Top-Rated Dairy-Free and Vegan Ice Cream
We tested 14 products made with plant-based milks, olive or coconut oil, even avocado. Just how healthy are these frozen treats, and do they taste good?
By Sally Wadyka
Stroll through a grocery store’s freezer aisle and you’ll see that “vegan” ice cream is no longer a fad—there are nearly as many options as there are traditional dairy ice creams.
“With plant milks on the rise, it was only a matter of time before plant-based ice cream was going to be popular,” says Amy Keating, RD, a nutritionist at Consumer Reports. Sales, which are currently $458 million a year, have grown 41 percent since 2018, according to the Plant Based Foods Association—and are expected to keep climbing.
CR recently reviewed 14 popular chocolate nondairy frozen desserts for nutrition and taste, and came up with a list of features to look for to get the perfect creamy, cool treat.
Consider the Base
In dairy ice cream, the base is milk, cream, or both. In nondairy frozen desserts, plant products take the lead. That includes almond, cashew, coconut, or oat milk; olive, coconut, or other oil; or even avocados. The base nearly always affects the taste of the dessert, our testers found.
“Some, like almond milk and olive oil, were more neutral, but milk, coconut milk, and coconut oil were noticeable enough to come through the strong chocolate flavors,” Keating says. “And if we had tested vanilla, the base flavors may have been more pronounced.”
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. For instance, coconut and oaty flavors paired nicely with the chocolate. “But if you don’t like the base flavor, you may not like the ice cream,” Keating says.
While our testers found several tasty nondairy frozen desserts, two stood out: Häagen-Dazs Chocolate Salted Fudge Truffle, made with coconut oil and other oils, and Van Leeuwen Chocolate Fudge Brownie, made with cashew milk, coconut oil, and cream.
But make no mistake: Even the tastiest nondairy treats don’t taste like ice cream. “Calling it ‘ice cream’ can set up an expectation that plant-based desserts can’t truly live up to,” says Robert F. Roberts, PhD, head of the food science department at Penn State University. “Manufacturers can make a very good product, but because plant-based proteins don’t work the same way as milk proteins, it’s not ‘ice cream.’ ”
Check the Sugar and Saturated Fat
No one scoops up a bowl of ice cream thinking it’s a healthy snack, and making it vegan really doesn’t change that, says D. Julian McClements, PhD, a professor of food science at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
For one thing, both plant-based frozen desserts and dairy ice cream can have a lot of sugar. Sugar lowers the freezing point and keeps the desserts from getting too hard.
“Real ice cream gets some of that sugar naturally from the lactose in dairy, but nondairy versions have no lactose and may have to add more sugar to get the same results,” Roberts says. For example, Häagen-Dazs Double Belgian Chocolate Chip dairy ice cream has 29 grams of added sugars in two-thirds of a cup. Its Non-Dairy Chocolate Salted Fudge Truffle has 37 grams—a full 2 teaspoons more.
And although these desserts are plant-based, they can be surprisingly high in calories and saturated fat. Nine of the ones we tested have 220 calories or more in two-thirds of a cup. And five have 10 to 21 grams of saturated fat per serving, as much or more than what’s typical for dense, premium dairy chocolate ice creams. For example, Van Leeuwen Chocolate Fudge Brownie French Ice Cream has 330 calories and 12 grams of saturated fat per serving vs. 580 calories and 21 grams in its nondairy version.
Several of the products have a more reasonable 6 to 8 grams of saturated fat per serving. Those based on healthier unsaturated fats can have even less. Cado, for example, is made with avocado and has just 2 grams of saturated fat, and olive-oil-based Wildgood has 1.5 grams.
The products with the best balance of nutrition and flavor were Breyers Non-Dairy Chocolate Chocolate Chip and Oatly Non-Dairy Chocolate. They earned a Very Good rating for flavor and were lower in calories, saturated fat, and added sugars than many of the others—more in line with regular ice cream and less than what’s typical for rich, dense premium ice cream. NadaMoo Dairy-Free Organic Chocolate got the top nutrition rating and a Good for flavor.
“The nondairy desserts that scored the highest for taste—Häagen-Dazs and Van Leeuwen—got low ratings for nutrition, but both are very rich,” Keating says. “A little goes a long way, so have one-third of a cup and cut your calorie, fat, and sugar intake in half.”
Are Vegan Ice Creams Better for the Planet?
Considerable research shows that plant-based products are better for the environment than animal-based ones, McClements says. Dairy cows and milk processing produce about triple the greenhouse gases as plant-milk production. It’s still unclear whether one kind of plant milk is more planet-friendly than another, but almond and rice milks have raised concerns because the crops require large amounts of water.
Compare Prices When Buying Vegan Ice Cream
Vegan ice creams can be expensive. Do you always get what you pay for? Yes and no. One of the best-tasting ones, Van Leeuwen, costs $8 per pint. But not far behind in flavor is the least pricey of them all: Breyers Non-Dairy Chocolate Chocolate Chip, at $5 for 1.5 quarts, which comes out to just $1.67 a pint. On the other hand, two frozen desserts with low taste scores cost considerably more: Nick’s, at $7 per pint, and Cado’s, at $8 per pint.
Editor’s Note: This article also appeared in the August 2022 issue of Consumer Reports magazine.
More from Consumer Reports:
Top pick tires for 2016
Best used cars for $25,000 and less
7 best mattresses for couples
Consumer Reports is an independent, nonprofit organization that works side by side with consumers to create a fairer, safer, and healthier world. CR does not endorse products or services, and does not accept advertising. Copyright © 2022, Consumer Reports, Inc.
