Freshly made yoghurt, kefir, sauerkraut and kombucha are all great sources of beneficial microbes. The latest findings in science show that it is integral to include these foods in our diet. A healthy gut flora affects everything from our mental well being to our immune system.

But because these products are alive they continue to evolve, and as time goes on, they turn into new and different things that have a different flavour profile and texture.

To stop this from happening, and to extend the shelf life of the product, producers heat treat the products after manufacture or perhaps add a food acid or maybe a preservative.

Which is what Dr Mosley, from Trust Me I’m a Doctor found in his research. He has done numerous studies on probiotics in food. The first looked at 10 probiotic dairy products found on supermarket shelves. 60 per cent of them had nothing living in them.

Dr Mosley was also part of a study that looked at supermarket fermented milk drinks or milk Kefir.

“We got 30 people and we randomly allocated them to one of those yoghurty drinks or drinking Kefir, and when we looked at their poo samples, basically those taking the yoghurt product, there was no discernible change at all in their gut biome, despite having consumed one of these things every day for a month,” he tells SBS.” Whereas those taking the fermented Kefir saw huge changes.”

He says, “The danger is if you buy these mass-produced things, they’ve been pasteurised to death, and therefore there’s nothing there.”

So what’s so great about a longer shelf life.

Shopkeepers love a longer shelf life as it minimises their losses as the product goes out of date.

Distributors love a longer shelf life as they have more time to get the product to market no matter how far away it is.

The large national manufacturer loves an extended shelf life as he can gain economies of scale by using just one big automated manufacturing plant where he can source the cheapest ingredients, packaging and skilled workers.

I personally think there is too much dead food in the supermarket. Think of all of those shelves and shelves of shelf stable jams, tinned food, biscuits, lollies and soft drinks. These foods may supply nutrients but we all know the more living unprocessed food you can eat the healthier you become.

At Mungalli we simply pasteurize the milk before manufacture as it is the law but then we re- inoculate this milk with probiotic cultures that breathe life back into our healthy biodynamic milk.

The yoghurt is then drained through cheesecloth and packed. It’s as simple as that, no further processing needed.

The beauty of supplying a local market is that we can manufacture our dairy products and have them into store within days, whereas the larger manufacturers have to have a much longer shelf life as it has to be trucked all the way around Australia.

Please enjoy some of our living, healthy biodynamic yoghurt made in the same way that has been used in traditional cultures for centuries. It was in fact the longevity of these cultures that first drew attention to these microbe rich foods.