update from Making Yogurt
We’ve tried making the soy yogurt. It didn’t work. It did work. Here’s our limited experience so far.
Our first batch was from homemade soy milk. It never set up. I don’t know if that was strictly from being homemade. (I’ve heard that homemade doesn’t work, but also from others that it can – I don’t remember if they said you had to add SOME store bought in too though.) The other possibility is that all of my equipment wasn’t “sterile” enough. I thought I handled everything properly, but it was very busy in the kitchen that day with many of the children involved, so who knows.
This is one VERY IMPORTANT point. You don’t want to grow any other bacteria than your yogurt (acidophilus type) in your yogurt. Wash everything that will touch your milk/yogurt in hot water and rinse well, then pour boiling water over/in them all. Don’t put your finger in your milk/yogurt to test it.
The next time I made soy yogurt I tried store bought soy milk. It worked beautifully! I had read that soy yogurt doesn’t set up as firmly, so I added a bit of agar agar (1/2 tsp. powder to one quart of soy milk**). It set up very nicely. It has great flavor. And we are enjoying it in several different ways.
We’ve eaten it plain.
We’ve made Strawberry and Strawberry/Banana yogurt – about 3-4 large fresh or frozen strawberries (thaw the frozen ones), 1/2 – 1 tsp. honey, a couple drops of real vanilla flavor, (optional about 1/3 – 1/2 banana). Blend really well in a food processor. (This isn’t a large enough amount to blend in the blender.) Stir into 1 pint plain yogurt.
We’ve used it to make Ranch Dip, and in salad dressing. (Recipes another day, or in my Good for You – Naturally! Salads recipe book.)
We’ve used it as a sour cream substitute in Stroganoff.
It’s about time to make more. I am going to try with homemade milk again next time I try soy yogurt. But I may try goat milk yogurt first.
** agar agar needs to “dissolve” – so stir it into at least part of the soy milk about 10 min. before heating, for best results.
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