Today’s sustainability tip: make your yogurt at home!

Sure, it only saves one plastic container here and there, but I guess even that makes me feel better. And bonus: homemade yogurt tastes loads better than store bought. In fact, my homemade yogurt has none of that tangy bitterness that store-bought has, so I generally eat it plain with no sweetener or flavor. Although I always include walnuts because I’m a walnut addict. Maple syrup is nice too.

I haven’t done this yet, but per google you can make almond- or coconut-based yogurt just as you would dairy milk-based yogurt. I’m going to try it next week.

All you need is

• some tablespoons plain yogurt (dairy/almond/coconut)
• milk (dairy/almond/coconut)
• an instant pot

You can find many recipes out there that are more precise, but I put the milk (1/2-ish gallon) in my instant pot and set it on the “yogurt –> boil” setting. After it reaches the correct temperature, the instant pot beeps. I cool the milk down to somewhere in the range 100-115, and then whisk in 3-4 tablespoons of plain yogurt from my last batch. Cooling the milk by just setting it on the counter takes awhile, so I put the instant pot inner pot into a bigger bowl of ice water. (save the water for your house plants!)

After the milk has cooled, pop the instant pot pot back in the instant pot and set the yogurt setting to 8 hours.

Bingo. Fresh yogurt.