The Yogurt Diaries

If you aren’t from Knoxville or if you have never had the pleasure of visiting Market Square and The Tomato Head, you might be missing out on the eighth wonder of the world. The Tomato Head has a plethora of goodness on the menu and it just so happens  that they also make the best yogurt on the planet. I know there is really no real rubric for me to use to prove my theory, but you will just have to take my word for it. They make this yogurt in house and it’s smooth and creamy and filled with happiness. Then, they add granola (they make that themselves,  too) and local honey and fresh fruit. I’m not sure I can even describe the flavors as they hit your tongue but if I had to try, I would say imagine the first time you ever saw the ocean….you put your feet in the sand, you inhaled the salty breeze mixed with SPF 30, you could hear the crashing of the waves as you slowly walked into the water and felt that first cool wave on your calves, and you smiled and looked out into the horizon and thought, “I want this every day of my life.” Now take that delicious thought and give it a taste. That is the yogurt at The Tomato Head. But before you start putting your shoes on and heading downtown to get your own, stop. This used to be a regular brunch menu item. It was every Saturday and Sunday. It was a toss up each weekend if I wanted Yogurt or Eggrolls with Soysage (that’s vegetarian sausage). Usually, I just got both. And then for some reason, which I’m pretty sure was a cruel twisted joke from the devil himself, just to take away my excess happiness, they took the yogurt off the menu. Permanently!!!! I went months upon months solely on eggrolls for brunch. They are delicious but it’s not the deliciousness that I just described. And then one day, I decided that I would just ask for some yogurt…every time I went in to eat. Coincidentally, my brilliant idea occurred just weeks before my 40th birthday and I kept dropping hints to one of their amazing managers (also, everybody that works there is amazing) and voila! I had birthday yogurt. It was even named “Angie’s Birthday Yogurt.” It really made my day. I didn’t need anything else for the rest of the weekend, but I went Sunday and got more because they still had some. Fast forward 6 months later, I’ve bought boatloads of yogurt and granola and honey and fruit and I’ve tried to recreate it, but like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, it’s just not as tasty when you have to make it for yourself. So I, again, started a one woman campaign for yogurt leaving notes and poems and drawings every time I went in to eat. I’m not sure exactly how many “tips” I left before my final note. I should have taken pictures of all of them because I thought they were pretty entertaining, but apparently I was the only one because I kept writing love letters and I kept not getting yogurt. So my final “note” was apparently the masterpiece. Actually it was more of a threat and if I would have known that it would get the result I wanted, I would have made that the second note I ever left. Here is what it said:

I was hoping to get yogurt in a dignified manner by begging like a normal person. However, I am now stooping to threats. If I don’t get some yogurt soon, I will be forced to start taking “tomato head” nudes and posting on my Instagram.

EX: My naked body + Kepner Melt Tatas = Not a pretty sight

Please don’t make me post pictures wearing a tomato head pizza bikini. I am not a cute size 6. Save us all! And just make yogurt. Please.

And then I signed my name and gave the note to one of the other amazing managers there (because as I said, everyone there is amazing).

Sidenote: The kepner melt is a delicious vegetarian sandwich that is one of the things they are known for. Even if you are a meat eater, you would still like this sandwich.

I also took a picture of the note because I was particularly proud of my brilliant idea that I just came up with on the fly and I posted it on Instagram. It didn’t take long before The Tomato Head commented and told me to keep my clothes on, they would make some yogurt. So needless to say, the following weekend, spoiled me got yogurt. And so did droves of other yogurt fans around Knoxville….. You’re welcome. Then today, as I was perusing the Tomato Head website, because that’s what you do when you’re in love, you get creepy stalker-like to see what’s going on, I found that they, too, have a blog. So I decided to save them a little work and write their next blog for them. (Dear Tomato Head, when this parenthesis ends, that’s where you start your copy and paste. You can thank me later).

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The Tomato Head is proud to announce the return of our beloved yogurt. As it turns out, people miss the fresh taste of happiness on Saturday morning so we have decided to bring it back the last weekend of every month. And because one of our loyal customers loves it so much, we’ve decided to name it after her indefinitely only changing the “occasion” in the middle. We’ve already had “Angie’s Birthday Yogurt,” which we will stick with in October and most recently the “Angie, Keep Your Clothes On Yogurt.” You can check out our Instagram if you’d like to know how that name came about.  Next month in July, we will be featuring the “Angie Shaved Her Head For This Yogurt” and so on and so forth for the remainder of 2016. More importantly, we would like to apologize for taking away your little bowls of happiness for so long and we would like to thank Angie for reminding us that it really is the little things in life that make us happy. So here’s to life, liberty, and the pursuit of yogurt!

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Tomato Head,

Feel free to edit or add to the above blog entry before posting it. It may be a little short. I can work on it if you need me to.  Also, I am very serious about that head shaving thing. You probably do not know the lengths I would go to just to have yogurt, your yogurt, once a month. But if that request is out of the question, I will settle for  yogurt on my birthday weekend (for the remainder of my life), which will be the weekend of October 8th this year and I’ll remind you in advance in future years, as well. Thank you for the yogurt. And thank you for being awesome and amazing!

Your biggest fan,

Angie