yoghurt???

[bea]

is there any reason why my 7 month old can't have natural organic yoghurt as opposed to the baby yoghurts you can buy?? is there any difference, ingredients wise other than the packaging??

thanks...

as i was thinking of giving her some with some pureed fruit!

It's all a marketing ploy.... regular full fat yoghurt will be fine - you don't need to make the giant food companies any richer

Bea - agreewith Pupuce,regular full fat (thats the important bit) natural yoghurt. My little boy had full fat yogs with mashed bannana, and loves it, as well as full fat custard - organic! but he was a little older before the custard got introduced.

I have a question following on from this. Our son's very favourite yogurt (although he eats others, all grown-up organic brands as mentioned here) is the Rachel's Dairy organic vanilla, which he adores. Trouble is, it is a low-fat brand. He also eats plenty of cheese and other dairy products such as custard, and drinks milk, so do I really need to fret about this?
Charliesmummy - is that the Joubere brand? Our son would go for total immersion given half a chance, and it is delicious, isn't it?

In France they have fabulous natural yog with cane sugar added. Very plain with just a slightly sweet taste. My dd loved it (so did I, it came in lovely packaging!!) as she doesn't like fruit 'bits'. The nearest I've found here is the Rachels Dairy vanilla so I give her that. Marina, I too worry about the low-fatness, so I just make sure she has full-fat milk in everything else. Have you tried the Rachels Dairy maple syrup flavour? It is to die for, but probably best not to go down that road...!

Enid, I know exactly the one you mean, mmhmm.
I did something interesting (or sad, depending on your perspective) the other day. Shopping for low cal goodies in M & S I bought and consumed a tasty "Count on Us" vanilla custard. Quite a few E numbers, but what the heck. But, then I checked the packs and it's actually higher in cals than one of their Jersey milk, unadulterated yogurts. So next time I will not feel guilty about treating myself to their vanilla variety, which isn't organic or low fat but still a comparatively healthy special treat.
French yogurts, almost all of them, are just the best, aren't they. Did you come across the Vrai brand over there? - Some of their products, but not all, are sold in Waitrose here. We take freezer bags on our day trips and while everyone else is stocking up on wine, we haul home kilos of yogs, lentils, children's underwear and other things that seem to be marked up 200% in the UK.

Our local Waitrose sells Vrai lemon flavour...yummy yummy. V sad to get this excited over yogurt. My top treat as an early teenager was being allowed to eat a family sized tub of Ski blackcurrant flavour yogurt, and I don't think I'll ever get over my yogurt fetish. Has anyone tried making their own and is it worth it?

Enid I used to make my own youghurt when I was at uni. One of my flatmates was making it and she gave him some of her "bacteria", all was needed to do was add milk and keep them at room temperature as the cold would kill them.

It was very good, but such a hassle!!! (don't think I'd have the time these days).

Don't ask how she got hold of the bacteria though as I haven't got a clue (all I know is that you had to kill a lot every day as they multiply very fast)

Marina - I seem to remember reading somewhere that there is more calcium in skimmed milk than there is in full fat. I'm not a scientist so I don't know why this should be, but from that perspective there's probably not a problem giving your son low fat yogurt. And the Rachel's Dairy yogs ARE fab!

Thanks Soothepoo, that does make sense now I think of it. We have in fact just demolished a carton between us for tea

Enid, I have a yoghurt maker from Lakeland which basically keeps a tub warm for the yogurt to "grow" it takes 8 hours and you just stir in a spon of existing yoghurt to a carton or UHT milk and leave - easy peasy.