Say No to Sprinkles

Dear BSC Commuter Caf,

I love those yogurt covered pretzels you have. And I appreciate that you are trying to get us excited for Spring and Easter by putting pretty colored sprinkles on the yogurt pretzels. Though they look cute, their tooth-breaking crunchyness completely takes away from the taste of the yogurt-- the best part!! Please bring back the plain yogurt-covered pretzels. Thanks!

-Brittany

Raspberry Yogurt Cake

This look so good. You could probably make it with other berries too, like blueberries.

2 eggs

1 cup of plain unsweetened yogurt

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1 or 2 tsp vanilla extract, to taste.

300 grams of raspberries, frozen (no need to thaw them) or fresh

Preheat the oven to 175° C (350° F).

Combine the yogurt, eggs, sugar, vanilla and oil.

In another bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder.

Add the flour mixture into the yogurt mixture, and blend together.

Pour half of the batter into a ten-inch cake pan (bottom lined with parchment paper, sides greased), then pour half of the raspberries on the surface.

Cover the berries with the remaining batter, top with remaining half of the berries.

Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a cake tester comes out clean.

Let stand for ten minutes, and transfer onto a rack to cool.

Serve with vanilla ice cream or vanilla sauce.

The cake is better the next day.

Like Maple Syrup?

Or anything maple-y? Try Brown Cow Maple (Low Fat) or Brown Cow Maple (Cream Top) flavored yogurts -- One of the many decadant flavors made by Brown Cow. Brown Cow yogurts do contain live and active cultures (S. thermophilus and L. bulgaricus, as all yogurts must have, plus L. acidophilus and Bifidus), and contain no artificial growth hormones!

I don't think I ever really see this brand in the local supermarkets, but if anyone ever sees it, you should give it a try!

Choosing Frozen Yogurt Wisely

Many of us, including myself, love to enjoy frozen yogurt as a treat. But don't be fooled by the word "yogurt." Frozen yogurt is not nutritionally similar to regular yogurt. Regarding calcium, most frozen yogurts provide about half what you'd get in a regular yogurt. In terms of protein, regular yogurt is also the better choice. It provides about 8 to 12 grams protein per eight ounces, as compared to only 2 to 8 ounces for frozen yogurts. In terms of calories, it is also not a good diet food (to replace ice cream, for example). A large cone of frozen yogurt--nine to 13 ounces--contains 225-325 calories per serving. These calories are mostly from carbohydrates, so they are more likely to fuel your muscles than get stored as body fat, and are preferable to ice cream calories. However, these calories quickly add up. Hence, eating "diet portions" is the key to consuming frozen yogurt. For a low-cal treat, try Edy's or Dreyer's frozen yogurt, which is fortified with extra calcium to deliver as much of this mineral as a glass of milk.

Yogurt has been touted for boosting your immune system, but there's another reason it may keep you smiling.

A study in the Journal of Periodontology found that people who consumed 2 ounces or more of lactic acid-rich foods, such as yogurt and kefir, had a 60 percent lower risk for severe periodontal disease than those who didn't eat any. Left untreated, the dental condition can cause bleeding, receding gums, and tooth loss. Scientists once believed it was the calcium in dairy products that fostered oral health, but now they say the effect may be attributed to probiotics, beneficial bacteria found in foods with lactic acid. Since dairy products made without probiotics, like milk and some cheeses, don't provide the same protective effect, get at least half of your dairy servings each day from yogurt.

I found this very interesting because my gum line is receding in some areas (mostly because I brush too hard) and it's causing my teeth to be very sensitive. I usually only eat one serving of yogurt a day, if that, and I really need to boost my intake because of all the previous benefits I've mentioned before, and because, come to find out, it may help my teeth too!

Organic Yogurt

Somehow my mom got a free 12-month subscription of "Glamour" sent to our house after ordering something off tv. So I frequently flip through the magazine at breakfast, and I found an article called "5 Foods Every Woman Should Eat Organic," and one of them is dairy. The article says:

Organic dairy can have a big impact on your health and the environment, but the truth is young women don't drink a lot of milk. They do, however, still reach for yogurt. Like all organic dairy, organic yogurts are made without the use of hormones and antibiotics--two of the things women tell me they worry about most--and can have higher levels of omega-3s, the heart-healthy fats we Americans don't get enough of, as well as beta-carotene, which may play a role in cancer prevention. I like varieties such as Horizon Organic and Stonyfield Farm, but any dairy product with the USDA Organic seal is probably a good choice. A food can't carry the seal unless it's made without toxic chemicals, antibiotics or synthetic hormones, and contains at least 95 percent organic ingredients. ("Hormone-free" dairy products are better than their conventional counterparts, but they may not have as many omega-3s as organics.)
Organic dairy can also be much less damaging to the environment. We've already started to see how, as millions of people have switched, farming practices have improved in a way that will help reduce greenhouse gases. That's a good prescription for your health and the planet.

I will have to try eating more organic yogurt! There are so many reasons why we all should. Stonyfield Farms is a brand found in most grocery stores that's organic. Perhaps I'll go for a few of those with my all-time favorite, Yoplait.

Ginger Cake with Caramel-Apple Topping

Whole wheat flour makes a better-for-you addition to this updated ginger cake. The creamy yogurt topping is like the icing on the cake, it's the best part!

Prep Time: 15 min
Start to Finish: 1 hr
Makes: 15 servings

2 cups Yoplait® 99% Fat Free creamy harvest peach or creamy vanilla yogurt (from 2-lb container)
1/2 cup caramel fat-free topping
1 1/4 cups Gold Medal® whole wheat flour
1 cup Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup molasses
1/3 cup canola oil
1 egg
1 medium tart apple, chopped
Lemon juice

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour 9-inch square pan. In medium bowl, mix 3/4 cup of the yogurt and the caramel topping; cover and refrigerate until serving time.
2. In large bowl, beat remaining 1 1/4 cups yogurt and all remaining ingredients except apple and lemon juice with electric mixer on low speed 45 seconds, scraping bowl constantly. Beat on medium speed 1 minute, scraping bowl occasionally, until well blended. Stir in half of the chopped apple. Pour batter into pan. Sprinkle lemon juice over remaining apple; cover and refrigerate until serving time.
3. Bake 38 to 43 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool slightly. Serve with topping mixture and remaining chopped apple.

High Altitude (3500-6500 ft): Grease and flour 13x9-inch pan. Use 2 eggs. Bake 42 to 47 minutes.

Substitution
You can use 3 (6-oz) containers of Yoplait® Original 99% Fat Free harvest peach or French vanilla yogurt instead of the yogurt in the recipe if you like.

Did You Know?
The apple needs a split personality: peel the half that will be stirred into the batter; leave the peel on the remaining half for a more colorful topping.

Lemon Yogurt Loaf Cake

I stole this from a baking community on Livejournal . . . But it sounds so good.

French Lemon Yogurt Loaf Cake

(adapted from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours, p.224)

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

Pinch of salt

1 cup sugar

Grated zest of 1 lemon

1/2 cup plain yogurt

3 large eggs

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup oil

Preheat oven to 180C (why is it in Celcius? Sorry ... You'll have to translate)
Put the sugar and zest in a medium bowl and rub the ingredients together until the sugar is fragrant.
Whisk in the yogurt, eggs and vanilla.
When the mixture is well blended, gently whisk in the dry ingredients.
Fold in the oil. The batter will be thick and shiny. Scrape it into the pan.
Bake for about 50-55 mins, or until the cake begins to come away from the sides of the pan, and a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool for 5mins, then unmold and cool to room temperature on the rack.

Yoplait Yogurt Goes rBGH-Free

An article I found:

February 10, 2009
Yoplait yogurt will soon be free of artificial bovine growth hormone (rBGH), a synthetic hormone that has been linked to a number of health concerns, including breast cancer.

General Mills announced Monday that it will stop using milk produced from cows injected with rBGH (also known as rBST) in all Yoplait yogurts by August 2009.

“While the safety of milk from cows treated with rBST is not at issue, our consumers were expressing a preference for milk from cows not treated with rBST, and we responded,” Becky O’Grady, General Mills’ vice president of marketing for the Yoplait brand, said in a statement.

The hormone is already banned in Canada, Australia, Japan and the European Union. In the United States, corporations like Wal-Mart and Starbucks do not use milk from rBGH-treated cows in their products.

full article: http://www.ourbodiesourblog.org/blog/2009/02/yoplait-yogurt-goes-rbgh-free

Well I'm glad Yoplait is going to stop using this bad hormone in making their yogurts, but I was unaware that it was in my yogurt in the first place! Good for Yoplait for responding to it's customers' needs though. Hopefully we can trust Yoplait and the farmers that produce the cows the "rGBH-Free" way that this hormone really isn't getting into our yogurt . . .