People have been eating yogurt and its kin for as long as they’ve been milking dairy animals. Milk ferments (like most fermented products) were probably discovered by accident when people left milk sitting in a vessel on a warm day. Although we’ll never know what, or if, our earliest forebears named their primordial batches of fermented milk, we do know that they enjoyed it and kept making more! This tangy curd is one of humanity’s oldest “manufactured” foods, and it was a staple source of nutrition for those same early farmers who first began growing grain in the region we have come to think of as the birthplace of civilization: the Fertile Crescent.
Extending along the northeastern edges of the Mediterranean Sea is the Anatolian peninsula, better known today as the country of Turkey. Just down the eastern coast you’ll find the nations of Syria, Lebanon, and Israel, and even farther toward the rising sun, Iraq and Iran. It was here, in this wide swath of the planet historically known as the Fertile Crescent, that farming first took root. The cultivation of grain eventually gave rise to rustic sourdough bread and robust, albeit low-alcohol, beer. The grain that made these delights possible also made it possible to domesticate and feed livestock — and subsequently, to obtain a supply of nutritious milk.
Goats and sheep are ideally suited to the native forages, weather, and topography of this part of the world. Over time, wild herds were tamed and bred, and they became mankind’s first farm animals. No one is quite sure when humans began to milk these animals, but it’s clear from residues on clay artifacts that fermented dairy products were part of the Neolithic diet by at least 8000 BCE. It’s easy to imagine that dairy might have been a part of our ancestors’ diet even earlier than that, but it was collected in vessels that didn’t survive the travails of time — such as animal skins and tightly woven baskets — providing no evidence for archaeologists to discover.
The Fertile Crescent and surrounding regions (highlighted in yellow below) are considered the birthplace of fermented dairy.
Once humans began harvesting milk, it would have been impossible for them to prevent the milk from naturally fermenting into a thickened, slightly sour product quite similar to our modern drinkable yogurt, buttermilk, and kefir. The myriad wild bacteria and yeasts on the animal’s teats, in the air, and embedded in the surface of containers would have ensured this spontaneous transformation. Different microbes would have been favored depending on the temperature of the day. The cooler the day, the more likely something like kefir and buttermilk would have formed. The hotter the day, the more likely that bacteria related to our modern yogurt cultures would have thrived. It’s no coincidence that yogurt was perfected in the warmest regions of eastern Europe and Asia! Over time and reuse, the fermentation vessels themselves would have become a source of a consistent supply of helpful microbes that eagerly devoured the milk sugars and converted the milk into delicious, healthy, fermented products. Author Anne Mendelson, in her magnificent book Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk through the Ages, coined the wonderful term “Yogurtistan” to describe the contiguous portions of the Mediterranean, Europe, and Asia in which yogurt, kefir, and koumiss (fermented mare’s milk) became cherished staples.
The first dairy farmers had a complicated relationship with milk. After early childhood they, like 65 to 75 percent of the population today, were unable to completely digest the milk sugar lactose. When we are infants and deriving all our nourishment from breast milk, our stomachs provide an enzyme, called lactase, that breaks the lactose molecule into two simple sugars: glucose and galactose. These simple sugars are very easy for our bodies to digest. After weaning, most of us lose the ability to produce this enzyme — a situation properly called lactase nonpersistence but known more commonly as lactose intolerance — as did all of our early ancestors.
Just under 8,000 years ago, some humans started to maintain the ability to produce lactase as adults (called lactase persistence). Surprisingly, it wasn’t our Yogurtistan forebears who developed this ability but farmers farther to the north, where the days and growing season are shorter. This genetic mutation quickly spread, in evolutionary terms, through the regional population. There are various theories as to why, but the consensus is that it took a tremendous amount of genetic pressure for tolerance to develop — in other words, those who were able to digest fresh milk were also more likely to survive and thrive in the northern latitudes.
For the people today who can’t easily process that pesky lactose molecule, the good news is that fermentation reduces its content in milk. While the milk ferments, lactic acid bacteria (LAB) convert lactose, through several steps, into lactic acid and some other by-products. The longer the milk ferments, the less lactose remains in the milk (until the milk reaches a level of acidity that inhibits microbial growth). If the thickened, soured milk is subsequently drained, even more lactose is removed. This would help explain why fermented milk products were first developed in regions where most people historically were, and are today, lactose intolerant.
But wait, there’s more! Once you’ve finished your cup of yogurt or glass of kefir, your digestive system destroys many of the fermentation bacteria and releases more sugar-busting enzymes that are capable of breaking down some of the remaining lactose in your gut. Depending on your degree of lactose intolerance, your body may be able to easily digest fermented dairy products and so fully utilize their health benefits.
Yogurt has gone by many names over its long history of popularity (see the chart at right), but the Turkish words yoğurmak and jugurt, meaning “to thicken” or “to curdle,” are cited as being the likely source of the most popular word now used — yogurt. Yogurt makes an appearance in the writings of Pliny the Elder (that often-quoted Roman author and naturalist) in 100 BCE and in Turkish books written in the eleventh century, where yogurt is described as a treatment for various health maladies. It is reputed to have been a mainstay in the diet of Genghis Khan, and it is said to have been brought to France by King Francis I in 1542. Its widespread use throughout Europe, the Middle East, and Asia is evidenced by the myriad names by which it was, and often still is, known.
The origin of the word kefir remains as mysterious as the origin of the gelatinous clusters of kefir microbes, called grains, themselves. Some people cite Turkish roots that mean “long life” and “good life”; others say it comes from the Old Turkic (a large group of languages from Asia and Eurasia) word köpür, meaning “froth” or “foam.” A Russian website I visited claims it means “pleasure drink.” One thing that is agreed upon is that people from the Caucasus region, between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, have been drinking kefir for a long time. Purportedly, the grains were considered a gift from the prophet Muhammad and were highly valued family treasures not to be shared with outsiders. A movie-worthy tale involving a beautiful young woman, espionage, and a kidnapping explains the true story of how kefir grains were brought out of seclusion and into the modern market in the early 1900s in Russia (see the full story).
|
Nation |
Names for Yogurt |
|
Turkey |
Jugurt, yoğurmak |
|
Greece |
Yiaourti |
|
Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan |
Katyk, madzoon, matsoni |
|
Russia |
Donskaya, guslyanka, kurugna, ryzhenka, varenetes |
|
Lebanon |
Laban, leban |
|
Egypt and Sudan |
Zabady |
|
Iran and Afghanistan |
Doogh, mast |
|
Iraq |
Roba |
|
India and Pakistan |
Dadhi, dahi |
|
Mongolia |
Tarag |
|
Nepal |
Sho, shosim, thara |
|
Finland |
Viili |
|
Scandinavia |
Fillbunke, filmjölk, longmjolk, sumelk, taettem |
|
Iceland |
Skyr |
|
Portugal |
Iogurte |
|
France |
Yaourt |
|
English-speaking countries |
Yoghurt, yogurt |
Yogurt began its rise to its current fame in the early 1900s, when Elie Metchnikoff (or Ilya Mechnikov), a Russian scientist and Nobel laureate, concluded that the good health and longevity of the Bulgarian people could be attributed to the presence of Lactobacillus bulgaricus in the yogurt that was a staple food in their diets. This species of bacteria had been discovered just a few years earlier by a Bulgarian medical student, Stamen Grigorov. Metchnikoff proposed that a diet containing these lactobacilli could ward off the ill effects of pathogenic microorganisms in the gut.
In the early twentieth century, Isaac Curasso and his family fled the Balkan Wars in what is now a part of Greece and moved to Spain. Curasso was familiar with Metchnikoff’s ideas about the lactobacilli found in yogurt. In Barcelona, he saw that many children suffered from intestinal infections, and he believed that yogurt — a Balkan staple — could help them. In 1919 he opened a small business selling yogurt. He named it Danone after his son, Daniel. In 1929 Daniel Curasso opened a yogurt plant in France. (That same year, Colombo Yogurt, founded by Armenian immigrants Rose and Sarkis Colombosian, went into production in Andover, Massachusetts.) A few years later, threats of Nazi persecution forced the Curasso family out of France and to North America, where in 1941 they opened the company still known today as Dannon Yogurt.
For the first few years, Dannon struggled to survive. Then, in the late 1940s, Daniel’s partner, Juan Metzger, made a brilliant marketing decision — add a dollop of jam to the bottom of each cup. Fruit-at-the-bottom yogurt was born and the company prospered. (For a highlights reel of the history of yogurt, check out the timeline.)
There’s a good reason why jam made yogurt a financial success: humans are hardwired to love the taste of sugar. We are genetically designed to crave quick-energy foods in order to survive. However, the vast supply of sugar that is readily available today has outpaced our bodies’ evolution, common sense, and ability to self-regulate. The modern grocery store is the creation of over 100 years of marketing trends, growth, and competition. It is filled with food products designed to taste better, look better, and, most importantly, sell better than any of their competition. Added sugar, reduced fat, extra thickeners, flavor enhancers, artificial colors, new gimmicks — you name it, yogurt has been subjected to it. (Kefir, being the new ferment in town, has yet to see the same degree of interference, but you can bet it’s coming.)
Meanwhile in other parts of the world, including the original Yogurtistan regions, yogurt and yogurtlike ferments began to take on unique regional characteristics — some created by those doing the ferments and others through the influence of naturally present microbes. The most viscous, gelatinous yogurt possible, viili, evolved in Scandinavia and has been recultured and passed down through the generations. In Russia and parts of eastern Europe, a practice developed of baking milk until it has a dark, rich brown color and caramel flavor and then culturing it, often with a crust of mottled milk skin on top, to create ryazhenka. In Vietnam, yogurt is made with a combination of sweetened condensed milk and high-heat-treated milk.
If you visit a typical American grocery store, you will likely find a yogurt section that occupies at least 12 feet of aisle space. (My local Kroger-owned store has a whopping 24 feet of conventional space allocated to yogurts and kefirs, plus 12 feet of “natural and alternative” versions. I had planned on counting the number of brands and flavors, but I didn’t have enough time to do it!) You might not find a single container of plain whole-milk yogurt, and even if you do, it will likely have added thickeners such as nonfat milk powder, guar gum, or carrageenan.
What started out as the ultimate health food is now often a highly processed product with enough sugar to qualify as dessert. You could argue that the probiotics are canceled out by the added sugar, as gut bacteria do not thrive on a high-sugar diet.
When you make your own yogurt, you can avoid all that unnecessary sugar and unwanted additives. You can also use the milk of your choice and — as a bonus to the planet — reduce packaging waste. Furthermore, you can make the healthiest, most pure, most delicious yogurt for a fraction of the cost of the high-end versions you’ll find at specialty grocery stores. The same holds true for all the other dairy ferments we’ll talk about in this book. When it comes to health, flavor, cost, and ecological benefits, homemade reigns supreme.