4 pints of milk to use quickly!

[eeky]

What can I do with it apart from lots of milky coffee and hot choc? Thought about custard but not the real deal, as not many eggs at minute chickens on strike - have Bird's custard powder (love this on proper puddings!). Can you freeze mad-up Bird's? I know easy to make up but for those instant microwave moments for dd and dh could be handy.

bread and butter pud? Anything with cheese sauce. erm erm junket

yoghurt! If you have a pot of live yog in the fridge, you can make 4 pints more very easily. Ask if you'd like to know, you could have it by morning.

Freeze it ?

white sauce?

Got cornflour, sugar, cocoa powder? Make chocloate pudding. Yum!

And don't forget you can freeze milk, of course (thinking laterally).

Rice pudding? Bread and butter pudding?

Decant milk into suitable containers (500ml soup/yoghurt pots?) & freeze.

Defrost when you know you'll be making cheese sauce, custard etc - anything that will get eaten straight away.

ooh, duchesse how do you make live yogurt?

Potato bake, pasta sauce, yorkshire puds, erm, sure they are other things too.

live yoghurt is easy!

(as long as you have an airing cupboard or back of aga or similar warm place- needs to be about 38C; will still work if lower but will take longer; should be no more than 40C really)

First, choose a small pot of commercial yoghurt that you like (you can use greek if you like the taste of it). Every type of yog uses different bacterial cultures, resulting in a different taste. Just choose what you like. Even then, you may find that for reasons beyond your control it turns out different every time.

1. bring the milk to the boil. This is to kill off any bacterial growth, so that you can replace it with the one you've chosen!

2. let it cool to blood temperature ( I dip a finger in it, but it might be more sanitary to use a thermometer I suppose) It's very important that the milk not be over 38-39C at this stage

3. put a generous tablespoon of your commercial yog in a bowl, whisk a little bit of the milk into it (to get rid of the lumps and blend it well). Tip the rest of hte milk in, whisk, cover with cling film and put in your warm place overnight.

In the morning, hey presto! test it's set, and you have yoghurt, much cheaper than commercial! you can add fruit, jam, etc to flavour it. The yoghurt will be warm but that does not matter as the only bacteria in it will be the ones you introduced the previous evening. Leave to cool, put it in the fridge, Bob's yer uncle.

forgot to say a generous tablespoon of commercial yoghurt will easily do over a litre of milk, possibly even two if you have a nice warm place. If you're using an aga, put the bowl behind the simmering plate at the back of the aga, standing on a pot stand or tea towel to stop it from getting too hot. Too much heat will kill the bacteria you are trying to grow.

junket. get rennet tablets.