Is growing your own probiotic yoghurt possible?

[RustyJ]

Good work Anne. I have a frozen starter which I will use in a couple of days time. I am not sure you have to steralize that well. In fact if the starter is good maybe it would overpower any stray baddies. Dr Myahill said she just left a bit of the last batch in and filled the container up again with her medium. The container must get pretty yucky.

I also bought some longlife milk which is supposed to negate any need for boiling. I will give that a go.

 

[anniekim]

Hi Kat, I have intolerance to yeast so have avoided it.

Hi, sorry for my ignorance, but has kefir got yeast it in then? Just bought some, but have yeast intolerance so don't know whether to eat now...

Many thanks in advance

 

[RustyJ]

Hi annie. I am not 100% on that. Have a google.

 

[anne_likes_red]

I'm making 500 mls yogurt from the frozen mutaflor capsule today, alongside 500 mls from one one that was refridgerated. I'll report back on that tomorrow

Well.....it Totally Worked!!!

The capsule was frozen 72 hours. It performed exactly the same as the refridgerted capsule. I checked the culture at 6 hours - no action, by 12 hours the milk was firming up... and at 24 hours the curds and whey are separated and the milk is (to the best of my knowledge) fully cultured with e coli nissle....from the freezer no less!

Next I'm going to freeze a portion of the yogurt for a week and see if I can get a good culture from that.

 

[RustyJ]

Ha. Good to hear Anne. I will use my frozen starter from yoghurt tomorrow, will let you know. This certainly opens up more possibilities for extending the life of each generation.

 

[cigana]

Just to add I am culturing Progurt. You don't need to boil the milk if you use UHT milk, but I've found some brands of UHT milk don't culture well.

Also a thought about airborn bacteria - surely we could test if they are really culturing by just attempting to culture the milk without putting any probiotic in to start with and seeing what happens?

Anyone tried culturing Yakult?

Cheers,

Mark

 

[carolwxyz99]

Just found this thread and it is fascinating. I have never made yoghurt and am dairy intolerant so am looking to try and make yoghurt from other sources. I am thinking of trying to make yoghurt from almond, quinoa or rice milk and using probiotics. Has anyone had much success with making yoghurt from non dairy milks?

I have found a yoghurt maker with glass jars which I am thinking of getting. http://www.wholisticresearch.com/shop/home/m/Shop/id/807/page/1/

 

[anne_likes_red]

Hi Carol,
I'm dairy and soy intolerant but if soy milk is fermented 24 hours it doesn't seem to affect me. I don't like to use too much soy though, so I've been using hemp milk (which I think has a similar protein structure to soy milk) and that seems to work well. It's not like dairy yogurt but I think it tastes good.
I haven't tried rice or almond milks. Maybe someone else has.

Anne.

 

[anne_likes_red]

Just to add I am culturing Progurt. You don't need to boil the milk if you use UHT milk, but I've found some brands of UHT milk don't culture well.

Also a thought about airborn bacteria - surely we could test if they are really culturing by just attempting to culture the milk without putting any probiotic in to start with and seeing what happens?

Anyone tried culturing Yakult?

Cheers,

Mark

Mark,

Yes, I was wondering about this so I just did a "control" jar of soymilk with no probiotic added, along with my jars of mutaflor. As far as I could tell nothing changed in the control soymilk - 24 hours @ 100F, whereas the others cultured perfectly.

I haven't tried Yakult but apparently it works well. Casei shirota is the sole strain in Yakult, so it should be easy know what you're growing, with simple precautions. The shirota strain is supposed to be good for anxiety in CFS - whether that's through cytokine moderation or not I don't know

Interesting about the different brands of UHT milk behaving differently!

Anne.

 

[RustyJ]

Hi Carol, the yoghurt maker looks good. Although in the spirit of this thread I would prefer not to buy another machine (trying to save money ). I REALLY did like Anne's method of using heat from her boiler (I think it was). However I use the hot water around the flask method which seems to work okay, and is a lot less effort though yoghurt mostly comes out a bit thinner than suitable for eating.

I am looking to go to glass. Particularly little jars for the freezer, which would need to be freezer proof. I am not sure what to do about this.

Anne, the frozen starter (bit from previous batch (frozen for 7 days) worked well, came up even thicker than fridge stored starter. I did take it out of the freezer the day before.

Next question is how much starter should it take? Obviously if freezing four or five starters (I am drinking almost a litre of yoghurt a day) don't want to use too much. I would think just two dessertspoons would be enough - off to try it.

 

[anne_likes_red]

Rusty - good news about your frozen starter!
I froze my portions in 1 Tbsp lots - can't wait to see how they go.

Jars: You can buy little Pyrex (or Pyrorey, or "Libbey") containers that hold about 180mls. They're sometimes called custard cups. They're tempered glass and they are freezer, oven etc proof. They come with a snap-on plastic lid. Anchor Hocking makes a similar product. I've had mine for years. If you can't get the ones with lids then cling film and an elastic band works fine. The ones I've been able to buy here (for between $3 and $5 each) the glass is made in the USA, or France and the lids are made in China. The glass outlasts the lids.
HTH
Anne.

 

[RustyJ]

Rusty - good news about your frozen starter!
I froze my portions in 1 Tbsp lots - can't wait to see how they go.

I guess there would be more alive bugs in the Tbsp of starter than the aging store-bought capsules.

Jars: You can buy little Pyrex (or Pyrorey, or "Libbey") containers that hold about 180mls. They're sometimes called custard cups. They're tempered glass and they are freezer, oven etc proof. They come with a snap-on plastic lid. Anchor Hocking makes a similar product. I've had mine for years. If you can't get the ones with lids then cling film and an elastic band works fine. The ones I've been able to buy here (for between $3 and $5 each) the glass is made in the USA, or France and the lids are made in China. The glass outlasts the lids.
HTH
Anne.

Thanks. I'm off to buy them.

 

[maryb]

You can't culture from Rice Milk, not sure about quinoa or almond but definitely not that one.
Difficult when you have a lot of intolerances, mine is casein, I'm just using an organic soya milk at present and culturing Culturelle probiotic very successfully. Make sure folks you are scrupulously clean with your stuff.

 

[aquariusgirl]

ok, if someone is starting out with this culturing stuff, where wld i go to read up on it?
culturing probiotics for dummies..so to speak.

 

[cigana]

Just to report I tried culturing Yakult yesterday and it has worked. One bottle of Yakult Light in about 750ml of whole UHT milk - took around 22 hours. Decent yogurt at the end.

Would love to know how many bacteria that makes!

 

[maryb]

Now then just to confuse the issue - If I am intolerant to casein, how much do you reckon would be left in if I tried to culture a Yakult in 750ml of soya milk? BTW my last attempt at culturing Culturelle didnt work for some reason, separated very quickly and smelt bad weather has turned really cold so room temperature has gone down. Think it may have to be a yogurt maker after all, dont fancy that 3am call annie!!

 

[cigana]

I'm afraid I've got no idea, but use Yakult Light, as it's contains less milk and therefore less casein than standard Yakult.

 

[RustyJ]

ok, if someone is starting out with this culturing stuff, where wld i go to read up on it?
culturing probiotics for dummies..so to speak.

Hi AG. I think you just need to do a bit of googling. If there were such a place, we probably wouldn't have started this thread. There should be enough tips in this thread to get you going. Cheers.

 

[Adster]

There is a guide to making yoghurt here, if that helps anyone http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle.info/beginners_guide/yoghurt/yoghurt.htm

 

[anne_likes_red]

I haven't reported in here for a while.

I've made yogurt successfully from first and second generation starters that have been frozen up to 2 weeks and I've made cowsmilk yogurt from a soy starter with no problem so it seems as if some strains are very forgiving. A single mutaflor capsule has lasted me 3 weeks. Amazing.

I've been doing the l casei shirota thing too

I still haven't grown and bifidus strains but I'm intrigued by studies that show the best way to increase the bifidobacteria in the gut is by using certain prebiotics or bifidusfactors. Anyway...I'm waiting on some prebiotics and I thought I'd give them a trial.


Anne.