Student column: Ice cream or frozen yogurt: what’s your choice?

Talk about it

With all these new frozen yogurt stores popping up everywhere, it got me thinking about what the difference is between frozen yogurt and ice cream; they taste exactly the same to me! They’re both cold and creamy.

The only difference I originally knew between frozen yogurt and ice cream is that somehow fro-yo was better for you than ice cream. How? I didn’t know. Where did I learn that? Wherever it was, I believed it. But after I Googled it I got many different answers;

Ice cream is made of cream (fat) and a lot of sugar, with a lot of carbohydrates and calories. Frozen yogurt is just that: frozen yogurt, with fewer carbohydrates and calories.

Yogurt is easier for the body to digest; many people who cannot tolerate milk, either because of protein allergies or lactose intolerance, can enjoy yogurt, while they can’t ice cream. The culturing process makes yogurt more digestible than milk.

Those are just two of the facts I thought made at least a little sense, but then I came across this website that answered my question exactly: TLCCooking.com. It said that

“By United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) standards, a food labeled ‘ice cream’ should have at least 20 percent milk solids and 10 percent milk fat by weight. Premium brands are fattier, typically 14 to 18 percent. Both milk and cream are used. Sweeteners account for another 15 percent or so.”

Frozen yogurt, on the other hand, “blends yogurt (milk fermented with yogurt cultures) with an ice cream base of milk, cream and sweetener. The resulting dessert is sweet and tangy, cold and creamy. If made with live cultures, frozen yogurt promotes digestive health by encouraging the growth of ‘friendly’ bacteria in the intestinal tract.”

In shorter terms frozen yogurt has the same base as ice cream, but with “special ingredients” added to it to make it better on your insides.

I found this very interesting; this was a question that I have been wondering about for a long time. As similar as frozen yogurt and ice cream taste, they obviously have their differences. I can’t decide which I personally like better, but now that you know there is an actual difference I dare you to go out and see which is your favorite. And if you can’t tell the difference, it’s just an excuse to keep going to get more.

Marissa Opp is a student at Farmington High School. Her column appears every other week.

Tags: high school, opinion, farmington, commentaries