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Homemade Popsicles and Best Packaged Frozen Treats

July 1, 2014   8 Comments

Should you turn up the AC or eat a popsicle to cool down?

Homemade Popsicles and Best Packaged Frozen Treats

If you don’t have AC, then the choice is obvious. I think eating something cold is a great way to drop your body temperature and I tend to crave frozen treats during the summer.

It is SUPER easy to make your own popsicles. You can do it with Dixie cups and popsicle sticks or buy fancy-shmancy popsicle molds see: Time To Make The Popsicles.

If you would rather buy them, check out these healthier choices below.

My favorite has to be the Jolly Llama Sorbet Squeezups. My kids went nuts over these and they are made with whole fruit - not concentrates or juices. There is added sugar but unlike other popsicles that I have reviewed (see: Don't Be Fooled By This Popsicle Marketing Trick), the FIRST ingredient is fruit.

They come in blueberry, raspberry, peach, mango, strawberry, acai berry, and banana coconut sorbet flavors.

They taste AMAZING and are a great fix for when you want to eat a tub of Ben and Jerry's because the portion size is figured out for you. Here are the nutrition facts for one Raspberry Sorbet Squeezup:

70 calories, 0 g fat, 19 g carbohydrates, 0 g protein, 3 g fiber, 0 mg sodium, 2 Points+

A package of 4 retails for $4.99 and can be found here: Jolly Llama Where To Buy

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If you can’t find Jolly LLama, you will be able to find the Haagen Dazs sorbet cups in your freezer section. I reviewed them here A Healthy Snack Friend In The Ice Cream Aisle and they cost about $1.25 each.

They don’t have as much fruit as Jolly Llama but they are still a good choice.

If you live near a Whole Foods, these are a great option. They cost about $2.20 for a box and the first ingredient is FRUIT. For the strawberry frozen fruit bars they have:

110 calories, 0 g fat, 25 g carbohydrates, 25 g sugar, 0 g protein, 1 g fiber, 1 mg sodium, 3 Points+

These delicious bars come in an assortment of flavors: Caribbean, Lime, Mango, Strawberry and Coconut.

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These aren’t made with fruit but I like these. So Delicious Dairy Free came up with a mini frozen dessert using coconut milk. Check out the nutritional facts:

100 calories, 3.5 g fat, 15 g carbohydrates, 1 g protein, 2 g fiber, 50 mg sodium, 2 Points+

It has 7 grams of sugar per serving and uses agave syrup as the added sugar ingredient. So you are getting about half the sugar and fat as compared to regular ice cream.

The beauty of these sandwiches is that they are just trying to be what they are - coconut milk frozen treats!

Please share your favorite healthy frozen treats.

These products were received for review consideration. No other compensation was provided.


Other posts you might like:


popsicleb

Time To Make The Popsicles

Is anyone else craving something cold? It is starting to heat up and I love cooling down with a popsicle.


Mini Ice Cream Sandwiches for Keeping Cool

Let’s all do a swan dive right into ice cream season! Weeee!....



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8 Comments:

I like Snack-Girl's suggestion of mixing frozen fruit with yogurt for a soft-serve type treat. I use fat free plain Fage, some frozen banana slices and frozen blueberries with a tablespoon of high quality cocoa powder (unsweetened baking cocoa) and the bananas are sweet enough to carry it off. I use the food processor.

This is a great post! I'm 24 and have been following you for about a year now. I love your alternate choices and recopies. You make eating healthier a lot easier!

Keep up the great work :)

I went to Trader Joe's yesterday and brought them a copy of "The 5 reasons to love Trader Joe's" They were so thrilled that they posted it for all to see !!!

Strawberry Frozen Fruit Bars? 25 grams of sugar!? Interesting that this is found to be better than the fruit juices negatively reviewed with as much sugar. I will bet this is added sugar because one cup of most berries have only about 6 grams of carbs.

Also interesting is that the sugar content of the Jolly Llama Sqeezeups and Haagen Dasz Sorbet have been left off. I suppose the carb content implies sugar content, however, carbs from fiber are healthier.

Since these have no fiber, they metabolize quickly to raise the blood sugar creating an imbalance. When you raise the blood sugar, it crashes later and this is unhealthy for the liver and pancreas. What gives?!

These are NOT healthier.

Probably the best are the coconut milk minis. They are made with Agave and although they have 15 grams of carbs, they will metabolize differently than other sugars and may be healthier.

Make your own and use fresh fruit and then you can control the fiber and sugar content. Imagine pureeing your fruit and adding a low glycemic sweetener like agave or use stevia and freezing. These would be better in my humble opinion.

What I do to cool off is enjoy Mother Nature's popsicle, a nice cold slice of watermelon! I buy one per week, cut it up in tree-shaped [triangles] slices, stick 10'' wooden skewers thru bottoms [rind]. Keeps well in fridge, very enticing and refreshing! I'm trying to steer clear of refined sugars wherever possible. I also cool off with unsweetened iced tea, 1qt water cold-brewed with 2 herbal teabags, my fav is minty sleepytime. I like to add fresh mint from the garden, lemon slices, etc., to my ice-cubes too. :0

our favourite desert/breakfast/treat of late is Acai bowls. As our local cafe makes fabulous Acai bowls, but they cost $16, we decided to copy them at home instead of getting poorer!

We freeze over-ripe bananas and any fruit in season (or just buy frozen berries). Here are the ingredients:

~ At least 1 frozen banana per person
~ frozen blueberries, handful
~ any other frozen fruit, handful

~ 1 tbsp Acai powder (as we just can't source the frozen Acai here) per person - be generous here, even though the pure powder form is also not cheap when bought even online

~ 1 tsp cacao powder per person (unless you dislike a slight chocolate flavour in the mix)

~ 1 tbsp flaxmeal or amaranth flakes per person (can be omitted as this is just to make it healthier and thicker)

~ any liquid you prefer - apple juice\almond milk\coconut water\soy milk - remembering that any fruit juice will make the mix sweeter, whilst other choices won't (cafes use juices)

Put all into a blender and add as much liquid as necessary to blend into a puree - best if frozen ingredients are in smaller pieces, but I just turn off the blender and push any un-blended pieces down, then switch on again - eventually it all mixes nicely

Pour into a bowl (it will have a delicious, deep purple colour by now)

~ Sprinkle granola or toasted muesli on top

together with your preference of any:
~ sliced strawberries
~ blueberries

~ sliced kiwi with skin still attached - even sour ones are good here, just slice them thinly and they provide a counter-taste to all that sweetness

~ desiccated coconut

~ slivered almonds

~ any seeds you like - pepitas (pumpkin), sesame, sunflower seeds (or these could have gone into the blender, too)

~ cut, dried apricots (or fresh, just to add another colour)

~ sliced dates (1 per person)
~ dried, sweetened cranberries
~ sultanas or raisins

~ slices of fresh banana (just to add yellow colour)

~ drizzle honey over top if not using juice in the Acai blend

and voila! You have a fantastic, tasty, healthy treat that may sound like a lot of work, but really isn't, and can be customised to your liking and would cost a heap of money at any gourmet cafe.

We are loving it. You don't notice the frozen bananas at all; they are just like ice cream when pureed. And my fussy, teen daughter says it tastes exactly like the shop-bought bowls, even though we use Acai powder.

We call them Acai borgs!

Hi Silva! This is a great recipe. It is a real powerhouse of antioxidants. It looks like some good protein sources too. This is right up my alley! Thanks!

You should try a brand called Fruitfull. Their strawberry bar is the same size as 365, has 70 calories and 13g sugar.


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