Yo Yo, It’s Time for Fro Yo!

When frozen yogurt first came out—in ice cream shops, restaurants, and supermarkets—it was widely considered a super healthy alternative to ice cream, and it sold like, well, ice cream. Unfortunately, many frozen yogurts were high in fat and sugar, and thus, weren’t much different, nutritionally speaking, from their ice cream counterparts.

Luckily, things have changed. These days you can get frozen yogurts made with skim milk for a lower calorie and fat profile, and with Greek yogurt for a slight protein boost. And, many frozen yogurts contain live and active bacteria cultures, one of the factors that makes regular yogurt so good for you in the first place. These cultures, also called probiotics, provide a variety of health benefits, including improved digestive and immune health. To be sure your yogurt contains them, look for the National Yogurt Association’s “Live and Active Cultures” seal on the package. To find out if your favorite shop’s yogurt contains probiotics, check out their website and look at the nutritional information. If you avoid dairy, there are now a few plant-based frozen yogurt options available, as well.

Helpful hints. Keep the following in mind when choosing your frozen yogurt treat.

• Not too hard. If you’re at a shop that offers both soft- and hard-serve, choose the soft. Due to the air whipped into it, soft serve tends to be lighter in weight and lower in calories than the harder, scoopable kind.
• Think about toppings. The most fun part of fro-yo shops is all of those toppings. But the candies and cook-ies can add as much as seven times more calories than fruit toppings! To create an enjoyable treat without the calorie splurge, load up on the fresh fruit.
• Keep size in mind. While portions vary, stick with the smallest size available, as the differences can be sub-stantial. For example, a simple “mini” serving at Pinkberry contains about 100 calories; a large contains nearly 400.
• Consider the sugar. Even though these treats may be yogurt-based, they are still sugary. A small serving may contain around five teaspoons of sugar; a larger serving up to 20 teaspoons or more. (It’s important to note that the grams of sugar listed on the label include sugars found naturally in the yogurt—about 5 grams per one-half cup.) Think of them as an occasional treat instead of a daily habit.

—Heidi McIndoo, MS, RD

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