A Fresh Take on Yogurt

Here’s a new take on the ubiquitous yogurt trend: when Culture: An American Yogurt Company opens later this month, it will hawk not only frozen yogurt, but fresh yogurt as well.

“We really think that yogurt can be eaten any time of day,” said Jenny Ammirati, who is opening the shop on Fifth Avenue between Third and Fourth streets with her husband Gino.

Culture will boast four types of yogurt: a thick, Greek-style strained yogurt, the thinner Swiss-style yogurt, drinkable yogurt, and of course, frozen yogurt.

All of the yogurt will be made in house (in the “yogurt room”) from hormone and antibiotic free milk trucked in from upstate New York. But most interestingly, the yogurt will be made from a yogurt culture that Ammirati developed especially for her shop, along with a little help from a Wisconsin farm that specializes in milk cultures.

“It’s smooth, its creamy, its thick, its tangy and a little tart,” said Ammirati.

The shop’s yogurt will be available in low-fat or whole-milk. Most yogurt will come only in plain flavors, but Ammirati is cooking up a variety of toppings to pair it with. She’s keeping most flavors under wraps, but revealed one: key lime pie, complete with a graham crumble.

"The toppings will be a very big part of it," she said.

Ammirati, a reformed finance professional, first got hooked on yogurt while doing an externship at Thomas Keller's Bouchon Bakery after studying to be a pastry chef.

“We were eating a lot of yogurt, and we thought, ‘Why don’t we try to make this at home?’” she said. “I feel like it’s not a hard leap from pastries.”

Ammirati will make everything in house, from the yogurt and the compotes and crumbles to top it with, to pastries.

“Yogurt is definitely an art,” she said.