Good for your guts (and face and fur)

A sponsored post for Vaalia

A winner has been chosen for this giveaway. Martine won with this comment: “We go through quite a bit of yoghurt in this house , I’m full time carer for my mother and she loves the stuff . In summer with fruit for breakfast and in winter on her porridge . And my live in 18yo grandson loves yoghurt for a snack or in his lunch frozen in summer . Me I eat it as well but not as often as my fellow housemates ?” thanks to everyone for entering!

“Hey girls, I need to take a photo of that yoghurt so please don’t rip…”

Yeah right.

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Yoghurt in my house is an action sport. It literally gets demolished the minute it arrives home from the supermarket, the baby sharks circling the bags the minute they hit the bench looking for something good and if yoghurt is there, that’ll do pig.

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Now that Mags is on board with yoghurt we’ve got a whole new element to the sport, because: it FEELS SO GOOD TO SMOOSH EVERYWHERE. You know those little pouches? You know how sometimes when you are working from home with a baby and lunch time looks like this?

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Yes that’s Playschool on the iPhone while she eats and yes my office chair is a kids high chair at the kitchen island.

Well, those little pouches will give me approximately 2.4 minutes of uninterrupted time.

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Except when they get dropped down into the high chair and a bottom accidentally sits on them and then we have a yoghurt pool situ. Even Frank gets in on the act these days.

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Yoghurt flea treatment anyone?

I’ve been eating Vaalia well before the kids when you know, yoghurt was just this thing you ate. With a spoon. So novel! I think for approximately 2 whole years I had instant porridge with Vaalia passionfruit yoghurt over its back every day for breakfast. And still! I love the stuff.

The creamy texture (almost custard like in its consistency) and flavour has seen me add to cart pretty much every shopping trip for the past 12 or so years. The fact that it’s got 3 probiotics (L. Acidophilus, Bifidobacterium and Lactobacilus GG (LGG®) in it is a bonus. I like it. I also used these when Harps was little as they had a lactose free option for little ones when we were working out her allergies and flare ups with her eczema and asthma.

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Vaalia sent us some of their range to have a crack at which obviously I was like, “DER, no brainer, we’ll be needing a lot. Many thanks”

Here’s what we tried:

Vaalia Kids Tropical Pouch

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This is their newest flavour in the 140-gram pouch. One of these will get thrown into a lunchbox and eaten every time. Mags gave it a crack, although I suspect there was more in her chair and on her pj’s than in her tummy.

You can check out more about it here.

Vaalia Kids Immune Defence Vanilla

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Given the start to the year that we had with illness, I am trying to get as much vitamins and probiotics into the girls as I can. These little pouches (50grams) are perfect for Mags and are a source of vitamins A, D, and B12 as well as the probiotics. They come in packs of 6.

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You can read more about them here.

Vaalia low fat French Vanilla

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This one is for me and my porridge. I like a good creamy dollop on top of my porridge with some fresh berries or a rhubarb compote on top. Might not be the healthiest way to eat porridge but it fills me up for hours. The main problem I have is keeping the sharks off it. Comes in a 900-gram tub.

You can read more about it here.

Vaalia Low Fat Rich & Fruity

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At least every afternoon tea will involve a tub of yoghurt and these 12 x 100-gram packs in 3 different flavours (Vanilla Blueberry, Tropical basket & Luscious Berries) were smashed. Animals!

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You can read more about them here.

All were very much enjoyed by all (including Frank) thanks Vaalia! And the floors now seem to have a permanent thin covering of yoghurt on them thanks to my littlest friend Mags and her love of them every time she eats.

But it’s all very good and well seeing ME eat yoghurt, how about some yoghurt for you. SHOW ME THE YOGHURT! I’m giving away to you guys a $100 Woolworths GIFT voucher to use towards Vaalia products.
To enter just tell me about yoghurt in your family. Does it get eaten by all? Demolished like us? Or savoured just for you? Leave a comment below for a chance to win a $100 GIFT card. You can read the T’C’s here. Giveaway open until 9pm Wednesday 18th May 2016 and open to Australian residents only.

Do you go through litres of yoghurt in your house too?
Ever let your kids play with empty containers as toy, or is that just me?
What’s the best way to stop those circling grocery sharks the MINUTE you get home?

Comments

  1. Have you checked out the sugar in that stuff? Might as well give your kids Mars bars! Not judging, but get upset when manufacturers try to mask it by throwing in the old Bifidus Acidophilus trick… Plain Greek yogurt with a handful of frozen blueberries is so yummy!

    • No judgement taken! Appreciate the feed back Andrea 🙂

    • Totally agree!

    • Unfortunate but true Andrea…and lately I’ve seen the “Greek-style” label on some yoghurts as well…which means “it’s got great texture but we’ve added sugar to make it more palatable to modern taste buds”…so I’ve been telling people to check labels on those as well.

      • Yes. Farmers Union all the way. Accept no substitutes!

      • Ooh, I didn’t know this, I’ve never checked ‘Greek yoghurt’ before and just noticed yesterday the tub I bought was actually called ‘Greek-style’.

    • Agreed also! You can make so many easy and yummy additions to plain Greek yoghurt and I reckon the texture of plain Greek is better than that of many of the runny flavoured ones. My kids like yoghurt with stewed apples/pears with cinnamon, honey and vanilla essence, berries blitzed in the microwave to make a sauce or passionfruit pulp (fresh or from a jar). I also don’t like that the flavoured yoghurts tend to have gelatin and thickeners and other random stuff in them. I do occasionally buy the kids a pouch as a treat/convenience, but for everyday it’s Greek with our own additions.

    • 14.3 grams of sugar in each little tub. Way too much and should be considered a treat. Not suitable for the baby yet at all.

  2. Yogurt gets smashed at my place! Especially by my 15 month old nephew who is an addict.

  3. We go through huge amounts of yoghurt at our place. There is just husband, me & 13 year old but we all love it. It is a frequent after school or after dinner snack. Vaalia is daughters yoghurt of choice & she is unimpressed if we take advantage of whats on special that week & get something else. All fruit yoghurts seem to have a decent whack of sugar but they have lots of good stuff too so kind of balance out & are a good snack in my book. We have the yOghurt (o as in open), yOghurt ( o as in jog) debate here.

  4. We love our “yodet” (as my 2yo calls it) over here. I’m with you – on top of my porridge is the way to go! The baby will be 6mo next week so he’ll also be hoeing into it headfirst very soon no doubt!

  5. My daughter (9mths) loves yoghurt… its a definite trait from her father! He would eat bowls of the stuff if I let him with berries and fruit!! I love it too but in smaller amounts haha 🙂
    Georgia could be almost full but will never pass up some yoghurt with her pear and apple!! 🙂

  6. I love yoghurt. I have it on my breakfast every morning. The kids like it, but don’t love it. My husband thinks it is off milk and refuses to touch it. More for me!!

  7. Michelle says

    We’ve long been yoghurt fans here, but I am recently dairy-free (for my breastfeeding bub) so as well as not being able to eat chocolate (travesty!) I’m off yoghurt for a while too. Breakfast is so tricky!
    My husband takes yoghurt to work every day and my 2yo has it for dessert each night. And when I am brave enough to take the 2yo shopping I often do a dodgy ‘grab a pouch off the shelf and pay for it after’ trick, so I too can get 2.4 minutes of peace!

  8. Keturah Stock says

    My daughter (Harper :)) loves yoghurt. My husband tries to love it to replace the nightly chocolate binge but it’s hit and miss… My son Jalen, he’s now 7, was a yohurt junkie until he was 4. I don’t know if it was a bad experience? A dream? A dodgy batch? But he now can not even be in the same room as it without wanting to be sick! He says its the smell!? So now, if he says he’s not hungry, or he doesn’t want what i’ve made. I say ‘that’s cool baby, perhaps you can just hafve yoghurt’? And he eats his meal no worries! So another reason I love yoghurt – I can bribe with it!
    I love all types of yoghurt, even treat myself with the ridiculously priced CoYo coconut yoghurt every now and then. It’s delicious!

  9. Oooooooh yoghurt!
    I’ve never been a breakfast eater..I know!!!! ? it’s terrible to miss the ‘most important meal of the day’. During my school years my mum was at a loss trying to convince me to eat breakfast before heading out the door. She would often hurl out the old ‘you are NOT leaving until you have eaten something!!!!!’ To which I would protest and eye roll as the rest of the family were scraping every last bit of cereal from their bowl. The compromise came in the form of yoghurt. It was the one thing I was happy to grab from the fridge and consume while packing my bag, doing my hair and generally staring my day. It was yummy, healthy and easy to eat on the run. As a nurse it is still eaten with gusto as my attitude towards breakfast has never improved.

  10. Hey Beth, I wanted to bring attention to the massive global problem we have with single use, ‘disposable’ plastics that are currently choking the seas and environment. Instead of single serves maybe a vat-o-yoghurt decanted into bowls/reusable squeezies etc would be an added message. Your excellent voice, and it’s reach, could be a powerful thing x C

  11. I can’t believe you didn’t mention the Vaalia lemon flavour! It’s like a healthy (ish) lemon curd. Soooooooo yummy. We eagerly monitor the distribution from the foil top to the scrapes at the bottom requiring the use of a spatula so not a morsel of it is wasted. It MUST be evenly distributed almost making use of the kitchen scales. Dishing it out brings lessons of maths, negotiation, sharing and most importantly mindfulness while consuming.

  12. In our fridge right now is Vaalia lactose free for my son who has dairy allergies, vaalia for babies and toddlers for my 9 month old and Vaalia large tub French Vanilla for the rest! It suits us all! Greek yoghurt wasn’t good for my dairy free boy and the vaalia for babies and toddlers doesn’t have as much sugar as LOTS of other things out there on the market for babes.
    Everything in moderation!

  13. Lisa Mckenzie says

    I only eat it sometimes as I’m lactose intolerant but you know who loves it my dog and apparently it’s good for them too!

  14. Karen Edwards says

    Two out of my 3 kiddies eat yoghurt I can’t keep up the yoghurt supply to them they’d eat it for breakfast lunch and dinner if I let them, I love the Vaalia lactose free yoghurt YUM!!!

  15. Melissa Goodland says

    We love yoghurt in this household. My kids would eat it for breakfast lunch and dinner if they had it their way. Love that this brand has good prebiotic just what my kiddies need coming into winter.

  16. I’m with Andrea. The sugar levels in these are insane. It was until I watched the Sugar Film and learnt how to work out how many teaspoons of sugar are in each serving …. Yes I know there is fruit in there and fruit has sugar, but not enough to account for the teaspoons and teaspoons in each serve. Kidding yourself if you think it’s healthy! My kids were addicted to vanilla flavoured yoghurt but I have slowly but surely weaned them off it and they now have full fat Greek yoghurt with some frozen or fresh berries and sometimes a drizzle of maple syrup or honey. No going back for us. I would rather have that and then a piece of cake later 😉

    • I just finished reading The Obesity Code: unlocking the secrets of weight loss by Dr Jason Fung. He says a yogurt has 13 teaspoons of sugar in it! They took out fat and replaced it with sugar. Whole fat is better for you as the sugar gives you a sugar rush, then crash…the full fat ones keep you feeling full longer. I switched to the full fat Greek yogurt as well. And he says eat real fat, butter, coconut oil, lard, olive oil and stay away from corn oil, canola, etc.

      • I agree. We eat full fat dairy and definitely butter not margarine. And we stick to Jalna or Tamar Valley yoghurt with no added sugar.

      • I agree. The sugar outweighs any benefit. Greek pot set yoghurt is the only one without added sugars and beware of ‘Greek Style’. Same with breakfast cereals and juice. You may as well give the kids the sugar bowl. And low fat anything is full of sugar, to give it taste.

  17. We buy the biggest tub of Greek Yoghurt I can get my hands on and flavour it ourselves. I think the boys favourite combo is yoghurt mixed with honey and peanut butter, topped with sultanas and eaten with apple slices {because who says that your spoon can’t be edible too}.

  18. Yogurt has been a favourite in our house from way back. If there is no yogurt in the fridge, I’m in trouble lol

  19. I find the Vaalia low fat range really good. I like that it has sugar as the sweetener, not aspartame or other sweetener.
    I’ve been making my own Bircher muesli with a good granola, some rolled oats, vanilla yoghurt, a grated apple and some cranberries. Mix up the night before then enjoy a delish brekky!

  20. My kids LOVE yoghurt but I’m reluctant to buy it at the moment as the last lot I purchased were mouldy! And they weren’t out of date. I couldn’t be bothered driving all the way back to our local supermarket to change them or get my money back because we live out of town. My children keep asking when am I going to buy yogurt again because they don’t think eating fruit for dessert is as yummy as eating yoghurt!

  21. We love yoghurt at our place. Best thing about the pouch ones, they are so handy on the go and a life-saver especially at the end of a grocery shop trip where you are like “uggghhhh” and the kids are like “arrgghghghgh!”

  22. “What’s the best way to stop those circling grocery sharks the MINUTE you get home?”

    Nail their other foot to the floor ?~!

  23. When I go food shopping I allow my girls to choose a treat for themselves and they always opt for a Valia pouch. Usually vanilla but lately they have opted to try Tropical as well.
    Keeps them nice and quiet while we are strolling the aisles and very little chance of mess too. ?

  24. Angelica says

    Grocery shopping involves getting a yogurt pouch for the 16 month old first and than racing through the store while she sucks the life out of that thing. She hates sitting in the trolley and yoghurt is the only thing that stops the constant trying to climb out action!

  25. Five yoghurt lovers in our house!
    Of yogurt in every variety
    Sometimes need to hide the tubs at the back of the fridge
    Just so I can have a taste late at night when the house is quiet!

  26. Might make us sound like weirdos but yoghurt is a treat and we freeze it. Takes my 5 year olds 20 mins to chip away at it!

  27. Michelle E says

    Beth even though it’s tasty and marketed shamelessly at my kids, we skip the commercial sugar laden yoghurts and buy the big 2 litre buckets of plain Greek yoghurt. I add a little honey, passion fruit off our vine or some natural jam and make little tubs for the kids lunch boxes. We add yoghurt to our soups and curries instead of cream, and we use it on tacos, nachos and anything you would normally have sour cream on. When I can be bothered, I make yoghurt in the thermomix – saves money and makes you feel incredible to produce your own batch ?

  28. Sometimes a fussy husband is harder than a fussy toddler but yoghurt is one thing he will smash! Full fat is our favorite but very limited in it’s flavours so we usually stuck to strawberry. Nothing better!!! ??????

  29. I feel like my family keeps the yoghurt industry in business!! My trolley on each weekly shopping day always includes:

    – at least 1 x 6 pack of vanilla tubs
    – at least 1 x 6 pack of berry tubs
    – 2 assorted 1lt tubs for smoothies and cereal etc
    – 10 x little pouches for lunchboxes
    – 5 of the bigger Vaalia pouches for my high schoooler.

    As you can see, we love our yogurt!

  30. Any kind or flavour of yoghurt goes down a treat in this house. Mr 3 eats a pouch most days, either for breakfast or as his treat for dessert. Hubby and I can smash a big tub in a few days, covering breakfasts through to midnight snacks. No doubt we’ll be adding more into the shopping trolley each week soon enough when the 7 week old starts solids. Yoghurt is just one of those things that permanently lives on our shopping list. The empty tubs usually end up in the garage for hubby to use for random car/garden/guy stuff!

  31. We love it! My kids inhale it just about. One daughte has a packet open before I have even carried the second load in from the car! I don’t buy the big tub often because I have lost my off switch and could seriously eat it in 2 nights. I love the idea of it on porridge- will try in the morning.

  32. Micaela C says

    Yoghurt every single morning for me, topped with homemade granola…yum,yum!

  33. Martine Grant says

    We go through quite a bit of yoghurt in this house , I’m full time carer for my mother and she loves the stuff . In summer with fruit for breakfast and in winter on her porridge . And my live in 18yo grandson loves yoghurt for a snack or in his lunch frozen in summer . Me I eat it as well but not as often as my fellow housemates ?

    • Hi Martine, congrats! You are the winner of this giveaway. I’ll shoot you an email to grab your address so I can get it sent out to you. Thanks for entering! 🙂

  34. We devour the stuff at my place. A squeezy yoghurt (pouch) is often the shopping bribe. I eat it on cereal. The kids eat it in the bath – fruit and yoghurt always gets eaten in the post dinner bath- less cleaning up! Plus I’ve been making a gluten free pizza base using plain yogurt. Live the stuff 🙂

  35. Ummmm not sure I should admit this, but we usually don’t make it around the store without my 2 boys finishing off 1of these pouches each!
    Bless the checkout superstar guys and gals who I always apologise too because they’ve eaten eaten then, they smile, scan and offer to throw out the empty pack! ❤️ My local woollies crew!

  36. Ummmm not sure I should admit this, but we usually don’t make it around the store without my 2 boys finishing off 1of these pouches each!
    Bless the checkout superstar guys and gals who I always apologise too because they’ve eaten them, but they smile, scan and offer to throw out the empty pack! ❤️ My local woollies crew!

  37. My 3 year old has mobility issues and cannot feed himself. These pouches are the only way we can get yoghurt into him and allow him to have some sense of independence. These are the only ones he will eat.

    Also, in the supermarket all 3 (3 kids under 5) have been known to consume them before we get to the check out.

  38. I understand everyone’s concern and each to their own BUT my little yoghini’s are hardcore addicts! It’s great for mixing through mashed avocado or steamed vegetables on those fussy days and their have been mornings where my little ones dirty nappies have a distinct “French Vanilla” smell about them. Like I said, serious yoghurt lovers here!

  39. Sarah Scott says

    I have 2 yoghurt smashing demons in the house (miss 15 is too cool for dairy) and man how good are the pouches for lunchboxes. Even better is my youngest daughter battles far too many chronic illnesses and spends a lot of time on horrid medications. Yoghurt is something she will always eat so regardless of sugar content this mama is happy to always keep it stocked in my fridge!

  40. Dear Beth,
    I love these yoghurts!
    Valia is my fav! I like them for my “funny” gut when I was teaching, my recess was yoghurt (I liked vanilla) with added fruit & crunchy muesli on top.
    The ones in pouches saved my floors at home when the grandkids stayed!
    One of the first independent eating they did!
    Gotta love the dairy!
    Denyse xx ps yoghurt is a multi generational food for good!!

  41. Anna Todd says

    We love yoghurt over here! Miss 13 months uses most of it for her face/hair… No wonder she has such lovely skin! Oh and for art! I’m pretty sure some gets eaten…

  42. Yes please! My daughter has yoghurt pretty much every day and we would love a voucher to try Vaalia yoghurt! It never last very long in our house. I might even try adding some to her porridge In the morning! I never thought of that before! Yummo!!! Thanks for the opportunity to win 🙂

  43. chris simons says

    Ahh yoghurt. One of the few things I don’t eat… I gave up looking for a yoghurt I actually like about 10 years ago.

    My 18 month old loves it, the 5 year old has recently decided he won’t eat it unless its a squeezy pouch variety and hubby eats certain flavours but only occassionally. I almost wish we either all loved it or all hated it.

  44. I’m not a sweet yogurt eater, the smell of the fruity sour dairy product is enough to make me heave….big blobs of Greek yougurt on savory foods I.e pumpkin soup or on any middle Eastern cuisine is different, strange I know. But, the point of my comment is when when my eldest now 5 was diagnosed with a dairy allergy at 6months the only upshot was no yogurt!! Fast forward 4 years & she has outgrown her allergy and taken to fruity yogurt with gusto! Those sachets are a godsend, they stick them in their gob & suck. No dishes or spoons for me to wash up & near to no mess to clean up which has me dry wrenching a lot less!!

  45. With 4 kids, we go through A LOT of yoghurt! .. I’m a sahm but am thinking of going back to work just to pay the yoghurt bills..

  46. I love the vanilla yogurt. I don’t eat much sugar from other foods so I use it as my treat food 🙂

  47. Yoghurt is a healthy food and we highly regard yoghurt as a great source of calcium. Breakfast, lunch on the go and for cooking, yoghurt is undoubtably one of our families favourite foods!

  48. Trying to speak my mind but I think I’m too late. So hello to you from Radelaide.

  49. Yoghurt is a necessity in my household. As soon as I purchase it and go to eat it I discover it has disappeared from the fridge. Everyone loves it, from breakfast, lunch or even dinner. Nothing beats a bowl of Greek yoghurt, some honey and nuts! Yum!!!

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