Culture club

Now that I have a large, cabinet-space-rich kitchen, I find myself unavoidably drawn to food making gadgets. While barely begun, this summer has nearly convinced me to buy an ice cream maker, as summers so often do. However, before I could get that far, I became convinced (and this is what reading food blogs gets me) that what I really needed was a yogurtmaker. And with the ease and efficiently of online shopping, I was soon able to price check, compare reviews on Amazon, and have a model (specifically this one) shipped before even really thinking through the idea.

I should preface this post by saying (for those of you who might be questioning why a person would need to make their own yogurt) that I eat a lot of yogurt. In fact, I usually eat at least one single serving size Greek yogurt a day. And at city prices, each of those easily-portable, fruit-on-the-bottom cups goes for around $1.50. Plus there's the environmental cost of throwing out all those plastic yogurt cups. I quickly became convinced that the Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker would pay for itself in no time. A stance I still, having now made yogurt, stand by.

After receiving my yogurt maker on Tuesday, I immediately went out and bought whole milk to try her out. I've gotten in the habit of buying fat free yogurt lately, but I went with whole milk because I wanted my maiden yogurt-making voyage to be rich and delicious. Also, whole milk only takes 8 hours to transform into yogurty deliciousness, whereas skim milk takes about 12, so my natural impatience was a factor. According to the directions, you can use soy milk as well, and I'm considering experimenting with out options (almond milk? rice milk?) in the future. But for now, I'm recording the fermentation of my very first batch of yogurt made with plain, boring dairy.

Step 1: Boil a quart of milk. Then Step 2 is to let it cool it to room temperature, which is what is actually pictured here. Naturally, I put it in an ice bath because I was too impatient to let the cooling process happen organically.

Next, I added 5 T of yogurt. You have to have yogurt to make yogurt? You might ask. The yogurt machine directions state that you should routinely set aside one of the 7 containers from each batch of your yogurt and use that to start the culture for your next batch. Of course, for the inaugural batch, this simply isn't possible, so I had to also buy yogurt. May this be my last yogurt purchase for some time!

Step 4(?): I decided to make strawberry yogurt for my first time out because strawberries are finally starting to come into season in New York, so I have a bunch of them. The yogurt recipe suggested cooking them prior to adding them to the milk mixture. It'll probably be at least two batches in before I start cutting corners and skipping Euro Cuisine sanctioned steps, so cook them I did.

Step 5: Decant pre-yogurt into the 7 glass jars of the yogurt maker. I took this picture before I put the glass lid on top and turned it on. I have no idea why this photo is shrouded in darkness.

Step 6: After leaving the yogurt overnight to allow the bacteria to mature, I awoke to find 7 jaws of nicely thickened yogurt. Alas, they were quite warm, so I had to abide by the yogurt maker's recommendation to let them cool in the fridge for at least 3 hours before eating.

Step 7: Enjoy! Here is my finished product. Slightly blurry because I can't maintain a steady hand while in the presence of such lactose greatness.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the way it came out. It had the perfect yogurt tang with just a slight sweetness from the berries. It was also far more rich than the yogurt I'm used to, but that's probably more due to the addition of fatty milk as opposed to a sign of my yogurt-making prowess. I brought one of these little guys in my lunch today. While I felt a little like an adult baby eating out of a small glass jar, it's nice to be able to re-use it for many lunch-time yogurts to come.

Of course, now I'm pretty sure I really do need that ice cream maker, so I can perfect the fine art of frozen yogurt.

I should probably learn my boyfriend's phone number

Last night, I was supposed to meet my boyfriend after work because we had a couple of appointments with brokers to look at apartments. We hadn't planned an exact meeting point because I was supposed to call when I got off work to say that I was on my way. Simple enough, except that when I got off work my phone wouldn't turn on. Or rather it would turn on, taunt me by letting me scroll to his name, and then shut off when I tried to look at his number or follow through with a call. Very frustrating. Especially considering I plugged it in the night before.

There are several pay phones of varying working order and questionable cleanliness in the subway, but it was at this point that I realized I couldn't even name the area code of his phone number. I consider this a problem with our modern dependence on cell phones, because it takes so long (or at least some effort) to memorize a number when you don't have the repetitive memory formed by punching the numbers quite a few times. I can still remember the phone numbers for my friends in middle school, but not the number of someone I call on a regular basis. Sadly calling the girl I used to make up Britney Spears videos on a trampoline with when I was 12 didn't seem to help my present situation. Finally, I realized I did have his number in my email, but at this point I was already on the train, and going back to work to check it would only make me later.

The plan I devised on the train was to sprint to his apartment and hopefully catch him before he left or gave up on me entirely for not returning his no doubt many confused calls. I made the 10-minute walk to his apartment in about 5 minutes (p90x has improved my fitness level, but still running in a dress, boots, and a heavy coat is something even Tony Horton might find difficult).
Astoria is lovely, but lengthy to traverse. I'm really just adding this picture to break up an otherwise boringly large block of text.

I knocked and he wasn't there. I let myself into his apartment and, not surprisingly, he still wasn't there. He'd downloaded skype on his computer, so I thought I could use that to call him, but alas, I couldn't find it (and he later told me he'd deleted it the day before). I looked up in my email to find his number and pulled a random receipt off his desk to write it down. Coincidentally, this random piece of paper turned out to be his phone bill and contained the very digits I needed.

Grabbing that, I took off again, heading in the direction of the general area he'd told me the real estate office was. I was beginning to feel a little like Franka Potente in Run, Lola, Run, you know, except for all the blood money and armed robbery. I found a real estate office and went in and started babbling incoherently while gesturing at my phone. I mentioned my boyfriend's name and one of the real estate agents seemed to have heard of him. That was my ticket in! Another one of the brokers offered me the use of a phone so I could contact him. Unfortunately, when I was able to get a hold of him, he told me I was still in the wrong place. Apparently, the reason they'd heard of him was because we had an appointment with them on Friday. I thanked them for the use of their phone and slowly backed out, saying I would meet him on the corner. I'm not sure I fully explained that I wouldn't be coming back.

Luckily, I was only a few blocks from where I was supposed to meet him, although another 20 minute walk to where the next appointment was. Good thing I'd done my p90x legs and back that morning! Otherwise, I might not have even been sore.

Another unfortunate result of my phone black out was that I didn't get to call and wish my father a happy birthday. So happy (belated) birthday, Dad! Hopefully, the card I sent proves I didn't forget.