How To Make Yogurt From Raw Milk (Using A Starter) Recipe + Video

If you’re looking to learn how to make yogurt from raw milk, you will very much enjoy the final results of this raw milk yogurt recipe. We use a store bought organic plain yogurt as a starter (3 tbsp). But we do not use a yogurt maker or crock pot. Just a pot, stove and fridge.

This is our first method of how to make yogurt from raw milk. We’ve stuck to this recipe since we love it. Future variations to try, include adding gelatin, fresh fruits, whisk blending vs spoon mixing and fermenting without a yogurt-starter. Many people use yogurt makers now. This could be another good way, I’ve yet to take a look at these makers because we try to have as little as possible as far as appliances and products, especially if made in China.

We heat the raw milk on this recipe at a much lower temperature than you get with store-bought yogurts made from pasteurized milk. There are different standard pasteurization times around the world, but on average it seems to be around 63°C (150°F) for at least 30 minutes or a shorter duration of times at a higher temperatures. We give an easy way to know when the heated milk is ready and include a video clip of the part at that step.

Making Yogurt From Raw Milk For The First Time

Our raw yogurt recipe video shares one of our first times making this gut health boosting food. Although a slight cottage cheesy texture forms on the top, it’s smooth within and all of it is amazingly fresh and tasty. It’s real yogurt. Its consistency and texture is in actuality smooth and creamy.

Unless you’re going for Greek, this plain yogurt recipe is better than any plain yogurt you’ve ever bought at any grocery store. It can be made thicker depending on preference, but this is not Greek yogurt.

Plain Yet Delicious!

You know those plain yogurts that taste extremely funky? Many plain yogurts have a distinct, unpleasing taste attached to them. Like they’ve gone bad even though they’re supposed to be fresh.

I’m not able to express this bad taste these plain yogurts have into words, nor pin point the reason. Could it come from preservatives? Or maybe from commercially farmed cows milk which is likely loaded with fortifications and whatever is injected into these heavily medicated cows.

Some plain yogurts are perfect. You don’t want anything added and enjoy them fully just as they are. Luckily, out of all the “approved” plain yogurts we buy at our local grocery store, Ling’s homemade yogurt from raw milk is better than them ALL.

This recipe here is now the exclusive yogurt we try to always keep stocked in our fridge at home. And it has absolutely no trace whatsoever of that distinct, bad taste that many plain-yogurts have.

Making Yogurt From Raw Milk – Step By Step Recipe Directions with Images

Here are the recipe step by step directions written with additional explanations at points deleted from the recipe card just for brevity’s sake at the time. You don’t need this additional version to learn how to make yogurt from raw milk, but the images of each step can be easier to follow than a video and for an easy recipe like this, might be all you need.

Recipe Ingredients

The ingredients:

1. Raw Milk (~32 fl oz)
2. Organic Yogurt (only need 3 or 4 tablespoons)

Step 1. Heat The Raw Milk

Heat the milk on low in a steel pot. The milk will burn quickly at medium or high heat, so keep it low and stirring. After a minute, start looking for the bubbles on the side.

Warning: If you do not stir the milk, the bottom will burn, and it will overflow as well. This would alter the taste most likely negatively. So we recommend using low heat and slow, constant stirring.

Step 2. Milk Is Ready After It Does This

You’ll start to have bubbles on the side of the pot.

Keep a close eye on the milk and keep looking at these bubbles…

They’ll it’ll start to foam and then it’ll all move in the pot like a living blob:

When you see the simmer bubble up and start coming out of the pot, that means it’s ready to let cool down.

Hopefully you don’t let it overflow! (Like how we did on the Roselle Juice Recipe)

Step 3. Let Milk Cool Down

Let the milk cool down.

Once it’s at around 40 degrees Celsius, wait another 10 minutes then pour 95% of the milk into the glass jar.

Leave a little bit of milk in the pot to use for the yogurt starter.

Step 4. Pour Warm Milk With Fat Into Glass Jar

As the milk sits in the pot cooling down, it should form a layer of fat across the entire top.

Once you can put your finger inside, and it feels warm enough to drink, this is when to pour the milk into your jar or container that you will let your yogurt set.

Step 5. Mix Yogurt Starter

Spoon in 3 to 4 tablespoons of organic yogurt into a small bowl.

Pour the little bit of raw milk you left in the pot on top.

Mix these together with a spoon.

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Step 6. Put It All Together

And after that I will put all them in the jar.

And after that I will wait for. Cool down. So this recipe is good. I didn’t put anything, but some people they put like sugar or honey or salt.

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Optional Step

If you’re doing flavor, this is the time to do it. We always do plain, and this recipe shares for plain yogurt making, but future ones we’ll play around with healthy flavorings that hopefully will be without sugar and see how it differs.

Step 7. Leave Undisturbed At Room Temperature 12 Hours

Before refrigeration, leave the glass jar covered out in room temperature for around 12 hours.

This is me jiggling the milk/yogurt starter mix after sitting on the counter for 12 hours.

You can see the consistency from just the counter top setting (though it’s probably best not to jiggle and disturb it!).

Step 8. Refrigerate 12 Hours

After its set from sitting on the counter top, place it to be undisturbed within a refrigerator for another 12 hours.

Once 12 hours is up, remove it from the fridge and it should be nice and solid now. It’s ready to enjoy.

Raw Milk Yogurt Recipe Complete. Enjoy!

And that’s all it takes to learn how to make yogurt from raw milk.

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Take the glass jar out of the fridge and enjoy the uplifting, amazingly fresh taste.

It is as cool as it is nutritious.

And more fresh than any store-bought yogurt you’ve ever bought.

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We hope you get to try this easy one and let us know how it went!

Thank you again for coming by our blog.

Recent Raw Milk Recipe Experiments

One of our neighbors has a farm with some cows. She provides grass-fed raw and pasteurized milk to many families in our local area. It’s a great quality raw milk and the one we use for making fresh, plain yogurt at home. Ever since we found this raw milk source, Ling has been making this raw milk yogurt and trying out other recipes, like fresh cheese.

Mozzarella Cheese

We’ve got mozzarella down. It actually tastes like mozzarella, but it’s so good that the first time I tried it I ate a softball sized ball of it. It was the best mozzarella I’d ever had. Due to the freshness and lack of any additives, you can taste how clean it is. It makes gorging on it more enjoyable. However, we’re working on improving the texture. It keeps coming out too creamy after sitting in the fridge a couple of days. This one’s a work in progress.

Raw Milk Chocolate Pudding

Chocolate pudding with raw milk wasn’t good. It gave a goat milk after-taste. I like goat milk, but don’t want to taste this in chocolate pudding, and from cow milk. Normally, the raw cow milk tastes great. So the chocolate pudding is a work in progress.

From all the experiments, this homemade yogurt recipe and learning how to make yogurt from raw milk has been the best and most useful for us thus far.

Yogurt is best made from raw milk. The same recipe with pasteurized milk comes out gooey. On the other hand, chocolate pudding only tastes right when you boil the raw milk first. So, we give it a light pasteurization treatment ourselves before making chocolate pudding.

Summary

This blog post shares how to make yogurt from raw milk with a starter and without a yogurt maker or instant pot. It’s easy to do. You just need a few tablespoons of organic yogurt, a steel pot, a stove and a fridge.

You will find this yogurt to be amazingly fresh and clean tasting. It’s as good to eat as it is easy to make. A good quality raw milk is essential for this great end-result. I wouldn’t do this with any milk I wouldn’t drink raw.

The hardest part of this entire recipe, other than sourcing clean, grass-fed raw cow milk, will be the wait while it sets!

One question I have is about the heating of the raw milk. I know every state has their own standards as to what pasteurization is (state milk laws), but I am wondering if because we’re heating it, is this still a “Raw” Yogurt Recipe?

We thank you for coming to our blog!

Do you have your own recipe for how to make yogurt from raw milk?

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions or different variations, please let us know in the comments below!

Next Recipe: Roselle Juice Recipe Using Fresh Calyx (Thick Red “Flower” Part)