Homemade Vegan Yogurt

I am about to provide you with the most unrecipe-like recipe I’ve ever posted. It’s almost a non-recipe, but a non-recipe for something I make all the time and that changed my mornings for good. Homemade vegan yoghurt. When starting to eat vegan I joined the oat milk-fan club and have remained there. It works great with cereal and I don’t miss cow’s milk the least. But yoghurt, yoghurt has been something I’ve missed. I know you can buy loads of vegan yoghurts at the grocery store, but to me there are two problems with those: they are expensive and they’re usually made with emulsifiers and thickeners and who knows what. So I carried on with my yoghurtless life until one day when I realized that I could make it myself. What a revelation!

I feel like making yoghurt is always made out to be this very precise science. The right amounts, the right times and above all, the right temperature. This generally means about 37 degrees Celsius for 12 hours or more, which I couldn’t really achieve in my little New York apartment. So I figured, who cares about science, I’d just give it a try anyway. Yoghurt is made using bacteria. Bacteria grow if the environment is suitable, otherwise they don’t. But they also do their best to survive, so I put my trust in my yoghurt bacteria. And they delivered!

Making your own yoghurt is simpler than you probably think. You need four basic components: vegan milk, sugar, yoghurt culture and a thickener. Once you’ve made your first batch of yogurt you can just keep feeding it, using the last deciliter or two as the culture for the next batch.

The milk

I use homemade oat milk but you could use any kind, homemade or store-bought. Try different kinds, have fun with it!

The sugar

The sugar is only to kick start the bacteria a bit, and you don’t need much more than a teaspoon. Any kind will do, and you can probably omit it too.

The yoghurt culture

When it comes to the yoghurt culture, the easiest thing to do is to buy some yoghurt from the grocery store. The only thing you have to make sure of is that the package says “with culture” or something of the sorts. These are the probiotic yoghurts that are supposed to be good for you because they contain living bacteria. Check the list of ingredients and look for names of bacterial cultures. If you can’t find a vegan one with living cultures and aren’t too stringent, you can start with some dairy yoghurt too. You can also by pure cultures made for vegan yoghurt making, but these tend to be unnecessarily expensive.

The thickener

To thicken your yoghurt there are several different things you can use. I’ve made it with chia seeds, oatmeal and the leftover “pulp” from making oat milk. You could also try tapioca or ground flax or chia seeds. How much you add depends on how thick you want your yoghurt to be. If it turns out too loose, you can always add more chia seeds!

The non-recipe

All the amounts in this recipe are approximate and the instructions are guidelines. You will have to experiment until you find your favorite way of making it. It all depends on which ingredients you choose and the environment in which you culture your yoghurt.

For 1 liter of yoghurt

8 dl vegan milk

2 dl yoghurt with living culture

3 tbsp chia seeds or 4-5 tbsp oatmeal or 4 tbsp “oat pulp”

2 tsp sugar

Bring the milk, sugar and thickener to a boil in a saucepan. Cook for a minute of two until the mixture starts to thicken. Let cool until it’s lukewarm, about 37 degrees Celsius. Now add the culture and mix until homogenous. The mixture will thicken more as it cools.

Now it is time to culture your yoghurt. Pour it into an airtight container, preferably a glass jar. Try to find a nice and warm spot in your home. It might be on top of the fridge, by a radiator or in my case by one of the scalding pipes that run through our apartment. Make sure that it’s a place where the yoghurt won’t get too hot though as this will kill the bacteria. You want it slightly above room temperature. If you can’t find a spot to match these criteria, put the jar anywhere where it at least won’t be cold and drafty.

As this is a non-recipe I can’t give you an exact time for the culturing. It’s taken me anything from 18 to 48 hours, mostly depending on the temperature. The warmer it is, the faster it goes. The only way to figure out when it’s done is to open the jar and smell and taste it. When your yoghurt is sour enough for your taste, it’s done. Simple as that.

Store your yoghurt in the fridge and remember to leave the last deciliter for making more yoghurt. For every time you make it you’ll learn something more about how to make that yoghurt perfect. It’ll probably be a bit different each time you make it, but that’s the fun of it!