Brownes natural yoghurt - are they all natural?

Brownes has been busy getting back into the kitchen for the last 18 months working on the new range of Natural, Greek and fruited yoghurt, and launched its new range of yoghurts this month.

I was requested to review some of the new range of yoghurts. I am always on the lookout for new products without harmful additives to review and present to the Additive Free Kids community, so of course I was very happy to!

I was informed that the new yoghurt had been created with a natural recipe that has:

– no artificial colours, flavours or preservatives (more on this to come, we will see how they stack up)
– is thick and creamy
– is gluten and gelatine free
– contains live cultures and real fruit
– is made in WA from WA milk.

Of course, I was keen to give these a try, and with the promise of having spent the last 18 months in the kitchen, hoping that Brownes would have found a winning formula across all their ranges, to be additive free – did they hit the mark?!

Some of them did and some didn’t!

This gets the big tick from Additive Free Kids! Pure, unadulterated, natural ingredients! My kids love it too!

Another big tick from Additive Free Kids! Pure, unadulterated, natural ingredients!

Another big tick! I was excited! Three amazing products in a row! Could Brownes, really have got it so right across the whole range? I should note that out of these three yoghurts, the Greek Honey is my kids favourite!

So, how did the other yoghurts go? Did they make the grade? They looked delicious! Such tempting flavours!

– Vanilla Bean
– Mango Passionfruit
– Apricot
– Mixed Berries
– Peaches and Cream
– Strawberries

I was really hoping that Brownes would be able to deliver across these delicious range!

The verdict? Sadly they weren’t able to deliver. Why? You have three amazing natural yoghurts, just throw some fruit in and voila! Unfortunately it doesn’t work like that.

NATURAL FLAVOURS

The one thing in common that all of these yoghurts had that didn’t pass the test was “Natural flavours“. Discussions were had with Brownes food technologists to get to the bottom of what was included in this vague ingredient label.

As the legislation currently stands, codes for additives within flavours do not need to be disclosed unless they are in the 6 series of numbers ie 621 etc. I was assured that the natural flavour within Brownes yoghurts did not contain these numbers.

I was reliably informed (as I already knew) that “the actual substance and complexes of the natural flavour are not required to be disclosed as they are proprietary ingredients of the fruit supplier“.

OTHER INGREDIENTS TO KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR

Some of the yoghurts also included Sodium citrate and citric acid. Whilst these ingredients are deemed safe for most of the population, those that are sensitive to MSG may wish to avoid.

CONCLUSION

So, what this says to me is that I have no idea what is included “Natural Flavours”. I would have to draw the conclusion that “natural flavours” have not been made from real food (otherwise they would be listed on the ingredients panel).

Our aim with Additive Free Kids is to encourage consumers to purchase products from manufacturers that are transparent in their ingredients listing and that use real food in their products. Unfortunately, I would be unable to recommend the yoghurts that contain “flavours” or “natural flavours” to our community.

I commend Brownes on having performed extensive research to gain a great understanding of what consumers and shoppers are looking for when buying yoghurt. Brownes recognised that the trend towards ‘natural’ is growing. Brownes knows that their current range of yoghurts were simply not giving WA families what they needed or wanted in yoghurt, so they worked hard to deliver a recipe that is both natural and best tasting.