These days, a household without an instant pot elicits a “U even cook bro?” reaction from many.

And rightfully so, as these little machines are incredibly useful for all manner of kitchen wizardry from pressure cooking to slow cooking to rice making to..

Making delicious, creamy, gut-healthy yogurt.

I personally avoided trying this out for a while because it seemed just a bit intimidating. But besides the waiting periods, this recipe really is pretty simple.

Depending on the fat content you want in the yogurt, you can do all milks from whole to skim. I personally used a gallon of 1% milk in this recipe, but I’ve used all.

You’ll need:

• A gallon of milk (whatever fat % you prefer)
• 1/4 cup of your favorite Greek yogurt
• An instant pot
• Fine mesh strainers
• Cheesecloth (optional-ish)

1.   Start out by putting the gallon of milk into the instant pot, close the lid, select the yogurt setting, and adjust the pressure to “Boil”.

This process can take up to an hour to complete.

2. Once the milk is done boiling, the milk needs to be brought down to about 100-110 degrees F before the starter yogurt is added. To do this, take the instant pot insert out and you can put it in a water/ice bath of a larger pot to cool it down faster. An easy way to do this is to plug up your sink, fill it with cold water and/or ice, and place the instant pot insert into it. Monitor the temperature of the milk with a thermometer.

3. Once the milk reaches between 100 and 110 degrees F, add 1/4 cup of whatever Greek yogurt you like the best. I personally prefer Fage.

4. Mix with a whisk to distribute the yogurt in the milk. Put the instant pot insert back in the machine, close the lid, select the yogurt setting, and it should automatically set for 8 hours. At the end of 8 hours, the yogurt should look something like this:

5. This is when we drain it. With a whole gallon of milk, I found that I needed to use 2 medium sized fine mesh strainers and set them over a large pot. The first few times I did this, I lined the strainer with cheesecloth, but after that I found that if the strainer holes were small enough I didn’t even need to use cheesecloth. Here it is before draining:

6. Once you have the yogurt in the strainer straining into a pot, put tin foil over the top and place in the fridge. I like to let it drain overnight. After draining overnight:

If drained overnight, you will have a very thick, almost cheese-like product. This is the product with no liquid added, directly from the strainer:

Mmmm. Thick and almost spreadable.

7. It makes about 1.5 quarts of final product. I prefer to leave it like this, although this is much thicker than even the typical Greek yogurt. It’s more like a cheese. If you’d like a thinner, more yogurt-like product, you can put it in quart mason jars and add back some of the whey liquid that strained into the pot to your desired thickness.

8. Enjoy within a week of making. Your gut bugs will thank you! And so will your taste buds.

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