Newbie, here. Guess I should introduce myself before I do my brain dump.
I love to cook and riff on recipes and food in general. I found this forum when searching for a recipe that got a hit here. Looked like a fun spot, so I registered
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Anyhoo, I learned to make yoghurt from a little, old (even at the time I bought it years ago) "Arab" cookbook which gave only the vaguest instructions based on how bedouins made it on their camels or something, IOW, wild, airborne cultures -- same as old timey sourdough starter.
The instructions were to "scald" the milk, then drain it. Hmmm. Ahem.
Based on that, I simply dumped my milk in a stainless steel stock pot, heated it over medium heat, with a minimum of stirring, just enough so it wouldn't scorch, until bubbles began to form around the edges. This was how I'd learned to scald milk at my granny's knee, when she was teaching me to make bread.
That first time was pretty exciting. I did a little extrapolating, could see it was going to need to firm up before I could drain it. So, I left it to rest until it started to set up. The book didn't say anything about covering it, of course, but I didn't think I wanted quite that much wild life in my yoghurt, so, I draped a layer or two of cheesecloth over the pot, put a giant rubber band on to hold it, and let 'er rip.
When it was "clotted" and beginning to crack, I drained it through a collander lined with more cheesecloth -- sometimes I add a little salt at this point. I now know to save the whey, but that first batch just went down the drain. Since I really only make yoghurt for yoghurt cheese, mine gets a long drain time. When it starts to get "solid" enough that I can twist the cheesecloth into a ball without squeezing my yoghurt out the mesh, I tie the corners together and suspend it in the stockpot by a slipping a wooden spoon through the knot.
After it drains at room temp overnight, I let it continue to drain in the fridge for a day, at least, maybe two, to firm it up enough for rolling into balls. I still do it that way. I did once add some natural Greek yoghurt to the scalded milk, and that batch set up faster and had a bit more tang to it, but for my purposes, it wasn't necessary.
From my experience, the higher fat content, of course the thicker and firmer the yoghurt, but also the milder. I'm guessing that's because it takes longer to get to yoghurt with lower fat content??? I did experiment with whipping cream once and got something that I called cream cheese, maybe not exactly, but close.