Euro Cuisine YM80 Electric Yogurt Maker Machine- Promote Gut Health with Probiotic Rich Homemade Yogurt -Home Yogurt Incubator with Glass Jars, White

I bought this yogurt maker over a year ago, and it's still going strong. In terms of product durability, the only thing that has "broken" are the little rubber foot pads at the bottom have fallen off, but a dab of superglue fixed that quickly.I've been making batches of yogurt back-to-back in this baby, and I love how quick the setup is. I usually start a new batch late in the evening, so that it can incubate overnight and be done by the time I'm up in the morning. I take one little jar of yogurt from my last batch and scoop it into a pot, then use the emptied jar to measure out six more jarfuls of milk into the pot. Stir the pot well with a ladle, then ladle into all seven jars, stick the jars in the yogurt maker and put the big plastic cover on, set timer, press the red button and go. In the morning, I lift off the plastic cover (you'll need to be a little careful here, there will be lots of water condensed on the inside of the cover, and you don't want that dripping into your yogurt), cap all of the bottles with the provided lids, and stick them in the fridge to cool. Yogurt is done!The yogurt I get is never as thick as the store-bought kind that you can stand a spoon in, but I'm ok with that. My yogurt is a little viscous but still liquidy, kind of like cake batter. You'll need to play around with the incubation time to see how long you'll need to get the tartness and viscosity you want. For me (California Bay Area weather), if I use whole milk straight from the fridge, I incubate for 11 hours for a slightly tart, slightly viscous yogurt. You can go as low as 9 hours if you don't want it very tart but still viscous. For 2% milk (again straight from the fridge), 10 hours for a tart, viscous yogurt. I've tried 12 hours with 2% milk before, and it came out completely watery. So again, keep trying different times.If you want your yogurt thicker, you can try heating the milk first. Measure out six jarfuls of milk into a pot (don't put in the yogurt starter just yet), and heat it for half an hour. Don't boil it, you want just under simmering. Then cool the milk to room temperature, and warm the yogurt to room temperature. Once both are ready, scoop the yogurt starter into the milk, mix, and ladle into the jars, etc. The heating denatures the fat proteins and spreads them out into longer strands, so that your yogurt has the fat more evenly distributed for a more even network that binds better for thick yogurt. Higher fat content in the milk will make thick yogurt easier to get. Don't expect store-bought thickness if you don't plan to add gelatin, like they do.I've only made plain yogurt, since I'm not interested in sweetening mine, so please keep that in mind. My roommate likes stirring in spoonfuls of jam right before eating, though. I also never bother with pre-heating the milk (too much trouble, and I'm lazy). There are lips in the jars that are hard to clean out with a dish sponge, so I let the jars soak for about 15 minutes to get the extra yogurt to dissolve, then rinse them out and wash. The provided lids are definitely not leak-tight, but the jar opening is a standard size and I've found that lids from spaghetti sauce jars fit perfectly, and are much more leak-tight. Want more bottles than just 7? Like other reviewers have said, the larger baby food bottles are the perfect size. Also note that when the yogurt maker is done, the beep is very subdued. You can hear it if you're listening for it and you're not far away, and it beeps several times, but it's not loud enough or high-pitched enough to be attention-grabbing and bring you out of that game that you're getting really into. It's more of a reminder than an alarm, and it's about half as loud as my microwave's beep.Great product, and I highly recommend it if you're willing to play around with it a bit. The routine I've settled into is quick, easy, and requires very little cleanup. I'm very pleased with my yogurt maker!

I bought the Euro Cuisine YM80 yogurt maker about 9 months ago. I wanted to really try it out before leaving a review. Disclaimer – I never made yogurt before owning this yogurt maker so I can not compare it to other yogurt makers or making it in a oven or crock pot. I love this yogurt maker and have been using it once to twice a week since I got it. I find that whether or not homemade yogurt is cheaper than store bought depends on your ingredients that you are using ie: organic milk vs. regular store brand milk. I was eating brand name and store name yogurt daily and it was getting costly. This really cuts down on the cost and tastes a lot better. (Partly tastes better since I am not using skim milk – I use either whole milk or 2% and it is wonderful.)The instructions with the yogurt maker are not necessary perfectly clear for a beginner. The area I found to be a little confusing is how long to incubate the yogurt. Example - Softer yogurt without boiling times: 8 hours for whole milk, 10 hours for 2%, and up to 12 hours for skim milk. Then under instructions it states: set time for yogurt – 8 hours for whole milk, etc. They do not give any time difference for using boiled milk or non-boiled. So that being said, I decided to boil my milk and use the times listed: 8 hours whole, 10 hours 2% and 12 hours for skim. (Haven’t bothered making the skim so I can’t say if that is accurate.)The yogurt maker has a hours reminder on the device. It does not turn off the yogurt maker and I am not sure if it was supposed to move during the incubating process but mine never did anything. I don’t bother with it. I just put a little sticky note in front of the device of my shut off time and set an alarm on my phone.I have been making yogurt with a 6 oz container of plain yogurt from the store. Then I make the next batch with a jar of my plain yogurt. I tried using a probiotic capsule that was a disaster and I ended up throwing out that batch. I have not tried using the freeze dried yogurt starter yet. I just priced it out and bought some that would equal $0.70 a batch and I would be able to reuse my yogurt at least once and maybe twice. I will update my review later after using it.Now after having this for awhile I have noticed I could not find any recipes for Coconut Yogurt which was my favorite. I came up with a recipe that has consistently delivered great resultsCoconut yogurt• 1 13.5 ounce can of Coconut Milk (I have used Goya)• Whole milk or 2% milk ( 4 cup measuring cup filled with contents of coconut milk – add the milk so that it comes up to the 4 cup point)• 1 scoop (1/3 cup) of dried instant non-fat milk (I have used Carnation milk)• 6 oz container of plain yogurt or yogurt starter• ½ teaspoon of coconut extract• 8 packets of Stevia in the Raw (or sugar)Add coconut milk, regular milk and dried milk to the saucepan and heat till the milk starts boiling and climbing up the pot. I place the pot in the sink with an ice bath to cool down faster. Cool to 95 degrees F (stir a few times to reduce hotspots – use a thermometer to check the temp). Then pour some of the liquid in the 4 cup measuring cup and add your starter. Blend til smooth and add back to the pot. I then add the coconut extract and sweetner. I put in the Eurocuisine containers and place in the yogurt maker. Incubation times depend on milk used – Whole milk is 8 hours and 2% is 9 hours. (The fat content in the coconut milk is similar to whole milk so I used that as a judge when deciding the times.)Please let me know if my review was helpful or if you enjoyed my recipe. Click the button below if this helped you at all. Thanks