I’ve gotten way, wayyy too familiar with the sight of teal mould on the inside of my yoghurt pots. OK, I might take my time making my way through the container ― but surely this is a disproportionate response to the sin of buying for one?
Luckily, though, it seems that there are ways around the dairy dilemma.
Aside from keeping crumbs and other food particles out of the yoghurt pot, ensuring the container is airtight, and keeping your fridge as cold as possible, there’s another (unusual) way to prevent yoghurt from going off prematurely or crystallising ― and it works for cottage cheese, ice cream, and sour cream too.
Turning the container upside down could keep it fresher for longer
The odd-sounding hack actually follows a pretty sound logic. As Country Living says, turning the container upside-down creates a vacuum “that inhibits the growth of bacteria that causes food to spoil.”
The lack of air at the top of the container also means that crystals are less likely to form. Of course, you’ll want to make sure your container is firmly sealed before you flip it upside down ― we don’t need a dairy-drenched fridge, ta very much. You can place the opened tub on a saucer to be double-sure if needed.
“Once you open yogurt, it’s best within five to seven days, but it can be stretched to about two weeks,” Food & Wine shared. So, if you can potentially double the shelf life of your beloved Greek yoghurt, why wouldn’t you?
There are other fridge hacks, too
If you’re looking to keep the other contents of your fridge fresh, too, consider keeping eggs and milk away from the shelf in your fridge door.
This is because opening and closing your fridge door on the reg (which I’m definitely guilty of) makes the temperature unstable, providing potentially damaging flashes of warmth.
Another hack is keeping your fridge between 0 and 5°C ― any higher than this and you could risk spoilage and bacteria.
You should keep fruits and veggies separate from each other in the fridge too (yes, really). This is because fruits and vegetables emit different gases that can cause each other to deteriorate.
Look, anything that puts an end to my mid-week emergency supermarket dashes...