Yogurt and Crunchy "Granola"

So this weekend I made yogurt and granola. Aaron didn't get any pictures of the granola (it was much less exciting than pound cake), but it needed some improvement anyway, it came out more like toasty oat pieces with no clustery bits… hence the quotes.

So let's start with the yogurt.

We actually got a yogurt maker as a wedding gift. You can make yogurt without one, but it definitely helps since you have to keep your milk-yogurt culture mixture at around 100 degrees for at least 5-6 hours before you have yogurt. Otherwise you just have stinky milk.

I started with a quart of whole milk and heated it slowly until the sides bubbled and it started to steam.

Then you take it off the burner and use the thermometer to get to the right temperature for your cultures.

It does take it a surprisingly long time to cool down and you have to watch for just the right window. I found that putting the pot on a cooling rack definitely helps.

Once you have the milk temperature right you pour a little milk in with the cultures. By the way, you can buy the yogurt cultures at a health food store or you can just use other yogurt (store bought or homemade) and mix the milk in with that.

Then you mix the milk/culture thing back into the rest of the milk.

Then you mix it all up and pour it into the magical yogurt maker (or, if my cook book is true, you could put it into a heated thermos).

(You don’t need to make the intense face.)

I left my yogurt in for 10 hours so it would be nice and thick. And it actually came out really well. It’s much less sweet and more sour/flavorful than store bought yogurt. I bet it would be even better with real milk from the dairy (I’m looking at you, Leah and Brian). You can flavor it with tons of great things like honey, vanilla, jam, and my favorite granola.

To make the granola you just mix 3 cups of rolled oats, 1 cup coconut, 1 cut mixed nuts, 1 cup honey, and 1 tsp. cinnamon. Then put it in a sheet pan with sides and cook for about 30 minutes. The recommended temp was 350, but that made mine too toasty, so next time I might just toast the large nuts first, then cook the oatmeal at a lower temp. Hopefully that will make it real granola with clusters. I’ll let you know.