Classic tart frozen yogurt

Tangy plain frozen yogurt like the soft-serve kind — light, refreshing and a base for any topping.

Plain yogurt is mostly water, and if you simply sweetened and froze it you would get a hard block of ice. That is why this recipe adds skimmed milk powder (more protein and solids to bind the water), dextrose and glucose syrup (they soften the ice cream without making it overly sweet) and a pinch of locust bean gum. The yogurt isn’t heated — the live cultures and the typical tang are preserved.

Type: Frozen yogurt · Servings: 8 · Difficulty: Moderate

Equipment

Ingredients

  • 100 g whole milk 3.5 %
  • 100 g granulated sugar (sucrose)
  • 50 g dextrose (glucose powder)
  • 40 g glucose syrup (DE 40, 80 % solids)
  • 50 g skimmed milk powder
  • 2 g locust bean gum (carob gum, E410) (or 1 g locust bean gum + 1 g guar gum)
  • 650 g plain yogurt 3 % (plain, with live cultures, chilled)
  • 10 g lemon juice (fresh)

Making the mix

  1. In a small pan, mix the dry ingredients: sugar, dextrose, milk powder and locust bean gum (carob gum, E410) — mixed with the sugar, the gum won’t form lumps.
  2. Stir in the milk (and the glucose syrup, if the recipe has it) and heat to 85 °C, just below boiling, stirring constantly. Hold it there for two minutes so the gum hydrates.
  3. Cool the syrup in a bowl set in cold water with ice, then chill it completely in the fridge.
  4. Whisk the chilled syrup with the cold yogurt and lemon juice until smooth. Don’t heat the yogurt — heat would kill the live cultures.
  5. Leave the mix in the fridge for at least an hour; it can stay until the next day.

Method — Compressor ice cream maker

  1. Switch on the ice cream maker 5–10 minutes in advance so the bowl pre-chills.
  2. Pour in the chilled mix (no higher than the fill line) and churn for 25–35 minutes until it has the consistency of a thick cream.
  3. You can serve it soft straight away, like soft-serve. For scoops, transfer it to a chilled container, cover with cling film and leave to harden in the freezer.

Total time: 3 h 50 min

Method — Freezer-bowl ice cream maker

  1. Freeze the bowl for at least 24 hours in advance. Take it out just before use, fit the paddle and switch the machine on.
  2. With the machine running, pour in the thoroughly chilled mix — filling the bowl no more than two-thirds full; freeze the rest as a second batch.
  3. Churn for 20–30 minutes until the mix thickens. Going on longer is pointless — the bowl has already warmed up.
  4. Transfer to a chilled container and leave to harden in the freezer for 2 hours.

Frozen yogurt has less fat than cream ice cream, so it thickens more slowly in a freezer bowl. The mix must be really cold (5 °C or below), otherwise it stays runny.

Total time: 4 h 15 min

Method — Ninja CREAMi and similar machines

  1. Pour the chilled mix into the CREAMi tub up to the MAX line (one or two tubs, depending on their size), put the lid on and freeze level for 24 hours.
  2. Put the tub in the machine and run the Frozen Yogurt (if your model doesn’t have it, Lite Ice Cream) program.
  3. If the result is crumbly or powdery, run Re-spin — with a very cold freezer even twice (many users add 1–2 tablespoons of milk or yogurt first).

Programme: Frozen Yogurt (if your model doesn’t have it, Lite Ice Cream)

Total time: 25 h 55 min

Stages

Preparation
15 min
Cooking
5 min
Cooling
30 min
Ageing in the fridge
1 h
Churning
30 min
Hardening in the freezer
1 h 30 min
Total time
3 h 50 min

Serving and storage

Best soft, straight from the machine, with fresh fruit, granola or pieces of dark chocolate. From the freezer, let it stand for 10 minutes.

In a sealed container with cling film pressed onto the surface, 3–5 days. It has less fat than cream ice cream, so it hardens and forms crystals sooner.

Tips

  • You control the tang with the yogurt: Bulgarian-style or kefir-type yogurt is sharper, a mild creamy yogurt gentler.
  • Don’t leave out the milk powder — without it the yogurt turns icy and hard once frozen.
  • Want more of a soft-serve texture? Serve it straight from the machine — home machines turn it out at −9 to −12 °C, as soft as soft-serve.
  • Add fruit and toppings only when serving; in the mix they would add water and freeze into ice.

Why it works

Plain yogurt is about 86 % water. Milk powder raises the milk solids non-fat (MSNF) to over 12 % — the proteins bind water and the ice cream is smoother. Dextrose has almost twice the anti-freezing power (PAC) of granulated sugar, and glucose syrup adds solids and body with little sweetness. The result has only about 2–3 % fat, roughly a fifth of the fat in classic cream ice cream; the sugar content, however, is similar — the acidity needs balancing.

Sources