easiyo yogurt maker any good? or make your own? (merged)

DenBo_4

I have an easiyo yogurt maker (given to me) and I have made a couple of easiyo yogurts and a couple of homemade ones, and the homemade yogs are so much nicer than easiyo, and miles cheaper! If you use uht milk dont even bother to heat it, it is sterilised, just add a couple of spoons dried milk to starter, mix, add cold uht skimmed milk, stir, put in easiyo yogurt maker and hey presto, homemade yog for about 40p max a litre. :beer:

If you want to save money easiyo is easy but not as economical as homemade, and doesnt taste as good either!:T

But thats my opinion.......................................

Frugal_Fox

Oh no - I got the satchets just to convince DH how easy and nice HM yog was. Once he got over the making of own yog we switched to our own - some from the Easiyo which I used as a starter and then laterly from some live yog and UHT milk. I love the taste of HM so it isn't a taste issue - mine is a thickness issue! The children love yog but find my thin one too thin. Ends up on jumpers, shorts, cardigans etc when they eat it at school! Does anyone have any assistance for making my HM thicker? Thanks

nodwah

Desperate_Housewife wrote: »

Thanks Thriftlady, I have been buying semiskimmed due to OH cholesterol levels but use whole milk for yog.

I have been making yogurt for about a month now and keeping the 'chain' going with the original starter (Longley Farm live yogurt) I noticed that it was starting to get a bit 'yeasty' smelling so I used a new starter from some I had frozen. The thing is it seems very fizzy somehow and still smells yeasty, it is also curdled. I gave the pot a thorough clean too. Has my luck run out? Should I buy a completley new pot of starter? Does freezing it alter its action? Any ideas welcome!

If it's smelling yeasty or cheesy i'd say the culture has been overgrown with , eh, yeast! That would account for the fizziness if it's fermenting.

THe original culture you had would be several different bacteria and it's always going to happen that one species will outgrow the others, changing the nature of a culture.
Commercial makers will have laboratory supplied cultures and be taking quality control samples all the time to make sure the cultures are stable and that they are actually growing what's meant to be there.
We can't do this in the kitchen and it's all too easy to get contamination with yeast and other fungi. So to get to the point it's prob best to start again with new starter and a total clean of everything. I'm not sure about freezing but other people do it but again it's likely that some bacteria will survive better than others.

A point from the other week - I've been straining my yog thru muslin as per your suggestion and it's great!

sarah_2-2

Frugal_Fox wrote: »

Oh no - I got the satchets just to convince DH how easy and nice HM yog was. Once he got over the making of own yog we switched to our own - some from the Easiyo which I used as a starter and then laterly from some live yog and UHT milk. I love the taste of HM so it isn't a taste issue - mine is a thickness issue! The children love yog but find my thin one too thin. Ends up on jumpers, shorts, cardigans etc when they eat it at school! Does anyone have any assistance for making my HM thicker? Thanks

Frugal- I've just started to make my own yoghurt using a flask and UHT milk and regular starter- the first time I did it it was just slightly thick milk really, so I adapted it the second time. I'm not sure whether it was just one of the things I did, or a combination, but I made sure the milk stayed warm for as long as possible, I put about 1 dessert spoon of starter in instead of 2, and (I think this made the difference) 2 dessert spoons of skimmed milk powder. It was then really creamy like regular yoghurts, but not as thick as the 'thick and creamy' yoghurts you can get, so I got a muslin cloth, put it in a colander (no sieve in my kitchen!) and left it over a bowl for a few hours- I ended up forgetting about it and so ending up with greek yoghurt style thickness, but I think if I didn't leave it so long I would have a happy medium- have fun with experimenting! x

Frugal_Fox

Thanks Sarah,
Will give this a try - my yog is currently being made. Thanks

SS13_2

Hi,
tried with a Lidl yog last night and failed. They had so many available there thatI was lost as to which one to use, ended up buying the plain proviact, added one tablespoon, after warming and mixing the dried and UHT milk.
Can you please list the actual brand names of the yogurt you use successfully
thanks
Steve

Redbedhead

I bought my easiyo this week. Just got the starter kit so will have a play with that at the weekend.

Queenie

Steve - I buy a small tub of Yeo Valley and use 2 tblsps

Redbedhead - :T Well done, have fun experimenting

Angelina-M

Morning all and happy new year.

I've been making yoghurt for quite a while now without much success. Ok sometimes its been fine but not thick and creamy. Other times its just been clumpy.

I didnt make any for quite a bit as i've been put off so a couple of days ago I decided to give it another go. I added my organic yoghurt (the expensive one with cultures, I forget its name) plus the dried milk and made it up with the carton of skimmed. Same result as before, yoghurt a bit blotchy and thin.

Yesterday I decided to try and get a starter going with an easiyo yoghurt kit so I bought the vanilla yoghurt mix. Added three tbsp of that plus three tbsp of dried milk and the skimmed milk. Left it six hours and its exactly the same as when it went in the easiyo. Just looks like vanilla milkshake - although not as thick!

So as this was an expensive packet, can I save it? Perhaps warm it up a little and add more of the powder and dried milk? I dont want to make the family poorly by messing about reheating it.

Thank you for any advice

SammyD_2

I make easiyo every week but I always use the packet and follow the directions, rather than using it as a starter. I don't think it is intended to be used just as a starter. If you were going to try, I wouldn't use the flavoured one, but try the plain one.