Generally speaking, most of the carbs/lactose in a milk product, whatever its fat content, is contained in the watery part (whey) and not bound to the fat or milk proteins. Whey DOES contain proteins, though, make no mistake. Draining the whey from curded (curdled) milk products removes much of the lactose and quite a bit of protein (hence whey protein isolate, which is very much more processed and separated whey, and cheese which is the very much lower carb curdled fat/protein). The proteins and not the lactose in the whey you've drained from your various experiments is what gives the whey its eggwhite consistency.
Yogurt still has lots of the whey/water component, Cheese does not. Yogurt gets the bacteria munching up much of the lactose, hence lower carbs. Yogurt made INTO yogurt cheese, if it's
actually curdled, will lose much of the remaining carbs. Yogurt made into the drained variety of "yogurt cheese" will lose almost as many of the remaining carbs. The softer the cheese, the higher the whey component and generally the higher the REMAINING carb count. There is a big difference between making true cheese (curdling and aging/fermenting) and the sour cream cheese you get with draining yogurt (fermenting and draining).
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A. One more thing - if I take either fullfat or nonfat milk, and I make my 26 hour yogurt out of it - (all lactose gone) can I assume it's carbfree?
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The fat ain't got nuthin' to do with it; all the carbs in any unmodified milk product is the lactose (milk sugar). If all the lactose is gone, all the carbs are gone. The trick is finding out if all the lactose is gone (and as far as I know only a lab test will prove that one).
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B. And I best you can't make yogurt out of Lactaid milk because it has no lactose in it right? Or does it have lactose but just contains an enzyme to digest the lactose once in your system?
The containers says carbs.
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I got some info out of one of the companies (Natrel, I think) about these 'lactose-free' milks... and they don't filter out the lactose, they add some (trademarked secret enzyme process) particular enzyme combo that essentially breaks down the lactose into its component sugars ... lactose is a disaccharide of some kind, probably explained on that webpage you were reading. So the carbs are still there. Great for the LACTOSE-intolerant but not for the SUGARS-intolerant.
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C. Also what is the difference between Kefir and Yogurt? I thought if I make my yogurt runny and REAL sour - that was Kefir. Huh.
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Kefir is made from a different and very specific friendly microbe than the lactobacillus type used (mostly) for yogurts. Different flavour, too, if you go out and get some 'starter' Kefir you will taste the difference.
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D. I assume if you boil or heat regular yogurt, all you are doing is killing off the good bacteria? Or can you use regular yogurt somehow to make a carbfree cheese if you boil it (just like milk) and then add culture again and incubate it for 26 hours and then drain it? Is it carb free then?
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Heating to 160F or boiling (ick!) yogurt kills off ALL competing bacteria, then you get to add in the friendly ones and they have a "clear playing field". You get to be Louis Pasteur for a little while. An addition of an acid usually speeds up the curding process, which is basically denaturing or cooking the protein to get them to clump together and 'solidify' (voila, cheese).
In any yogurt or cheese, SOME variety (or many) of friendly bacteria or culture is fermenting the product, in the process of which the lactose gets eaten and thereby turned into lactic acid among other things.
ONLY if the carbs/lactose get eaten/fermented (not boiled), does one get fewer carbs.
Seems to me you've got it all nailed, except for mixing up the heating and the fermenting, and their purposes.
Hope that helps.