Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophiles sound like things that would drive you to the health department in search of an epidemiologist or a good dose of penicillin – depending on what you’ve been up to. Despite the fearsome names, these two characters are beneficent parts of the mystical world of probiotics and also essential building blocks of one of the world’s favorite dairy treats, yogurt.
Simply put, Lactobacillus and Streptococcus are friendly cultures that turn warm milk into thick and creamy yogurt. You can see them work in your own home by heating some milk and adding plain yogurt (or a packet of yogurt culture) to it. The culture will grow and thicken and turn milk into yogurt. It’s not as nice as water into wine, but it’s a pretty nifty thing to see. In addition to creating a delicious edible, these cultures, these probiotics help make the food good for you.
Probiotics are good bacteria, the kind that make your gut a better place and, therefore, your life a little better. They help with all sorts of digestion issues and may even have a calming effect on parts of your digestive system that may become irritable from time to time. Nice stuff, probiotics. Though how and how well these particular probiotics really work and what they work on is still under investigation, here at the Tomato Head office of Instagram Affairs we’re pretty certain that, in addition to their many good works in the digestive tract, these particular probiotics, especially as they appear in our house made yogurt, may have an addictive quality for some people and may result in strange behavior in certain individuals.
Consider Exhibit A – our frequent guest and Instagram Stalker Angie posted a photo of a hand written message, one clearly composed in distress. In the note Angie, in the heated throes of yogurt withdrawal, threatens to post a series of “Tomato Head Nudes” that would, she suggests, include some particularly provocative shots with a Kepner Melt.
Like many good things, perhaps our cultured friends Lac and Strep have a dark side – one that grips the very heart of some poor souls, creating desire and diminishing modesty. It’s hard to say, harder still to see.
And so, though the wisdom of complying with such demands is certainly questionable, we became very concerned about the general welfare, especially for our poor and much beloved Kepner. Suppose that we did let Angie post her nudes, and Instagram deleted her account – where would that leave the poor dear? Would she take to Market Square with nothing but a manic smile? So for her own sake, for the good health of the Kepner Melt, and the peace of the realm, we yielded.
And yet, Angie’s need goes unassuaged. Soon after we helped her avoid a citation for public indecency, Angie began again. This time she threatened to shave her head, which, of course, isn’t really a threat – some of our favorite people have already shorn their wavy locks in favor of a clean and lean pate, one that’s free of gel, scrunch and other life complications of the hirsute. Instead, we see this as a sign of progress, of hope, of healing. So again we offer yogurt.
She also wrote a special post for us to include here. And since artistic expression is often a part of the healing arts, we’d like to share Angie’s own words with you:
“The Tomato Head is proud to announce the return of our beloved yogurt. As it turns out, people miss the fresh taste of happiness on Saturday morning so we have decided to bring it back the last weekend of every month. And because one of our loyal customers loves it so much, we’ve decided to name it after her indefinitely only changing the “occasion” in the middle. We’ve already had “Angie’s Birthday Yogurt,” which we will stick with in October and most recently the “Angie, Keep Your Clothes On Yogurt.” You can check out our Instagram if you’d like to know how that name came about. Next month in July, we will be featuring the “Angie Shaved Her Head For This Yogurt” and so on and so forth for the remainder of 2016. More importantly, we would like to apologize for taking away your little bowls of happiness for so long and we would like to thank Angie for reminding us that it really is the little things in life that make us happy. So here’s to life, liberty, and the pursuit of yogurt!”
This weekend for brunch we are, in fact, offering Mahasti’s delicious “Angie Shaved Her Head For This Yogurt” with all of its probiotic impact – not just for Angie but for all people of good heart, good taste and good gut health. The yogurt will be loaded with good stuff, lots of fruit – Angie, we suspect, will provide the nuts.