InstantPot - making yoghurt

[toffeebutterpopcorn]

So I have my mini pot and fancy trying yoghurt but... I make a lot of curries and so the inner pot does retain a bit of a spicy smell when cooking.

I don’t fancy curry flavoured yoghurt and to buy a spare inner pot is £££££.

Will slow cooker liners work?

It's probably not the pot that is retaining the odour, but the plastic seal. It can be removed and swapped out for a new one. I keep 2 and use them interchangeably, one for savoury foods, one for "sweet".

Also give your inner pot a good clean with Barkeeper's Friend, and then run a steam cycle with water and lemon juice. That helps freshen up!

Good call, Batman!

@toffeebutterpopcorn

Good call, Batman!

Heh heh heh... now just getting the toty wee 3l rings is another matter...

@toffeebutterpopcorn

Heh heh heh... now just getting the toty wee 3l rings is another matter...

In the meantime, if you have a dishwasher, try putting the seal in it on the top shelf and see if that helps too 👍

You definitely need more sealing rings. I have three - one for spicy stuff, one for sweet, and one for general cooking.

The dishwasher has never fully got the smell out of the spicy one.

Yep, ring issue.

I take mine out for yoghurt.

Excellent! Thanks all.

So ..... what recipes work best ?

I've used this one the most:

thisoldgal.com/instant-pot-greek-yogurt/

But also this

amindfullmom.com/instant-pot-yogurt/

Mmmmm looks good.

Excellent tip here ‘steralize the Instant Pot. This helps to remove any odors from prior Instant Pot meals. You don’t want your yogurt tasting like my Competition Chili con Carne recipe, would you?’

I make loads of yogurt in mine.

First, I get raw milk and put it on slow cooker function over the day

When it is a deep golden yellow, I cool it down to 45 c and mix some yogurt really well. and then put it back for the yogurt function without a boil. Perfect thick, creamy yogurt with natural sweetness from the thickened milk

I use UHT milk so don't need to sterilise it, just mix in a spoonful of yogurt and start. No seal needed and you can do it in a bowl/jars inside the pot.

I’m trying to get some nice low fat, tart, thick yoghurt. I don’t like the super thick (like the new Yeo Valley stuff). I’ve only ever managed to make quite runny stuff (in my old electric yoghurt maker).

Ricotta cheese is good to make too, while we're on the dairy theme!

recipes.instantpot.com/recipe/homemade-ricotta/

Got my rings, got my cleaner, got my live yoghurt and milk... ready to go!

You don't need the seal on for yoghurt
I rinse the lid in very hot water. I make my yoghurt in the pot it will live in. I know some people strain it to get a thicker yoghurt but mine ends up thick. It's much improved with just being left
I have a glass bowl with plastic lid. I put 1 litre of full far uht in the bowl, some left over yoghurt from the batch before ( I only do this 2 times them I use half a small pot of yeo valley so I don't grow something I don't want in it) 2 dessert spoons of dried milk powder. Quick hand whisk then on yoghurt setting usually overnight so it ends up longer
Lift bowl out to cool then into the fridge. I scoop out what I want and the runny bit stays at the bottom so I get think yoghurt without straining. I used to stir and decant but it went runny

The bowl lid isn't on in the instant pot, just when its in the fridge

Everything barring the base can go in the dishwasher. I have lots of the inner rings spare so if something is quite strong and possibly taint the next dish I just swap the ring out and soak the other

I’ve had a problem with rubber rings getting really smelly from the dishwasher.

Ok so - got up early and after ten hours on ‘yoghurt’ it’s done! So easy - 1l of skimmed long life milk and t tbsp of live (goat) yoghurt and it is beautiful! It smells lovely and tart and is quite firm (cooling away nicely in the fridge now).

What shall I put it it???

And it doesn’t smell of curry! Yippee!

@toffeebutterpopcorn we just tend to put granola and fruit on top of it but as and when needed.

I have done the whole sterilise hot yoghurt where you need to cool it but after a while I just switched to using UHT milk, always in the cupboard and ready to go. I use a recipe pretty much the same as @WhoNeedsaManOfTheWorld. I do a 3 litre batch but basically 1 ltr UHT milk, 2 tbsp milk powder, 2 tbsp Yeo Valley natural yoghurt in the green carton.

I mix the Yeo yoghurt and milk powder into about 500ml of the milk and whisk it before adding it into the Instant Pot where the other 2.5 ltr milk is. We put this on at night so it processes overnight for 10 hours and I then strain it using 2 large Ikea sieves lined with kitchen roll. Dh likes it super thick, as in you could plaster a wall with the stuff.

I take off at least 1ltr of whey and it then fits into a 1.8ltr glass storage jar from Ikea.

Isn’t UHT milk harder to digest? Something about how the protein changes with high heat, not sure though.

Raw milk (well, thermalised milk) yogurt is more runny and not to everyone’s taste (DH doesn’t quite like it). But it is really light and so easy to digest

I don't really know how any yogurt could be hard to digest to be honest.

I suppose any milk can be hard to digest if you have that problem. The IHT worked out nicely - thick enough and tangy.

So can I use some of this as the culture in the next batch?