(Not So) Simple Food- Eastern Yogurt

                 Vietnamese Yogurt
                                           another recipe from my mom

I'm going to step away from my normal simple eating posts to bring you a recipe that not many people over in the western world know about. This is a recipe that is common in Vietnam(where my mother was a missionary), China and other countries that don't have the access to fresh milk like we do. In those countries its common to see canned milk used in recipes and soy milk to be drunk regularly(and apparently is tastes delish! Fran and I will find out soon when we take our trip to China!!!). Coffee is flavored with canned sweetened milk and is adored. So to keep with this tradition, we are going to use canned sweetened milk and a small amount of yogurt and water.....and get a large amount of yogurt that you will LOVE. I promise.

In Vietnam and China yogurt is served by street vendors....and you are given a straw. This yogurt can be made thicker with more time and patience but, unlike a lot of my recipes, I am not going to tweak this one because....why mess with perfection????

This recipe can be difficult in the way that sour dough can be difficult, or even yeast breads. You have to baby-handle the ingredients. Your temperature has to be right and the amount of everything that you put into the recipe has to be right.

Normally I would switch from canned milk to fresh. I have a recipe of sweetened condensed milk that I use for my coffee creamer, cakes, and other things. But since this recipe is from another culture that I respect and love I will not be changing it. If you would like to try, I do understand and go for it!!! Let me know how it goes!!!

And the best part: you get to use jars.....I will always be excited about it. Sorry.

IMPORTANT: Read everything before you start.

                                              Ingredients

                                            1 can sweetened condensed milk
                                            1 8 oz yogurt, plain or vanilla. I have tried greek, I dont
                                                   like the flavor, but go for it!!! It will be thicker.
                                            2 milk cans boiling water
                                            1 milk cans cold water

Note: These are the brands I use, you do not have to use whole milk. I would definitely try to use organic everything when making a starter of any kind. I am unable to find organic sweetened condensed milk. If you can definitely use that.

                                                                                                                 Directions

Get your jars cleaned and ready.
Get a large cake pan or something as deep. This is for the water bath.
Get a large bowl. Boil water in a kettle. Open a can of sweetened condensed milk, empty it into the bowl. Whisk in 2 cans of hot water and 1 can of cold water. Whisk very well, make sure there are no clumps.

IMPORTANT: wait until the mixture has cooled to room temperature.
Add your yogurt, mix well, getting rid of all lumps.

Put that YUMMY mixture into your jars, leaving about 1/2 inch from the top. Lick the bowl clean or feed spoonfulls to the waiting open mouths standing behind you.

Turn your stove onto the lowest temperature, mine is 170 degrees. Place your jars of yogurt into your cake pan/pans. They should have space in between them. Place the pans with the yogurt jars in them into the oven(do not fill them with water until you put them on the rack in the oven).

Take your tea kettle and fill the cake pans about an inch full of boiling water. This way you won't burn yourself trying to lift a heavy glass cake pan full of boiling water and glass jars. See what I did there? Guess how I learned? By burning myself trying to lift a heavy glass cake pan full of boiling water and glass jars.

Let's move on.

Close oven and wait.

And wait.

Aaaaaand wait.

You can let your yogurt sit in a hot oven for 2 hours. Then turn off the oven and let them sit for another 3-4 hours. Your yogurt will get more sour and thicker the longer it sits in the heated and then warm oven. I prefer to eat thinner and less sour yogurt, thick yogurt makes me gag, sorry. I usually let my yogurt sit for 2 hours in the oven and then, once it reaches the thickness of a very thick milkshake, I take it out. This is usually about an additional hour, so 3 hours total.

IMPORTANT: Be careful removing your yogurt from the oven. The spilled water will get on your mitt and shoot through to your hand FAST(guess how I learned?). I usually use a turkey baster(....now) and empty most of the water before I remove it from the oven. If it has been sitting there for 3 hours after you turn off the oven you may be ok. But please dont burn yourself.

Once they have cooled off to room temperature place the lids on the jars and put them in the fridge.

ENJOY!!!!

If you enjoyed this post wait a couple weeks and I will be putting up my Flan recipe!!!! This recipes awesome but it is nothing compared to that one :-).

Note: Technically you have created a starter. So technically you should never have to buy yogurt again. I have not tried this but I would love to hear if it worked for you!!!!