Homemade Soy Yogurt

I've been making homemade soymilk with my Soyabella for a couple of years now. I love it -- it is very simple, provided you plan ahead enough to soak the soybeans. You place the soaked soybeans in the grinder attachment, fill the machine up with water, and press the "Milk" button. Fifteen minutes later, voila! Fresh soymilk. I love that you can control what goes in the soymilk -- I only add a small spoonful of agave nectar and a dash of salt.

Fresh soymilk makes the best tofu. The taste is subtle but unlike anything I've tried in from the grocery store.

And this weekend, my soy-products-making skills expanded, thanks to my new yogurt maker that was gifted to me for the holidays (thanks, Mom!). Introducing the newest appliance that must squeeze into my tiny New York-sized kitchen: the Salton yogurt maker.


See? Look how nicely it stacks on the toaster.

After making a fresh batch of soymilk, I pretty much followed Susan's directions with a few modifications. I know you can make yogurt without a yogurt machine, but my apartment is incredibly drafty and the heat fluctates widely, depending on when the boiler in my brownstone turns on (which we have no control over, *sigh*). Yogurt cultures are picky and will thrive in only a set temperature range. Above 130 degrees, the nice yogurt bacteria will die.

I left the yogurt to ferment for about 12 hours, and it was the perfectly tart and yummy. It was a little runny until I refrigerated it, after which it gelled up nicely. The agar is used as a gelling agent and may be omitted, but without experimenting, I'm not sure how thick the yogurt will be.

Ingredients
4 cups of soymilk
1.5 tablespoons agar flakes
1/2 cup soy yogurt with active cultures

Directions
1. Make your soymilk, adding a little spoonful of sugar (or follow Susan's directions for store-bought soymilk) & remove the soy yogurt that you will use as the starter from the fridge. I used plain Whole Soy yogurt. Any soy yogurt with active live cultures should work - check the ingredient listing. Next time I make soy yogurt I'll reuse 1/2 cup of the previous batch as the starter.

2. Scald all of the materials that will contact the yogurt with boiling water to sterilize.

3. Put approximately 1.5 tablespoons of agar flakes (agar powder is supposed to work better than flakes, but I had none) into 4 cups of soymilk and dissolve. The agar flakes would not dissolve until I heated up the soymilk in the microwave for a couple of minutes, stirring every so often to check whether they had dissolved.

4. Place an instant read thermometer in the soymilk and when it cools down to approximately 115 degrees F, whisk in 1/2 cup of soy yogurt.


5. Transfer yogurt to yogurt maker and let brew for 6-12 hours. The longer it ferments, the more tart it will taste. I left mine for 12 hours and it had the perfect tartness for my taste.

6. Place your freshly-made yogurt in the fridge. After letting the yogurt chill in the fridge overnight, I used a handheld blender to make it extra creamy and smooth. Enjoy!