Yogurt!

I'm not sure if I mentioned the yogurt curse or not, but a few months ago, after making yogurt every week for years, my yogurt just started failing. I checked all the variables - temperature, cleanliness, freshness of culture, etc. and found nothing to explain it. After failing multiple times I took a yogurt break. Last week, I braved the yogurt frontier again. This time I decided to try something new. I usually rest the milk and culture on the fruit drier overnight. This time I filled up the dairy crock pot, turned it on low, set a cake rack on top with the pot of heated and cooled-to-warm milk/culture combination. I used the same culture we've had for quite a while (especially after taking a long break!). In the morning - yogurt! Delicious, creamy, smooth, not-too-mild, not-too-tart yogurt. We were so excited! Especially since a quart of homemade yogurt only costs $0.61 (okay, maybe $0.63 when you add a spoonful of homemade jam!). Much better than $3-4, even if it is $0.06 more per quart than it was in Portland. :) And it's time to make another batch. HOORAY!