A recent batch of Veena Mehra’s yogurt in Houston. She’s been making yogurt the same way, with the same starter, for about 40 years. PHOTO: Nishta Mehra

If you’re making your own yogurt at home, you need an old batch to make a new batch. And the community of microbes in that yogurt starter — and the flavor — should remain relatively unchanged if you make it the same way every time. That’s what Rachel Dutton, an assistant professor of microbiology at the University of California, San Diego who studies cheese and other dairy products, says, anyway.

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