Do not ask me why, but recently I purchased some commercially made yogurt.  I know, I know, I make my own now, so why did I buy it?!  Ummmmm, not sure, possibly guilt that the kids did not have choices in yogurt flavors, or could be that the store had coupons, or some combination there of.  Any way, I bought some, and that may have been the beginning of the end.

I will admit, once upon a day I really liked Yopl**ecchh, but now, not so much.  All I could taste was this super sweet chemical flavor, and it even felt strange in my mouth, not rich and creamy, bleechhhh!!  So I have learned my lesson, no more commercial yogurts in the grocery cart, only locally made ones, or my own.

Still have the dilemma of favors, the kids, being kids, get bored with plain yogurt, so now I need to mix it up a bit, create some new flavors, find some fun and tasty new ways for the same old goodness.

Back to El Wizard Google for a hunt, and lo and behold I have found a few fun ideas for creative yogurt flavors, minus the jello mix in type ones.  A yummy sounding one was to add instant coffee to the milk before heating it up, then culture it with the coffee right in it, hmmmm, can anyone say “Oh Yeah!!” I have got a few Ethiopians who will go nuts for this!!  Or mixing in molasses or maple syrup to the milk before putting it in to incubate, the Vermonter in me sits up and takes notice:-). How about putting  pumpkin butter into the finished product, sounds pretty yummy too, or placing some nutmeg or cardamom into the milk while it is heating, mmmmmm.

If the flavors of yogurt are not enough to get their taste buds dancing how about this, drain the yogurt until it is yogurt cheese, then make it into frozen yogurt or cheesecake, wowza, that is just amazing!,

This may be a very bad idea to experiment with all of these flavors(for my hips at least), but for my kids I am willing to subject myself to all kinds of torture.  Any one else with me, for the sake of our kids and their oh so refined palates, of course!!!