my starter, which I though was just a regular active culture yogurt was a brand called "SKYR".  I think this is actually not a true yogurt but a "yogurt cheese", i.e. may contain rennet.  Is this how cottage cheese is made?

Anyone, Anyone?

[Run Amok]

We've actually had several threads on this. I'll see if I can dig a few up for you. I've tried it a few times over the years and I find that I just prefer the consistency of texture and taste from commercial greek yogurt. Milk here is ridiculously expensive so there is minimal cost savings to make my own yogurt than just buying it. It's simple, but a long process in terms of heating/cooling/making the yogurt/straining, etc and it's kind of messy. It's one of those YMMV (a lot) things.

[Run Amok]

Here's one from last fall: http://chrunners.net/forum/index.php?topic=73277.0;all

[Chasing Amy]

You don't need a fancy strainer.  Place a regular strainer over a bowl and line it with coffee filters. Dump your yogurt in.

For taste, the longer you let your yogurt incubate, the tarter it will taste. I usually leave mine for 8-10 hours.

[cindyleigh]

Thanks RA, that old thread gave me some new things to try ( and more questions).

Amy, but of course I do need a fancy strainer!  I never pass up on the opportunity to purchase a new piece of kitchen ware    and I really did need a chinois.

[Ice Cream]

skyr is icelandic cheese, not yogurt.

http://www.thenibble.com/reviews/main/cheese/cheese2/whey/2006-07.asp

[cindyleigh]

skyr is icelandic cheese, not yogurt.

http://www.thenibble.com/reviews/main/cheese/cheese2/whey/2006-07.asp

yep, that was I think my big error ....so since the Skyr had rennet, I actually ended up making cottage cheese. 

I thought "Icelandic yogurt" was someone's attempt to capitalize on the Greek yogurt trend - whoops!  It did taste like amazingly good greek yogurt (the actually Skyr I bought for the starter, not the grainy stuff I ended up this).

I'll try again.

[cindyleigh]

UPDATE:  the problem wasn't the yogurt, it was boiling the milk.  They key to smooth yogurt is to bring the milk just to the boiling point (about 195°F), and then hold it there a few minutes.  I had to do some test runs in my microwave but now I have the system down to a science. 

The last batch I made (attempt #3) was absolutely fabulous!  Tonight I made it the same way, doubling the recipe.  I'm hooked!