I NEVER thought I would be making my own yogurt. I honestly don't like cooking or baking anything complex that takes more than a few minutes when I'm at home. As someone who spent 5 years in the commercial culinary industry, cooking at home for myself is not a 'hobby' it's a chore.
But what I do love - is gut health. I'm pretty obsessed. It's the biggest contributing factor to optimizing your health. If you want to make a major shift in your health with only small adjustments - focus your efforts on your gut.
Ok - so yogurt. Specifically L. Reuteri Yogurt.
This stuff is the BOMB, First, I've had a really hard time finding the simple straight forward list of why this bacteria Lactobacillus reuteri is considered good for you.
So here it is:
enhances dermal collagen (smooths wrinkles)
accelerates healing time
reduces appetite
increases testosterone
increases libido
preserves bone density
promotes deeper sleep
"Increased empathy and desire for connectedness with other people"
Probiotic effects that prevent SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth)
Promotes the release of oxytocin
Are all of these things scientifically proven? Well - no. There is a lot of scientific 'evidence' that the bacteria L. Reuteri initiates multiple positive processes in your body. So when the yogurt is delicious, it's easy to make, you know exactly what's in it & the potential benefits could happen over time - why wouldn't you?
The key player in why this specific bacteria is so important - it slows they symptoms of aging. If you are looking for longevity - this yogurt should be one of your weapons.
Want to know how to make it?
Use this blog - it was the most direct & helpful one I could find.
This blog is a good second runner up
It's written by Dr. William Davis. He became famous from the book Wheat Belly & then wrote Super Gut, which is where he first offered the recipe for this yogurt & explains why this bacteria is so important for us. He explains his investigation into the bacteria & how they have found this bacteria specifically in the gut biome of people who exhibit a slower aging process. More importantly - due to our industrialized Western eating habits, many of us have lost this important bacteria in our guts. We're also not born with it - unless our mothers had it. Then even if we're born with it - we can lose it.
**As a warning, I've read Wheat Belly. It has tons of incredible information in it. But Dr. Davis' writing style is not very credible. He offers a lot of subjective, as well as sassy, comments that create inferences or correlation, which, if someone is easily influenced or not a critical thinker, they can mix it up as truth or fact. Then his book Super Gut, is extremely thick with scientific terminology which makes it very difficult to digest & gain the benefits of the content he is delivering. Its very easy to get lost in a lot of the Latin versions of bacteria & the biological processes going on in our body. If you don't have a background in health sciences, it could be a slogging read.
I highly suggest you do your own research beyond my blog to see if this is something you want to undertake. I fell in love with the idea of the results & outcomes. Making this yogurt is an investment. I needed to scour the net to find my supplies. I was lucky everything could easily come from amazon.ca but it wasn't a straight line hunt.
Lucky for you - I found all the goods & I'm listing them for you!
The bacteria tablets I used & have worked awesome, I found on Amazon here
Here is the Inulin you'll need
Now I agonized over the yogurt maker. I had a few different ones stacked in my cart but I chose this one below & it was not a mistake. The blog talks about using a sous vide & your own glass bowl with a make shift lid. I don't have time for this silliness. This one is easy to use, easy to set - but the suggestions to set the temperature & still use a thermometer to check the internal temp of the yogurt then adjust accordingly is really helpful. When making yogurt in my old house with baseboard heaters & no air-conditioning during the summer I needed to be very careful. My new place with a brand new heating/cooling forced air system during the winter upsets the machine a lot less.
Its worth mentioning that the blogs talk about the type of cream to use. The blogs call for 'half & half'- which can be anywhere between 10-18%. I found that using 18% yields the best results. Then as you go from the mother batch to following 'kid' batches - you can back off into a 10% for maybe batch 3 or 4 when it gets quite thick. Then roll back into the 18% again.
The blog is quite chipper, saying it's not difficult at all. Don't be fooled, I've botched a few batches. Some times I've had batches where half are perfect & the other half are split as curds & whey. I've had a batch where something weird got in them & the surface of 5 of the 8 yogurts had a film of a bumpy growth that should not have been there (this is not the bacteria you are looking for...) But I have had more successes than failures & it gets easier over time.
So how do I feel after eating it?
Well it's so good that I have to share them with my partner who hates his workday without one. The yogurt maker is now almost a permanent fixture on the counter.
The majority of the health improvements are a slow burn. I would rather enjoy eating it on a daily basis & get surprised by a longer life in 60 years with great skin & great bone density than be grumpy that I can't find any immediate effects.
It's called maturity.
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Julia is a Holistic Health Consultant, holding a Double Diploma in Community Support & Addictions Work, is a Certified Transformation Specialist, Personal Trainer & Nutrition Coach & a Lvl 2 Reiki Practitioner. She specializes in Trauma Informed Practice & Resiliency Coaching and Holistic Pregnancy & Postpartum Health Coaching. PrettyAggressiveRecovery@gmail.com
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