The entire premise of my OP depends on acknowledging this perverse fact.
It’s no wonder everything is going down the tubes.
Let’s ask whomever posted this on a blog so they must be an expert.
I’m a degenerate, too. I love vanilla yogurt and I don’t care who knows!!!
HAAAhahahahahahahaaaaaaa!!! 
Vanilla is common because most Americans think vanilla is synonymous with plain. Which, yes, is in fact degenerate.
I love yogurt and have tried many different varieties. Particular favorite flavors are caramelized fig, black cherry and blood orange. I enjoy plain yogurt, which I generally have in the fridge, with unsweetened cocoa once in a while too.
I imagine in 50 odd years of yogurt eating, and sometimes making, I have had literally thousands of portions of yogurt. None have been, nor ever will be, vanilla.
Well, i don’t like vanilla yogurt. And i especially hate it when i intend to buy a big tub of plain yogurt, and i accidentally grab vanilla, which is usually the only flavor to come in big tubs.
(If you only buy single serving yogurt, you might not have noticed the ubiquity of vanilla.)
But i imagine it’s sold because people mix it with stuff. They put it on cereal or add their own fruit. And vanilla is a friendly flavor that blends well with other flavors.
Yeah, I was confused by the OP until I figured that part out. With single serving, I find plain often the hardest to find. There have been many times when I just wanted some plain Dannon, single serving since I don’t need a tub of yogurt and I don’t want Greek yogurt for whatever reason, and I just can’t find it. And god forbid you want normal full fat yogurt (unless you’re buying Greek yogurt, then you might have some luck, but even then there have been times I’ve had issues.)
And with vanilla single serve, I often have to go hunting for it. It’s my oldest daughters favorite flavor, and store space will sometimes have 4x the shelf space for, say, strawberry, but only one row of vanilla, which feels like it is out half the time (because clearly it’s more popular than the shelf space allotted to it suggests.) Then again, sometimes it seems with some brands they don’t even stock vanilla.
I did. Do you want to make something out of it? If so, we can settle this thing by taking it to the Pit.
Seriously, my guess it’s because vanilla is considered a flavor that goes with anything (OP excepted). You can mix it with cereal or fruit and to a lot of people, it’s better than plain which is too tangy.
Good point. “Vanilla” is an excuse to add sugar. It may really just be that sweetened yogurt is more popular than unsweetened yogurt, but when they add sugar they also add vanilla flavor because it’s easier to market “vanilla” than to market “sweetened”.
I can’t eat plain yogurt. I eat a lot of it, so I buy the larger containers (1 quart). TJ’s only has two flavors in that size: plain and French vanilla, so I get the latter. They used to have strawberry-banana, which I really liked. They also used to have ordinary (non-French) vanilla, which I liked better than French. Based on some posts upthread, I think I’ll try a full fat plain and see if that is palatable.
IMO the big thing about FF plain is that you can’t be thinking of it as a form of sweet dessert or snack akin to a warmer sort of ice cream. Which is how, IMO, the flavored stuff is marketed and sold.
If you mentally place it in the same category as cheese, cream cheese, or sour cream you can enjoy it for what it is: a tangy protein/fat rich dairy product that’s not in the least sweet-tasting.
At first it may feel weird to eat a half-cup sized dollop of what’s almost but not quite sour cream all by itself. But it works, at least for me. It makes a good topping for baked potatoes too. It’s not identical to sour cream, but it’s similar.
I think of it as sour milk, rather than sour cream. Sometimes i sweeten and flavor it, and eat it like a dessert. Other times, i just have a bowl of it, like a glass of milk, or use it as an ingredient to a sauce, or dollop it onto some other food. I like sour, so i enjoy it.
I don’t eat fat free yogurt, though. I find it chalky and unpleasant.
My husband has a strong preference for regular (unstrained) over Greek yogurt, and has started making it regularly, since i found a decent instant pot recipe. Fresh whole-milk plain yogurt is very nice, in a tangy refreshing way.
Almost as bad as {{shudders}} mango.
Vanilla’s useful as it can be eaten and used in different sweet recipes without imparting too much flavor, or lumps.
Of course, some vanillas are better than others.
The Greek jogurt here includes cream, so I normally stick to vanilla, plain, or whatever special flavor’s on sale. This week is still strawberry/rhubarb.
When I buy yogurt I get the giant vat of plain. That way I can use it to cook and, when I feel like it, put a bunch in a bowl, add a drop of vanilla and a drop of almond extract and swirl maple syrup if I have some and honey if I don’t. Also nuts go good in that too.
I’m a different kind of degenerate.
Since the discussion seems to be broadening to yoghurt pet peeves…
I usually add my own fresh fruit to plain or vanilla, but the one off-the-shelf fruity one I love is fruit-on-the-bottom apple. But I must be in a minority, because it rarely seems to be available. I mean, okay I guess it’s basically just yoghurt with apple sauce, so I could synthesize it from the components. But somehow that’s not quite the same.
When I was a jung’un, there were two major brands of yogurt in the store. One came in a variety of flavors, the other in a variety of “fruit”-at-bottom types. The flavored yogurts were simply icky compared to the ones you had to marble-up before eating.
Oh, I thought that was the Brits who did it. Americans were the ones with tutti frutti, in my recollection.
That is also the reason why there is no vanilla flavoured chewing gum.
Or is there?
I’m partial to fat-free plain Greek yogurt with Splenda, chia or flax seeds, and apple pie or pumpkin pie spice. That and a piece of fruit makes a good breakfast and keeps me happy until lunchtime. Vanilla is an acceptable option.
I find most yogurts to be too sweet because they’re basically fruit-flavored puddings. The artificially-sweetened kind is marginally better, but not by much.
I think chocolate is the worst flavor for yogurt. It’s bitter-sweetness does not go with it.
Welcome back! Glad to see you again!