Senior Moments
Charles P. Eberson
A Senior’s Observations, Opinions and Rantings
There was the Berlin Wall, the Great Wall of China and Trump…well you know. But on a recent trip to the local supermarket, I was unprepared for the Wall of Yogurt. When my wife and I go food shopping, we try and be as efficient as possible and split up the list. One of the items on my list was yogurt. How complicated can shopping for yogurt be? When my wife and I got married many decades ago, one of our gifts was a yogurt maker. All it took to make our own was some milk and small amount yogurt as a starter. Maybe if we were feeling especially adventurous, some fruit. Still, it was an acquired taste. If it wasn’t for the widely touted health benefits, I probably would have avoided it completely. Years ago, an yogurt company made a splash with putting fruit at their bottom of their yogurt thus making it more appealing to the general public. One of the nutritional benefits of yogurt is the probiotics that we ingest but now I see labels stating “Prebiotics and Probiotics.” They must be even better for me. Yogurt companies have still been waging the battle to make their product more palatable to the masses so they have made significant changes. You can now choose yogurts that come with various condiments which are housed in the lid such as pretzels, chocolate chips, granola, graham crackers and yes, M & M’s. Now were getting somewhere. Still the manufacturers of yogurt push the envelope of what is considered health food even further with additional selections such as strawberry cheesecake, key lime pie, s’mores, cookies & cream, caramel fudge pretzel, banana choco nut, peanut butter delight, coconut chocolate bliss and as a nod to the Girl Scout cookies including their logo, thin mint and peanut butter chocolate. There are even Twix and Snickers yogurts packaged exactly as the candy bars. As yogurt shoppers, we are concerned about healthy choices. Manufacturers know this which is why they prominently label some of their products as 0% fat. However, closer examination reveals that one container has 190 calories with 60 calories as fat. I was never a math whiz but I don’t get this. Another manufacturer makes no false claims about its fat content labeling its product as Triple Cream at 170 calories with 90 calories as fat. Realizing that these yogurt marketing gurus have to start indoctrinating their audience when they are young, their products are packaged in little plastic tubes so the children don’t have to use utensils. They simply push the yogurt out of the tubes with their adorable little hands. The boxes are adorned with splashy bright colors and playful cartoon characters. Not to leave out adults who also have difficulties with utensils perhaps while driving or biking, there are drinkable yogurt products available that come in a convenient plastic bottle. As if all of this is not enough, you can also choose from organic yogurt, French style, Greek style, almond non-dairy, lactose free and grass fed. Before too long, my wife appears with a cart full of food and sees my cart is empty and asks what I have been doing all this time. Just shopping for yogurt.
