Mass Murder to Mass Production

In the end I just had to surrender to the normative force of the factual. The basic means I had available to prepare my own yoghurt were just too basic to produce reliable results. I tried to imitate an incubator for my yoghurt bacteria with the means of

• an electric oven with a mechanical timer (restricted to a maximum run time of 60 mins) and an analogue heat selector (which expectedly was extremely inaccurate)
• digital clinical thermometer
• repeatedly checking temperature of the electric oven using the clinical thermometer which I positioned inside the oven (open the oven, turn on the thermometer, close the oven, wait for the result of your measurement, open the oven, turn off the thermometer, close the oven... and of course, every time you open the door the temperature inside the oven changes...)

The production was extremely time-consuming. I had to constantly control the temperature (which was near impossible to be kept at the same level for more than 30 seconds) plus I had to reset the timer every 60 minutes (the oven only heats up while the timer is running). So for 10 hours I was constantly involved in breeding bacteria for them to produce my yoghurt. The whole venture was ridiculously unsuccessful.

Enter YOGURTEO.

Moulinex yogurteo (I thought Moulinex were bankrupt)

At some point in time mis casi suegros had pity with me and send out a new yogurtera as a gift for el chico alemán/el gringo to feel at home in Argentina. Defeat! But since then I went straight from mass murder to mass production. I re-established my old habits to eat at least 300 grams of yoghurt every night. Dairy Heaven!

Yoghurt Mass Production

I experimented with different recipes, i.e. particularly trying out different starter cultures and different times for the breeding process. The best results you get from

• La Serenisima Activia Natural Yogurt (1 x 190 grams)
• Sancor Leche entera extra calcio (1 litre)
• Nestle Milk Powder (3 tablespoons)

What do you do with these things?

1. cook the milk
2. let it cool down (this is a very important step, if you want to prevent mass murder...)
3. put the starter cultures (i.e. the yoghurt you bought) in a bowl and stir until smooth using a fork
4. filter milk to remove skin
5. put three tablespoons of milk powder into the milk (this is necessary to provide the known texture to the yoghurt, because the milk you are buying at the supermarket has been processed so much, that yoghurt you make from it just does not develop the same texture and taste as raw milk does... plus the milk I buy here has specifically been hyper processed in terms of additions of vitamins and calcium)
6. put the prepared milk into the smooth yogurt; continuous stirring
7. prefill the incubator glasses with the mixture of milk and bacteria
8. set the incubator to 8hrs
9. after 8hrs put the yogurt into the fridge for at least 6hrs

Always keep one glass of yogurt as a starter culture for the next turn.

Fun fact: there are two brands of natural, non-flavored yoghurt you can buy in Argentina, Sancor Yogs and the aforementioned La Serenisima Activia. Yogs is what I would consider kinda natural yoghurt: no preservatives, additional artificial or natural flavors, sweeteners, cereals, fruit stuff; plain yoghurt with some milk powder and gelatine (as a stabilizer... doh!). The Activia (which actually is a Danone product sold in Argentina under the name of La Serenisima, who in turn are the biggest dairy producer in Argentina and, with a 1.5 billion USD yearly revenue, apparently are an internationally renowned dairy brand [that's what wikipedia says]) packaging says it is natural yoghurt, but as a matter of fact there is lots of additional stuff in there, particularly sugar. But in terms of the used bacteria it produces the best results. So I kinda have to accept the sugar. And after the first turn of yoghurt production the additions to the original plain yoghurt are fairly irrelevant, because the initial yoghurt has been so diluted and the only thing that continues to grow inside the yoghurt are the actual bacteria I need as a starter culture.

As I was in an experimenting mood, I even tried to prepare myself some frozen yoghurt. Frozen yoghurt is fairly hip in Europe. I thought: easy! You just put the yoghurt in the freezer and you get... frozen yoghurt. Let me tell you the truth, that was one more failure in my dairy ventures. The freezing process turns the yoghurt (smooth and creamy texture) into a mess of once again liquid whey with little coagulated protein flakes swimming in there. Not very nice to look at. Doesn't change the taste though... :)

So no, frozen yoghurt is not just... freezing your yoghurt. It is processed ice cream just as well. If you want your frozen yoghurt to be really yummy, you put lots of cream. Which in turn means, yes, frozen yoghurt contains yoghurt, but that doesn't really make the stuff healthier. Put some toppings and it is even worse than your average regular ice cream...

Anyway, I am decided: I'm gonna quit my job and establish my own dairy company... :)