Whey & Yogurt - Liquid Whey

Homemade whey is needed to produce fermented foods and the authentic old fashioned fizzy drinks. It is healthy and you can have fun with it. Whey can be used in multiple ways as with other cultured milk products. This is the stuff that REAL Kimchee is made with... not vinegar. Regularly adding beneficial cultures to your diet will aid your digestive tract by providing "good" bacteria. Whey made from fresh raw milk or fresh yogurt - is the best possible method. So use fresh, raw, and organic when ever available. I hope you enjoy the ever so slight sour bite to the finished yogurt product, and to the whey. Keep everything sterile and cleaned with vinegar water - NO DISH-SOAP!! Rinse with filtered water, not muni-tap because the chlorine will kill your main product rendering it contaminated and useless. Store your whey in a glass [mason] jar. I personally have several methods and various cultures. Piima, and Villi to name a few [Fil Mojlk is my favorite butter-milk]. This recipe here will be the easiest to prepare. The ingredients you can purchase from the local natural foods market. I am brand specific because of the health factor. You need to start with live fresh cultures, and healthy WHOLE RAW if possible milk. Baby it isn't gonna work with highly advertised, flavored, sugared, fancy pansy yogurt and fractionated [homogenized] milk, no no no!!! Please buy the Voskos Greek un-flavored yogurt and Raw whole milk by Organic Pastures, Claravale Farms, or what ever Raw Organic milk you have available in your area. You almost want to hear it MoOOoooOOoo. My finicky Supplies list: sauce pot, thermometer capable range around 104 degrees, 1/1/2 quart glass bowl, 1 yard cheese cloth folded to an 18" square, a strainer, wooden spoon, 1 quart wide mouth mason jar or tall glass pitcher, stove/oven/or yogurt maker (my Yogurmet came from a thrift store 8 bucks), and patience... wait for it.... wait for it. ok go! I don't know if I can value the nutritional calculations here regarding the Whey because I don't think they can calculate Whey separate from Milk. The value they will provide will probably be for the secondary product - the yogurt.

• Ready In: 24 hrs 10 mins
• Yields: 2 1/2 cups

Ingredients

• 1  quart  whole milk, raw
• 4  ounces yogurt, voskos unflavored

Directions

1. Bring the 4 ozs of yogurt to room temperature in a large glass bowl on the counter.
2. In a sauce pot on a moderately hot stove heat the Raw milk to 100 - 102 degrees stirring constantly and do not go over 104 degrees or you will kill the live enzymes in the raw milk.
3. immediately cool to about 90 degrees by placing the sauce pot on the ice cubes in the pie pan while continuing to stir.
4. thoroughly stir/whisk the warm milk into the yogurt and cover with the cheese cloth.
5. place in 100 degree oven overnight ( 8 hours) but watch that your oven doesn’t cycle and spike too high - killing the enzymes and culture.
6. remove from oven.
7. use a knife and slash cut several cris-X-crosses through the yogurt to start the separating process.
8. chill in refrigerator several hours – you should start to see weeping liquid that is the color of lemonade but viscous like chicken broth.
9. line the strainer with the cheese cloth over a bowl and let most of the liquid whey drain from the yogurt
10. pick up the corners of the cheese cloth and squeeze a bit to help the whey drain out.
11. tie the cheese cloth corners together and suspend in a tall glass pitcher or the mason jar using the wooden spoon as a support.
12. leave to drain for several hours.
13. harvest your 1 1/4 cups of yogurt out of the cheese cloth and refrigerate – eat as store bought by adding fresh berries.
14. pour all of the whey into a clean glass jar and refrigerate
15. skim off undesirable left over solids or strain again through the cheese cloth
16. yield 2 ½ cups whey
17. keeps fresh 6 months if refrigerated properly.