Yogurt is thought of as a healthy food. It provides healthy bacteria, protein and calcium. Unfortunately most yogurt available in the grocery stores is not what I would consider healthy. When my older daughter was young I bought her yogurt tubes because she could take them to school and loved the taste. What I didn’t realize was how unhealthy they were because of the food colouring and sugar in them. I believe that yogurt is no longer a healthy food once you add those.
The bacteria in the yogurt helps keep our system in balance and helps us avoid sinus, ear and candida infections. The bacteria also decreases the amount of lactose in yogurt, which means that yogurt is easier to digest than milk. In my opinion, to buy the best yogurt:
Avoid:
- artificial food colouring (“colour” as an ingredient, Yellow #5, Red #40, or Tartrazine)
- sugar (on the ingredient list, not the nutritional panel that shows “sugars”)
- aspartame, Splenda and other artificial sugars
- additives or extra ingredients like cornstarch
Choose:
- plain yogurt
- yogurt sweetened with fruit juice or fruit
- yogurt sweetened with honey or stevia
- yogurt without colour, or coloured with beet juice or annatto
I buy plain yogurt and add fruit to it myself. I love plain yogurt with fresh raspberries or bananas. Sometimes I add homemade granola, raw nuts, pumpkin seeds or unsweetened coconut. I buy vanilla yogurt for my daughters occasionally, buying the ones with organic sugar so that the sweetener isn’t quite as processed.
More reading on the health benefits of yogurt:
Reasons Why Yogurt is a Top Health Food by Dr. Sears
In this blog post I have been writing about dairy yogurt, but the same information applies to goat yogurt, soy yogurt and coconut milk yogurt.
An easy, healthy and creamy frozen treat that we like is a frozen banana. 