Piling on the Pounds with Fro Yo Swirled Frozen Yogurt

Sometimes a misconception can lead you into a lot of trouble and at other times, the results can be quite subtle. This is what happened to a friend of mine recently when she discovered that she had gained five pounds in weight and could not understand how. It seems that she had been told that fro yo was healthy and so she had been eating froyo frozen yogurt every day. I don’t meant that she was eating fro yo frozen yogurt at every meal, but just that she had been getting through tubs of fro yo swirled frozen yogurt as a dessert for weeks!

The main reason for the confusion was the way that frozen yogurt has been marketed. You only ever hear about how much better for you fro yo is than ice cream and how it is a healthier alternative dessert than many others. This can be misleading and for someone on a diet, or someone who has a sweet tooth, the thought of a dessert which is not bad for you can make them get very happy and excited. The thing to do is to try and find out a little bit about anything new which appears on the market and which sounds too good to be true.

While it is true that froyo frozen yogurt is made from milk and not from cream, as is the case with ice cream-hence the name, it still contains calories. A lot of people tend to get confused with the terms low fat and low calorie. If something is low fat, it can still be high in calories which are not good news for anyone. Even I started to think that a bagel was healthy because it was advertised as 97% fat free, but then I checked it out and saw how many calories it contained. Then you have to think about the extra things such as the butter and cream cheese without which a bagel seems to be incomplete.

The scenario is the same for fro yo frozen yogurt and there are certain things that you need to know about it. Sometimes it can be better to have a small scoop of ice cream instead of fro yo, depending on the company you choose and the way that you have it served. The problems arise when you start to add extra toppings such as fruit, nuts, sauce and sweets or sprinkles. Also the portion size tends to become a bigger problem because people think that since it is low fat, they can have more of it.

Even some flavours of fro yo swirled frozen yogurt can be very high in calories, as my friend found out. These days there is no excuse for saying that you did not know about something or the other. We live in an age where almost all information is readily available to us with just a few clicks of a mouse, or by typing in a few words on our laptops or even our phones.

Keeping an Eye on the Calories in Fat Free Frozen Yogurt

It seems as though half the world is starving and the other half is constantly on a diet. This is the impression which you get from the media and since it is such a powerful tool, the images created by the media can be long lasting and change the way that people think and behave. Let us take for example the way that so many people have started to choose low fat frozen yogurt as a dessert option, thinking that there are fewer calories in frozen yogurt than in ice cream.

Although it is true that when it comes to calories frozen yogurt does have the edge, the thing that people tend to forget is that if they eat twice the amount then the benefits are lost. This is also the case if you start to make unhealthy selections of toppings on your low fat frozen yogurt. The calories in fat free frozen yogurt come mainly from the additional sauces, sweets and even fruit which are chosen.

While frozen yogurt can taste tarter than ice cream, it is lower in fat than ice cream because of the substitution of pure milk in the place of heavy cream. This emphasis on a treat that is a little bit healthier is why frozen yogurt is more than a craze. As recently as the 1990s, it made up 10 per cent of the whole dessert market. Whereas ice cream contains a lot of sugar and salt to add taste to the final product, frozen yogurt allows for the substitution of ingredients like honey or agave nectar in place of sugar. While frozen yogurt is still not as healthy as normal yogurt, other benefits that it includes are more minerals and nutrients than regular, traditional ice cream.

Although the number of calories in frozen yogurt will vary from company to company and for each different flavour, in general a half-cup serving of whole milk frozen yogurt contains 110 calories. The same amount of regular ice cream contains 134 calories. A half-cup serving of low-fat frozen yogurt contains 107 calories, and a half-cup serving of low-fat ice cream contains 114. This is just a rough guideline and some companies produce low fat frozen yogurt which can contain up to 160 calories for a half-cup. The flavour will affect the final calorie count, but the most important thing to remember is the addition of toppings, and portion size.

Things such as nuts, hot toppings like caramel or hot fudge, candy toppings like sprinkles or crushed candy bars, fruit toppings like strawberries, and even more creative toppings like brownie bits will push the number higher than you would like to think. By all means choose consider the calories in fat free frozen yogurt carefully, but remember that if you only have it as an occasional treat, then you can afford to let the calories be high sometimes. This does not mean that you should pile your cone or cup up with every kind of topping available.

Chocolate Brownie, Frozen Yogurt and Bananas Taste Great Together

There are some combinations in this world which are just meant to be and I have found that chocolate features in a lot of these! There are not many people around who can honestly say that they hate chocolate and one of the latest combinations which I have found to a success is the chocolate brownie frozen yogurt and fresh fruit. Even chocolate flavoured sauce frozen yogurt and bananas go well together.

Chocolate fro yo (frozen yogurt) and chocolate sauce frozen yogurt and a spoon are often quite enough to make small children very happy. Wonderfully rich, chocolate frozen yogurt is a great treat for both children and adults alike. The taste is like chocolate cream pie filling with a bit of tang from the yogurt. There is lots of calcium, but it is low in fat and calories, well lower than ice cream anyway. It is also easy to make at home and you do not have to be an expert in the kitchen to be able to rustle up this sweet treat. Here is a very simple recipe for four servings:

Ingredients needed;

• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 2 teaspoons corn starch
• 1 (12 fluid ounce) can fat-free evaporated milk
• 1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 cup plain low fat yogurt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method used;

1. Stir together the corn starch and sugar, and place in a saucepan. Stir in the evaporated milk, and chocolate chips. Cook over medium heat until chocolate is melted and the mixture is thickened. Stir constantly to prevent burning.
2. Remove the mixture from the heat, and stir in the plain yogurt and vanilla. Refrigerate until chilled.
3. Pour the mixture into an ice cream maker, and freeze according to the manufacturer's instructions.
4. If you do not have an ice cream maker, then just freeze in the freezer and make sure that you keep stirring it every hour or so.

Yogurt adds nutritional goodness, a distinctive taste, creamy texture, and wonderful moistness to your cooking. The possibilities range from simple combinations of yogurt and fruit to dishes made with Greek yogurt or homemade yogurt cheese. No matter what food you’re making, there are just a few tips and precautions to observe in cooking with yogurt:

•  Yogurt can be used in dips and dressings—as a substitute for mayonnaise or sour cream in equal amounts—to reduce calories and fat.
• Yogurt is a useful addition to marinades; its high acidity helps tenderize meat.
• Yogurt can be used in place of sour cream or heavy cream in sauces and in stove-top recipes. However, never add yogurt directly to a boiling or extremely hot mixture—heating yogurt over 120° F destroys the beneficial bacteria.
• Avoid using aluminium products when cooking with yogurt, as the acidity of yogurt can react negatively with aluminium.

Even if you decide that you do not like chocolate flavoured sauce frozen yogurt, you can still enjoy the goodness of yogurt in a variety of other ways, both sweet and savoury.

Frozen Yogurt for Kids is Better than Many Other Desserts

Yogurt is one of those foods which are of great benefit when it comes to matters of health and in some cultures; it is used as a part of religious or cultural ceremonies. These days, it is recommended that yogurt is not given to infants until they are a year old, as is the case with fresh milk. However, frozen yogurt for babies is fine as long as the child is over seven months old, because it has different properties from fresh yogurt. So frozen yogurt for baby is fine and there are various ways to serve it.

There are also companies which make special frozen yogurt for kids and this is often touted as a healthy alternative to ice cream. Do not let this fool you in to believing that frozen yogurt calories are non-existent because the only main difference is the amount of fat which there is between the two. There are frozen yogurt flavours which do have considerably fewer calories but then there are others which are quite sweet.

Tips for cooking with yogurt;

Cultured foods, such as yogurt, make for incredibly moist baked goods. While you will not get the health benefits of the bacteria, yogurt will still provide valuable nutrients such as calcium and protein. Using yogurt as a substitute for buttermilk, sour cream, or butter will also reduce the calories and fat. Freezing yogurt doesn’t harm the bacteria.

Heating yogurt too rapidly can cause it to separate into curds and whey. You can avoid this unappetizing prospect by warming the yogurt at least to room temperature before adding it to hot mixtures, and by heating any yogurt mixture slowly, stirring constantly.

To thicken sauces, add a little arrowroot or flour (1 or 2 tablespoons per cup of yogurt) mixed with cold water. If adding yogurt to your salad dressing, dip, or cold soup thins it out too much, simply chill the mixture for an hour or two to thicken it. Yogurt should be folded into other ingredients. Over stirring will thin it out.

When it comes to serving yogurt as a dessert, you can give just plain with fruit, either fresh or stewed, or as the growingly popular frozen yogurt For babies, especially those who are teething it is a good idea to freeze small cubes of yogurt and then let the baby chew on it to help ease the pain of teething as well as getting some food down them.

Frozen yogurt calories may be quite low, but you need to be aware of the way that the additional toppings you add to a bowl of frozen yogurt can make the calorie count spiral. It is best to choose from frozen yogurt flavours which have fewer calories and then add fresh fruit or a few nuts to it. The main things to avoid are the heavy chocolate sauces and the sprinkles and let us not forget about the marshmallows and other sweet treats to tempt the children, and let’s face it, the adults also!

Have You Ever Tried Blueberry Frozen Yogurt as a Dessert?

Last year I took the kids to a farm where you could pick your own fruit and they had a great time, not only in the actual picking of the fruit and the chance to run around a farm, but also in the farm shop where I spent a lot more than I had thought to. Apart from selling the fruit such as strawberries, apples and blueberries flavoured frozen yogurt was also available. This was something new for the kids and the blueberry sauce frozen yogurt was soon an instant hit.

Blueberry frozen yogurt is not the only flavour which was popular and since then I have found that frozen yogurt is a very popular dessert in my household. This is fine with me since it is a healthier alternative to ice cream and is much better than many of the other desserts which are available and all of which have found their way in to my kitchen at some point or the other. Frozen yogurt is virtually fat free and the problems tend to arise when you start adding the various toppings which are available.

Another thing to remember is that frozen yogurt is not actually a health food as some people seem to thinks so. Although it does contain yogurt, which is healthy and good for you, it does contain things such as different types of sugars which are bad for you. It may not contain as much fat as ice cream but it is still not very healthy, especially if you have a lot of it. One of the reasons that frozen yogurt seems to be healthier than ice cream is that it is not as rich and sweet, giving the illusion that it is not fattening.

Anything is fine in moderation and this goes the same for desserts. You should not deprive yourself of the occasional sweet treat, unless it is on doctor’s orders. This will only increase your cravings and you will find yourself reaching for the first sweet thing that you can find. This is why it makes sense to have a tub of frozen yogurt in the freezer, as it will give you that sweet kick, but is not as bad as a bar of chocolate or a bowl of ice-cream. There are so many flavours of frozen yogurt around these days that you can be spoilt for choice.

A lot of people have found that it is easy to make blueberry frozen yogurt at home and this way you can control the things which go in to it. If you freeze bought yogurt, read the ingredients to check for sugars and fats. Some of the toppings which are popular but raise the amount of calories consumed include nuts, chocolate chips, chocolate sprinkles, wafers and various sugar based sauces. The best thing to add is fresh fruit, and but you should avoid things such as bananas and mango if you are in a position where you have to keep an eye on the calories.

Naughty and Nice – why fat free fro yo is the ultimate sinless snack

It’s a familiar problem for dieters and healthy eaters everywhere. What do you do when you want a special treat that feels luxurious but which won’t pile on the pounds?

Let’s face it, even the most diligent of us deserves something decadent from time to time – and there are days when only something sweet will do. For many people low calorie frozen yoghurt can provide a full-flavoured answer – giving you all the delicious taste of a dessert with much less or in some case, no fat at all and fewer calories than other treats.

Forget cakes, biscuits or even ice-cream, choosing low calorie fro yo means you can enjoy a little taste of luxury, a delicious pudding or an indulgent afternoon nibble, that won’t leave you feeling empty but won’t break your diet either. And as consumers become ever more aware of the need to eat healthily it’s a very modern way to get a sweet tooth fix that has far fewer calories.

As the UK’s number one fro-yo brand yoomoo is an expert in creating amazing, low calorie frozen yogurt that tastes as wonderful as it looks. With fewer calories than more traditional snacks like ice-cream or normal, full-fat yoghurt, it represents a fabulous way to enjoy something that’s naughty and nice. Their yoomoo bars offer a great range of flavours, toppings and sauces too, meaning consumers will never be short on choice either, and in three sizes of servings means you there’s a tub to match every appetite.

So how calorific is low fat and fat-free frozen yogurt? How many calories are there in yoomoo’s wonderful fro yo products?

Well, the simple answer is not very many.

Whereas a small, 100ml serving of traditional ice cream typically contains 200 - 300 calories, the same size serving of yoomoo’s fat free vanilla yoghurt weighs in at just 93 calories – a hefty difference. Even their super-rich chocolate flavour only contains 140 calories (compared to the equivalent in ice cream) making it a fantastic way to answer your cravings!

Toppings can be an important too. Choosing one of yoomoo’s fresh fruit toppings can ensure your dessert stays low-calorie and remains a completely sinless snack. Add in the fact that all of yoomoo’s products are made exclusively from natural ingredients and are packed with probiotics and it makes them a healthy option in more ways than one.

Healthy eating website, livestrong.com recommends opting for yogurt-based treats as a way of maintaining weight and shaping up. As they explain: “Yogurt, especially non fat and low-fat varieties, offer considerable health benefits. Subbing ice cream for yogurt can work successfully in any healthy weight loss plan.”

As yoomoo co-founder, Amanda, explains: “yoomoo is all about making fro-yo fun, edgy, and tasty, while keeping it healthy.

“The yoomoo range is guilt free! All our products are made from British milk and are suitable for veggies, with nothing taken out and no room for nasties! Our at home pots are naturally low fat and our yogurt bar fro-yo is deliciously fat free, so yoo really can moo with peace of mind.”

When to Start Giving Frozen Yoghurt for Babies

When we were small we were told that we need to drink a lot of milk in order to grow well. While this is true, in this day and age we need to find alternative ways to get the goodness of dairy products into children, such as flavoured milks, yoghurt and the latest treats  frozen yoghurt for kids.

In recent years it has come to light that many children are lactose intolerant and that the one thing which we have always believed to be the best natural food- milk- is to blame. When I had my children I was told that they should not be given fresh milk until they were a year old. However, products made from milk were fine to give once the child was over 7 months, such as rice pudding, custard and yoghurt.

The cultures in yogurt decrease the lactose and help break down the hard-to-digest milk proteins. This is why babies can eat yogurt, but not drink milk, before one year, but this recommendation is for the baby who has no history of dairy sensitivities or allergies. In many cultures, yogurt is actually one of baby’s first foods! There are many companies which now provide frozen yoghurt for baby palettes. There are different ways of serving up frozen yoghurt for babies and these can lead to some messy fun.

Ideas on how to serve frozen yoghurt to your baby:

• Spoon some into a bowl and let baby practice using a spoon!
• Pop some into a mesh feeder and let baby chew on it – great to soothe teething gums too!
• Using a Popsicle mould, give baby the pop on the stick – ensure that you keep watch as the frozen treat is eaten so that baby doesn’t hurt herself with the pop stick!
• Using ice trays, pop out the frozen yogurt cube and let baby eat it with his hands. Most babies love to feel the cool cube in their hands!

When it comes to getting children to choose between unhealthy ice cream and the healthier frozen yoghurt, flavours are the key to success. You need to make sure that you offer a wide range of interesting flavours and that the frozen yoghurt tastes just as rich and creamy as the ice cream which children will always prefer.

If you are making frozen yoghurt at home, then get the kids involved with the preparation. Children love to eat things which they have helped to make, so get them to give you a hand with the mixing and the preparation of the fruit to add the flavours. They will enjoy pouring into containers and moulds and allow them to make suggestions as to the frozen yoghurt flavours they would like to try.

Frozen yoghurt for kids is a healthy dessert and especially if you make it at home, you can control the amount of sugar and fat which it contains. There are also healthy versions of frozen yoghurt for babies which are available in the market to buy.

The New Cool Choice – Why Frozen Yoghurt is Britain’s Hottest Healthy Option

We’re all looking for ways to enjoy a well-deserved treat – without breaking our diet or feeling guilty.

So it’s little wonder that frozen yoghurt is busy taking UK consumers and our tastebuds by storm.

In the last few years the US favourite has been becoming a massive hit here too. And as ice-cream sales melt away (down seven per cent since 2007) frozen yoghurt, or ‘fro yo’ as those in the know call it, is taking over as the new cool option.

Since 2010 sales of the low-fat dessert have soared by an astonishing 50 per cent – fuelled by the success of leading frozen yoghurt brands like yoomoo.

The brand arrived in London three years ago, helping to boost popularity and consumption of products including low fat and plain frozen yoghurt.

Since then their combination of natural, great-tasting fro-yo and elegant, on-trend yoghurt bars have given a massive boost to UK fro-yo sales, seeing them rise from £4 million to a staggering £6 million a year.

yoomoo has become a byword for great-tasting, indulgent but low-fat food and experts are predicting that with their help, thefrozen yoghurt market could be worth as much as £150 million by 2013.

For their part, fans say they love the fact that the number of calories in frozen yoghurt is much lower than similar-tasting products like ice cream (a typical serving of yoomoo low fat frozen yoghurt is only 102 calories) and with less than three per cent fat it’s certainly an ideal substitute for anyone looking to choose a healthier option or watch their weight.

As if that wasn’t reason enough, all yoomoo’s frozen yoghurt products are made from British milk and are suitable for vegetarians too, meaning they can be enjoyed by a huge range of customers.

As you’d imagine for a treat that first became popular in California, fro yo has always been popular with celebrities (Keira Knightly is said to like hers with a healthy sprinkling of choc chips) and the showbiz connection is another reason for its unseemingly unstoppable rise across the UK and beyond.

As Chris Brockman from global market research company, Mintel, explains: “Frozen yoghurt has a number of things going for it. It is a healthier alternative to ice cream and is particularly well connected to young consumers through innovative flavours.”

yoomoo co-founder, Amanda agrees. Inspired by the desire to create healthy, wholesome treats, she says: “First and foremost, we’re on a mission to create healthy, guilt free frozen yogurt which is free from nasties and made from fresh British milk.

“It is a relatively new concept for the UK, although it has been established in other countries for many years because of its role as a zero-fat alternative to other snacks.

“It is a category set for expansion and a brand that holds significant promise.” With sales set to hit triple figure millions any day now, there’s no denying that this is one food favourite that’s set to be with us for a long time yet.

Learning about Nutrition Facts for Frozen Yoghurt is Simple

Many years ago, food was sold in containers which were simply to hold the food and drink in until the product reached the intended destination. However, that changed with the advent of food labelling and packaging. These days, the containers in which food is served also serve the purpose of educating people about the contents. For example, you will find the nutritional value of frozen yoghurt on the side of each tub.

Nutrition facts, frozen yoghurt or for anything, now play a large role in the way that we shop and in the choices we make when we are buying food for our families. We are all more aware these days of making healthy choices and so we need to make sure that we check each label before we make a purchase. These labels make it clear as to the amount of calories and nutrients which our food contains and it is sensible to compare a few different brands and types of each food before you choose, especially when buying a new product.

Frozen yoghurt is a cream free dessert made from yogurt and other dairy products. It is served in various flavours along with fresh fruit (banana, mango, kiwi, blackberry, strawberry, blueberry, and pineapple), dry fruit (raisins, almond, coconut) and liquid (honey, pomegranate juice) toppings. It is considered to be a low fat alternative to ice cream and a rare dessert to be counted amongst healthy foods.

Calories in frozen yoghurt

The calories in a single serving of frozen yoghurt will vary depending upon the type you choose. One large scoop of regular or low-fat frozen yoghurt contains about 150 calories. One large scoop of non-fat yoghurt contains about 1/3 fewer calories. Soft-serve cannot be scooped, but 1 cup of soft-serve contains roughly 230 calories.

Fat in frozen yoghurt

One scoop of regular frozen yoghurt has about 4 g of fat. Low-fat frozen yoghurt contains about half that, while fat-free frozen yoghurt may contain up to about 1 g of fat. Some soft-serve frozen yoghurt contains high levels of fat--about 8 g per 1-cup serving--while others contain hardly any fat.

You need to be aware of the fact that apart from the actual frozen yoghurt, the choice of toppings on your dessert will make a difference. Many of the toppings offered at frozen yoghurt shops are high in added sugar, calories and fat and alter the nutritional content of the yoghurt. The best toppings for frozen yogurt are fresh fruits, whole grain cereals, nuts and seeds. These are packed with fibre, vitamins and minerals that benefit health.

When you are searching for the nutritional facts for frozen yoghurt you can find all the information that you need on the internet. This will make it easier for you to understand the labels on the packaging and to know just what things you need to be on the lookout for. Making healthy choices is all about being aware and having the sense to check labels and read the nutritional value.

Fro Yo Swirled Frozen Yoghurt is the Latest Popular Dessert

I heard the term fro yo- frozen yoghurt- a few years ago when a nephew took me out for a treat. Since then, fro yo has caught on so well that there are now so many companies which produce and market the treat as an alternative to ice cream.

Fro yo- yoghurt which is flavoured and then frozen- is lighter than ice cream and often has a tangy flavour. It is lower in sugar and fat and therefore touted as being a healthy dessert which can be enjoyed by adults, children and even babies. Even those who cannot tolerate milk can often have a small amount. However, remember that yoghurt contains lactose, a protein in milk that is difficult to digest if a child has lactose intolerance. Symptoms include stomach pain, gas, nausea, cramps, bloating or diarrhoea.

Yoghurt offers several health benefits, including protein and probiotics, but may not be a good choice for all children. If your child has health problems, talk with the doctor about whether yogurt is a healthy option to include in the diet. For some kids, a moderate amount of yogurt may be suitable, while other children may need to avoid it completely.

You also need to be aware that some yoghurt is loaded with sugar and fats, so be careful. A container of yogurt can contain up to 26 grams of sugar, making it easy to exceed daily intake recommendations. If your child really enjoys yogurt, look for one that is geared for kids, some of which are lower in sugar. Reading labels is the best way to find a yogurt that aligns with your child's health goals.

It is hard to get kids to stich with a healthy diet in these days of fast food and unhealthy snacks. When faced with the choice between a healthy piece of fruit or an ice cream cone, it must indeed be a very special child who will choose the former. This is leading to many health problems for the young people of today with obesity and diabetes on the increase and this in turn leading to further problems such as heart disease.

When you are looking for healthy yoghurt, frozen or not, choose a non-fat yoghurt, which contains no fat, but still includes all the nutrients that make yogurt a healthy food. It is also recommended choosing a yogurt that contains 15 to 20 calories per ounce, or 90 to 120 calories for a 6-ounce container.

The thing to be careful with is that although fro yo has very little or no fat, it is easy to make the mistake of adding so many extra calories with the topping that you select. Fro yo swirled frozen yoghurt is the new favourite dessert in my family but I have to ensure that when it is served there are no toppings such as heavy syrups and sauces. These add calories as do nuts, dry fruit and other toppings, even fruit if it is too heavy such as bananas.

Teaching Children to Enjoy the Taste of Frozen Yoghurt

In common with almost every child I know my niece loves ice cream and would happily eat it with every meal, in fact she would rather eat it instead of every meal, including breakfast! The good news is that my sister is sensible enough to not allow this and to try and persuade her to select alternative desserts, such as frozen yoghurt, or fro yo as it is also known. My sister has tried to offer this a number of times, with varying degrees of success, depending on the flavour of the dessert and the choice of toppings given.

Froyo (frozen yoghurt) has gained in popularity in recent years as an alternative dessert for those who enjoy eating ice cream but do not enjoy trying to lose all the calories which pile on due to the consumption of this delicious treat. Since frozen yoghurt is virtually fat free, due to the use of skimmed milk instead of cream, it is a healthier choice and fro yo has become a 2 billion dollar industry, with the majority of consumers being female.

Fats are a natural part of many foods, including most dairy products. When you take them away, the flavour and texture suffers, so it makes you wonder how manufacturers make low-fat and fat-free frozen desserts so smooth and creamy, and still tasty?

Food engineers have been amazingly resourceful about finding ways to fake the texture and flavour of fat. Although it is easy to think that it’s simply a matter of churning it twice, the truth is in fact much more complicated than that. Manufacturers use all sorts of emulsifiers, binders, and thickeners to mimic the texture and taste of higher fat products, but the good news is that most of these additives are derived from foods like soybeans, eggs, and corn.

While all frozen yogurts are not created equal, they are fairly comparable and although most frozen yogurt is non-fat or very low in fat the calories still add up. Most non-fat “original” or “plain” (typically the lowest-calorie flavour at most frozen yogurt shops) is about 30-35 calories per ounce with about 20g of sugar—meaning that a large 16-ounce cup weighs in at 380 calories and 76g of sugar before adding any toppings. This is where the problem lies.

When we see the words “fat-free” we automatically, and most incorrectly, assume that we can eat as much as we can without suffering from the consequences such as putting on weight. We tend to forget that “fat-free” does not mean calorie free and we tend to overindulge, especially on the toppings.

When it comes to giving frozen yoghurt to children, be inventive and use different colours and flavours and sell it as ice cream to them. You can add various toppings and these can range from fresh fruit and sauce to sprinkles and marshmallows. It all depends on how much of a sugar rush you wish them to have and how willing they are to try new things and flavours.

Eating Frozen Yoghurt in London in the winter

The first time I tried frozen yoghurt, or frozen yogurt as it is sometimes spelled, it was in the middle of a particularly cold winter’s day and I remember think that surely this would be a better thing to eat in the summer. Eating frozen yoghurt in London, in the middle of Leicester Square was very enjoyable and I found the taste more pleasant than the ice cream available in a nearby shop.

Frozen yogurt, UK usually consists of milk solids, some kind of sweetener, milk fat, yoghurt culture (Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus are common cultures), natural or artificial flavourings, and sometimes natural or artificial colouring. The end result is a dessert which is tarter than ice cream, but still offering a sugar rush and filling your mouth with a rich creamy texture. There are fewer calories in frozen yoghurt, with approximately 110 calories per a half cup serving, than in an equal amount of ice cream and this is due to the fact that most of the fat has been removed from the milk and cream is not used.

Frozen yoghurt, UK took off in the 1980s, reaching sales of £17 million in 1986. Yoghurt contains friendly bacteria that help keep your digestive system healthy, but these friendly flora are only helpful if they’re alive when you eat them. That’s why you should look for the words “contains live and active cultures” on any yoghurt package to be sure you’re getting the good stuff. The good news is that freezing does not kill beneficial bacteria. In fact, it preserves them in a state of suspended animation until you eat them, at which point they warm up and resume their regular helpful activities, like fending off harmful bacteria, aiding with digestion, and producing certain vitamins.

Though all the fat from frozen yoghurt variety gets removed, some cholesterol remains behind; although a half cup serving contains only 5 mg of cholesterol, making frozen yogurt a healthier alternative to ice cream. The only problem with this is that people do not take into account the fact that if you add toppings which are other than fresh fruit, and even with that you have some calories, the calories will pile up and you could end up consuming more calories than you had originally planned to.

To put this into perspective, you have to realise that a single serving of this dessert contains enough calories that to burn them off you would need to do one of the following activities:

• 31 minutes walking
• 13 minutes jogging
• 9 minutes swimming
• 17 minutes cycling

Like regular yoghurt, frozen yoghurt can be a healthy accompaniment to a meal and is very good for your health, as long as you are aware of the best toppings to choose. There are popular chains which have sprouted up all over the country and offer so many different flavours to choose from that it can take a while to decide which frozen yoghurt in London you wish to taste first.

Discussing the Calories in Fat Free Frozen Yoghurt

For anyone with a sweet tooth it is necessary to finish a meal with a dessert and if this craving is not pandered to, the whole meal seems incomplete. The downside to this habit is the amount of weight which is easily gained if you are not careful and this is why so many people were so happy to see the advent of fat free frozen yoghurt. For someone who is on a diet, or just wishes to have a dessert without too many calories frozen yoghurt is ideal.

Yoghurt

Yoghurt is a dairy product made by bacterial fermentation of milk. The lactose in the milk becomes lactic acid when it is fermented. Lactic acid acts on the protein in the milk to make yoghurt thick and sour and it has been around for centuries. There is a lot of protein, calcium, riboflavin, vitamin B6 and vitamin B12 in it, making it better for you than milk is. Many people who are lactose-intolerant can enjoy yoghurt, because much of the lactose in the milk has become lactic acid. Yoghurt also has medical uses and is effective in the treatment and prevention of antibiotic-associated diarrhoea.

Yoghurt as a dessert

In recent years, there has been a trend to use yoghurt and make it into a dessert, with the addition of fruit, flavourings and toppings. It is served in much the same way as ice cream, but is rising in popularity due to the reduced number of calories in frozen yoghurt as compared to ice cream. In the early 1990s, frozen yogurt was 10% of the frozen dessert market.

Calories in frozen yoghurt

Even though frozen yoghurt is virtually fat free, you need to remember that this does not mean that it will not make you put weight on. It still contains calories, and these can soon build up without you realising it. A half-cup serving of vanilla soft-serve frozen yogurt contains 114 calories, while a half-cup of chocolate frozen yogurt has 115, although these figures vary slightly, depending on the manufacturers.

Most of the calories in fat free frozen yogurt come from the high amounts of carbohydrates found in the food. Fat free frozen yogurt contains only 4 grams of protein and 23 grams of carbs per serving; 20 of those 23 grams come from sugars.

These figures are just for the frozen yoghurt itself. The thing which has to be kept in mind is that most people will add their favourite toppings to a cupful of the yoghurt and not realise that they have just doubled the number of calories in their “healthier dessert option”.

The calories in frozen yoghurt may be less than in the same amount of ice cream but the toppings need to be kept a minimum, and possibly fruit, in order to not gain weight from this dessert. There are so many flavours to choose from and the taste is great, a little tarter than ice cream, but rich and creamy to enough to satisfy that sweet tooth.