Whole foods and Yogourt

Its a darn good thing there isn't one of these in Georgetown.

I was at square one last night for a bit of shopping, and had a deal voucher for $20 worth of groceries here.  Surprisingly it was my first time visiting this store.

My $20 didnt go far, enough to get a basket of peaches, a baguette and some chicken breast.  However, I really did enjoy it there.  I asked the person at the butcher counter as to which of the chicken breasts were free range (one of my strict dietary stipulations) and I was pleased to hear that not only are they free range, but they have a whole 5 step program for maximum chicken happiness.  Or something like that.  He eagerly talked about the chickens for ages, his enthusiasm was such a refreshing change from other stores.  You could tell he truly loved his job and believed in the product.  Hmmmm... who does that sound like?  Oh ya, me with fair trade products!  Yay!

I practically had to run through the store to ensure I didn't get into too much trouble, but added to that bill some delicious veggie pizza (hey i was hungry!  Better than bringing the whole store back with me) totally loaded with olives, and that new iogo yogurt.

Lee gave me a bit of a hard time for getting the yogurt because he thinks I fell victim to their heavy advertising.  That's the main reason I boycott many things from Tim Hortons to Apple, I hate to be influenced to do anything.  HOWEVER.  I saw it differently.  We go through a ton of yogurt and I love to try new types, so regardless of marketing, I was happy to give it a shot.

As I read through the labels, I was even more pleased to try it for a few reasons:

• tasty looking flavours without trying to be low in fat or calories - I hate the fat free variety of yogurt, its just so overly processed, I can taste the artificial sweetener, and no matter what they put in it, it just tastes awful.  Not all fat is bad for you!  What I have in front of me now is Lemon Pie, and Creme Caramel.
• Gelatin Free - Most yogurts have gelatin in them, making them not vegetarian.  Please note there is a distinct difference between vegetarian and vegan.  Still not vegan, but no ground up animal bones in these yogurts.  I cant imagine vegan yogurt would be that great anyway!
• Its made in Canada, for a Canadian company. 

After consuming the creme caramel flavour, I am quite pleased with the taste.  However, I think the dessert flavours would get old fast.  Not something I could eat every day for the rest of my life.  The other flavours were all probiotic and looked wonderful, but I chose the dessert varieties because the probiotic was a smaller package and at just under $8 a package, I wanted to get the most bang for my buck. Another improvement I could see necessary is to replace the sugar from the 2nd ingredient with honey, agave syrup, or whole cane sugar.  If they want to continue as a premium healthier brand.

So overall, good yogurt, some small improvements from traditional brands, but I will wait for them to be on sale before I purchase another case.

On to the lemon pie!