Homemade yogurt

This weekend, I found out that you can make yogurt at home. I am mystified by this process. I've never heard of anyone making homemade yogurt. Makes sense, though, as it obviously doesn't grow in those plastic cups. Nadia's mom makes all the yogurt their family eats, and I think it tastes a lot better than yogurt from the store.

Here's the basic process:

1) Boil a bunch of milk in a casserole-type dish (we were told Corningware with a glass lid). It doesn't matter what kind of milk. It can be skim, 1%, whatever.

2) Let the milk cool down so it's not hot, but still warm. Add about a tablespoon of the yogurt culture (which is just some of the leftover yogurt from the last batch of yogurt you had).

3) Put the lid on the yogurt and then wrap it in a towel. Put the whole thing someplace where it will maintain its temperature for about four hours, like a camping-size cooler. Apparently, if it's a warm day, you could also just set it in the oven (but leave the oven off).

After four to five hours, you check it and it should be yogurt. You put it in the fridge after that and add your flavorings, if you wanted any. Nadia's mom said that people bring the cultures that they use from India (wonder how that gets past customs?) and we're going to talk her into giving us some of her yogurt to take home so we can try and make our own.