Making soy milk

[cteavin]

Hi,

I used my Vitamix to make soy milk this weekend with mixed results. After soaking the beans overnight I put one cup in a pressure cooker, then into the Vitamix and those contents into a very fine mesh chinois. I sweetened the milk but the flavor was off from what I can find in the super market. No matter, while one cup of beans was in the pressure cooker I put another cup of raw soaked beans in the Vitamix with a few cups of boiling water and blended it for about five minutes, strained it in the chinoix and poured that liquid into a pot to boil for 20 minutes (I'd read to do this to deactivate certain enzymes). After a light sweetening THIS was the flavor and consistency I'm used to drinking. The next morning I poured some into my coffee it coagulated. Think tofu. I'm perplexed, any ideas on what's going on? Does anyone have a good method on making soy milk at home?

Thanks,

ct

[heidih]

This post in hzrt8w's eGullet food blog gives you his method.

[cteavin]

Thank you. I'm still curious about the science of what's going on, if anyone knows.

[Jenni]

Hmm, think I heard soy milk does this in some hot drinks. Think you are supposed to add it to the cup first...? Not sure, but google brings up this thread on a vegan forum which has some potential answers/theories, and also this Q&A plus comments here. More results came up, tonnes actually, not sure how many are reliable but there you go.

My personal recommendation would be that, unless you are unfortunate enough to have lactose intolerance/ allergies, don't use soy milk in coffee!

[Will]

Well since acids like vinegar can coagulate soy milk, and coffee is acidic... I'm guessing many commercial soy milk brands add substances (carrageenan, maybe) to help mitigate this.

The only time we've ever made soy milk at home is with a soy milk maker, but honestly, even with one, it's a lot of fuss. We usually just buy soy and nut milk (in aseptic packaging for cooking and general use, or fresh from the Asian supermarkets or soy milk shops / breakfast places for drinking straight); if we went through it faster, maybe we'd take the effort to make it ourselves.

I haven't tried your exact method, but given that it's producing the taste you're expecting, I'd say you're doing pretty well. If the only problem is that it coagulates in coffee, you could:

1) Drink your coffee black

2) Ignore the cosmetic and / or textural unpleasantness of slightly coagulated soy milk in your coffee

3) Continue buying commercial soy milk

4) Try to add some sort of stabilizer / emulsifier to your homemade soy milk and see if that helps

(Personally, I'm a fan of #1, and if your coffee is good, it will probably taste better that way anyway).

Edited June 14, 2011 by Will (log)

[cteavin]

Thank you both. I'm a big fan of Starbuck's Soy Latte, and I recreate the experience at home with store bought soy milk. Also, I love the variety soy and nut milks add to things like cereal or as a beverage with something. I'm going to give the stabilizer a try when I make it again this weekend. Is there a good list online that can give me an approximation on how much of what kind to use?

Cheers,

[Kent Wang]

I use a Joyoung soy milk maker, which essentially blends it, cooks, and repeats for a few cycles. I don't add sugar; just water and beans.

The taste is quite different and I think superior. I really hate American soy milk that has tons of emulsifiers and sugar to make it taste more like milk. But even soy milk without additives from the store doesn't taste as good as fresh from the maker; fresh tastes richer, more "full-bodied".

[cteavin]

I've made it twice more, once with soy lecticin and the other with a xanthin gum and the texture was more milky and it didn't curdle in my coffee. The taste didn't change, it was only slightly thicker.