GFCFSF Yogurt: Turtle Mountain's "So Delicious"

I heard about the Turtle Mountain So Delicous "cultured coconut milk" (yogurt) on the GFCFKids Yahoo Group. I was excited because, although a friend gave me her yogurt maker, I had been unable so far to make my own GFCFSF yogurt (although I know it's possible). I found these at our local Whole Foods and was excited to try them. Success! My kids liked them!

Before I got TOO excited, though, I checked with the company. Since I know they also make soy yogurt, I was thinking they probaby used the same equipment for both the coconut and the soy yogurts.

This is the reply I got from Joey Garland, Consumer Relations Coordinator, Turtle Mountain, LLC, on July 30, 2008:

Thank you for your email regarding our products. I am happy to inform you that our cultured coconut milk products are all gluten free, casein free and soy free.

We do not use separate lines; however, we have very stringent cleaning and testing procedures that we use. I would like to direct you to our website with our allergen information and testing procedures and I am including the link as well (click HERE).

If you have further questions you can email our Quality Control Manager, Mark Clute (click HERE for his email).

I did have further questions about the shared lines, so I wrote to Mark Clute. Here is the reply I got from him on August 7, 2008:

To respond to your questions, we run soy milk on the same lines as we do the coconut milk, but before we run coconut, we properly clean the lines. This involves a hot water rinse, caustic wash, acid wash, hot water rinse and sanitizer. Then we test the rinse water to verify that there is no soy left on the lines. The test is an ELISA test that measures down to 10ppm. We also test the mix base to verify that it has no soy proteins in it.

These tests verify that the products do not have soy in them.

As a company we understand how important and serious this issue is to customers such as yourself and therefore do everything to prevent any contamination.

To me, this quality control process sounds reasonable and protective, and I was pleased with their customer service. In my book, this is a "company to trust" and I have been buying their cultured coconut milk since then.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Be careful when you purchase this to make sure you're getting the one that says "cultured coconut milk." My hubbie went shopping last week and came home with 1 cultured coconut milk and 4 soy milk yogurts by the same company. Since they're on the shelf next to each other, you have to be careful you're getting the right one.

ANOTHER NOTE: This company also makes a coconut ice cream, so check out your freezer/ice cream section. Our Whole Foods didn't have any GFCFSF the last time I checked, but when I visited my mom in Chicago, I went to her Whole Foods, and they had a french vanilla flavor that was AWESOME! My kids had that plus some GFCFSF chocolate cupcakes I had made, and they were all set to celebrate their uncle's 40th bday while the rest of the people ate ice cream cake.