Benefits of Yogurt What is Yogurt What's in Our Yogurt Dannon Info Center

Yogurt is a dairy product made by culturing cream and/or milk with live and active cultures. The cultures in yogurt are living organisms. Yogurt that's produced in the U.S. is made with two specific live and active cultures: Lactobacillus bulgaricus (L. bulgaricus) and Streptococcus thermophilus (S. thermophilus). These metabolize some of the milk sugar (lactose) in the milk into lactic acid. This action helps change the consistency of liquid milk into yogurt.

L. bulgaricus and S. thermophilus are required by U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) standards for a product to be called yogurt. Other cultures may be added but are not required. The live and active cultures in DANNON® yogurts are selected by the Culture Research Laboratory at the Daniel Carasso International Research Center.

Because live and active cultures make yogurt what it is, check yogurt labels for these vital ingredients before you buy. Some yogurts have extremely low levels of cultures and others are heat-treated or pasteurized after culturing, destroying the cultures and their properties. DANNON ensures the presence of live and active cultures by pasteurizing their milk before cultures are added. Yogurt should be eaten within the week following the "sell by" date in order to take full advantage of the amount of live and active cultures present in the yogurt at the time of manufacture. Most DANNON cup yogurt products carry the National Yogurt Association's Live and Active Cultures (LAC) seal. This seal identifies those products that contain significant amounts of live and active cultures (at least 100 million active cultures per gram at the time of production and at least 10 million at the end of shelf life). DANNON guarantees most of its yogurts meet the LAC standards for active L. bulgaricus and S. thermophilus at the time of purchase. DANNON also adds a third culture to some of its refrigerated cup yogurts - Lactobacillus acidophilus (L. acidophilus). L. acidophilus is one of the three most commonly used cultures in yogurt. Because L. acidophilus levels can't yet be accurately measured in yogurt, L. acidophilus content does not appear on our labels. Source: Yogurt & You, The National Yogurt Association. McLean, VA, 1993. Nutritional Value of Yogurt