Saving money for us means opportunities in other places! One way we pinch our pennies (and treat ourselves) is by making homemade yogurt! Not only is it cheaper, but our family finds that it tastes better! Let’s dive into why we find it better.
What is yogurt?
What is yogurt and what is the difference between Regular and Greek yogurt?
Yogurt itself is a food produced by the bacterial fermentation of milk. Sounds strange wanting to eat a food that has bacteria fermented, but it’s good bacteria! Yogurt is a great source of probiotics which are the “good” live bacteria and yeasts. Having a proper balance of bacteria in your gut improves digestion, blocks dangerous organisms that can cause infections, and boosts your immune system. Both regular and Greek yogurt have these benefits. There are a few differences between the two that stand out the most. The first is texture. Regular yogurt is thinner and can be a little runny. Greek yogurt is thicker and has more of a creamy texture. The second difference is cost. When buying yogurt in the store, Greek yogurt is more expensive. I think this is because the ratio of the starting product to the finished product is smaller. When making yogurt, you strain off the whey. The more whey is strained off, the more it becomes a Greek yogurt. The third difference is taste. Regular yogurt has a sweeter taste. Greek yogurt has a tangier taste. This is due to how long the yogurt ferments. The longer the ferment, the tangier it tastes. Now that we have the basics down, let’s look at the difference between store-bought yogurt and homemade.
Ingredients
Store-bought yogurt can vary with what ingredients come in it. Some yogurts have simple ingredients with only “Cultured Pasteurized Grade A Milk.” If you want flavored yogurt ( I will tell you how we flavor ours) ingredients start becoming more diverse. Tapioca starch, malic acid, sucralose, potassium sorbate, just to name a few! When I read ingredients on a food label, I like to know exactly what those things are. If I read an ingredient and I can’t reproduce it myself, I start to get concerned. Homemade yogurt has one simple ingredient – Milk. The way we flavor our homemade yogurt is with jam, which is purely fruit, sugar, and lemon juice. At the most our homemade yogurt has milk, fruit, sugar, and lemon juice. All basic ingredients that can be grown or bought without extra chemicals.
Equipment
You don’t need any specialty equipment to make yogurt. There are many different ways. You can make it in a crockpot, Instapot, on the stove, or in a yogurt maker. The way I am going to explain it is by using an Instapot. I am all for having one kitchen tool that does many different things. We were gifted our Instapot about four years ago. I was so intimidated by it for the first 3 years. I had tried making some different dinners. I hadn’t gotten the hang of it and pushed it to the back of the cupboard. Well, this year, it has been awarded its very own spot on the counter. Not only am I using it weekly for yogurt, but I am using it for dinners and other items. I digress. My Instapot and a cheesecloth are the two tools I would not assume someone has in their home. If you want to purchase either of these, here are some links to take you right there!
https://amzn.to/4cwUVIY – Instapot Duo
https://amzn.to/3TSmEMW – Cheesecloth
Price Break Down
But is all of this really worth it? Can you really save money? You bet you can! We eat Greek yogurt so let’s look at that. A 32 oz. container of whole milk Greek yogurt at Walmart is currently $3.54. That makes it $0.11 an ounce. Not bad huh? Let’s see how much it costs homemade. A gallon of whole milk at Walmart is $2.66. Out of a gallon of milk, we average about 75 oz. of Greek yogurt. That makes it $0.04 an ounce. We go through all 75 oz of yogurt a week. (We use it to eat, cook with, and make salad dressings with!). If we bought 75 oz of yogurt through Walmart, it would cost us $8.25 weekly. Making it homemade, it only costs $3.00 weekly. We also get the byproduct of whey and can use it in other recipes. That’s a whole different discussion. Over a year, we are saving about $273.00! It may not seem like much, but it requires little effort on our end to save $5.00 a week.
If you like regular yogurt it still is a cost savings! 32 oz. of regular yogurt at Walmart costs $2.36. That makes it $0.07 an ounce. When making regular yogurt, you don’t strain out the whey. This means that one gallon of whole milk, which is 128 oz., produces one gallon of yogurt! Using our price of $2.66 for a gallon of milk, it makes regular yogurt $0.02. If you were to go through a gallon of yogurt a week, that would be a savings of $6.30 weekly or $327.60 yearly.
The Process
After all of that, we are finally to the recipe. Here we go!
Tips and Tricks
- Always make sure you have more yogurt starter than not enough. Putting more in doesn’t hurt it. Not putting enough in will cause it to not set up.
- Flavoring your yogurt to vanilla can be as easy as mixing honey and a little bit of vanilla extract
- Flavoring your yogurt with jam (my favorite) isn’t hard either! Using homemade jam or store-bought, put it in a saucepan and warm it up. Thin it down with some water until it reaches the thickness of a syrup. Store in the fridge and mix in your yogurt when you are ready to eat.
- If your yogurt will be done in the middle of the night (I’ve done this too many times.) no need to fret! When you wake up in the morning, pick up where you left off and move it to the fridge. It does not hurt it to sit the extra hours overnight! I have let my yogurt sit for 16 hours and it gave it such a rich tangy flavor! Absolutely delicious!
- Use this yogurt to make homemade frozen yogurt as a great substitute for ice cream!
- Use this yogurt as a base for salad dressing! We mix ranch powder in and use it for a great salad dressing substitution.