My 20-year-old has a real affinity for specificity; he always has. He has also always been drawn to food and cooking. A few years ago, for Christmas, we really focused our gifts on experiences for the kids and spending one-on-one time with them. It’s always fun to think about each kid’s personality and interests and come up with an activity suited specifically to them. This year, my son and I took a Community Ed class and made pasties. What a blast from the past—in my thirties, showing up in a high school home economics classroom with my own teenager. We peeled and chopped and mixed and baked, and in the end came home with a whole batch of pasties to share with the family.
When he was in high school, he took more cooking classes, and general food safety and handling rules became more and more important to him. Eventually, he ended up working at a grocery store in the deli, and it may be here that he was first introduced to frozen dairy desserts, and that’s where the real specificity of food labeling comes in.
As one who is critical of the advertising put on food labels, he remarked at the number of “ice cream” treats that were labeled as frozen dairy dessert, and not ice cream. This led us to ask what makes ice cream real ice cream. In the United States, colloquial terms such as ice cream must be given a definition of some kind, and in this case, the Food and Drug Administration requires that ice cream contain between 10% and 20% milk fat. Brands like Dairy Queen contain 5% milk fat, and thus cannot be officially categorized as ice cream in the United States. Products with this lower fat content can be considered low-fat ice cream or soft serve, but not true ice cream by definition.
Similarly, I always wondered what exactly frozen yogurt is. Is it really just frozen… yogurt? Kind of. The Food and Drug Administration does not seem to have the same level of oversight over frozen yogurt in the U.S., just regular yogurt. Generally speaking, frozen yogurt is made from cultured dairy and is a slightly more tart alternative to traditional ice cream. It is often lower in fat and touted as a healthier alternative to ice cream, but many frozen yogurt products contain sugar levels comparable to ice cream and may offer limited nutritional advantages. Some frozen yogurt may contain live cultures, but since the FDA doesn’t really regulate the labeling of froyo, and businesses are free to maintain their trade secrets, there is no way to know how much of a live culture you may find inside. Frozen yogurt isn’t a viable alternative to a good probiotic, but if you enjoy the flavor and the texture, it is something a little different.
Over the years, there has been a rise in the popularity of frozen yogurt shops, where you are greeted with a wall of self-serve flavors of frozen yogurt, followed by a toppings bar. After choosing the size of your dish, you dispense your frozen yogurt. (If you want to try more than one flavor, my advice is to pick two complementary flavors and come back another day if you want to try more, or everything will run together. The same goes for the toppings bar.) The toppings bar is next. There you’ll find everything from cookie crumbles to fresh fruit to popping boba and gummy worms. Be careful, though. You pay by weight, so the heavier your froyo gets, the more expensive it becomes.
It’s a relatively popular model for frozen yogurt, and it truly is a lot of fun. When you have picky eaters or people with varying tastes, DIY froyo is sure to meet everyone’s needs. Tiny Treats in Thunder Bay and Chilly Billy’s in Duluth are two local froyo shops where you can try it yourself.
Tiny Treats, Thunder Bay
Tiny Treats is located in the Northwood neighbourhood of Thunder Bay. There you will find a variety of sweet treats, a “one-stop shop,” if you will. Tiny Treats serves frozen yogurt shakes, smoothies, ice cream rolls, cheesecake, and self-serve frozen yogurt. They have bubble tea and even a variety of frozen yogurt cakes. And, of course, their frozen yogurt bar.
Tiny Treats smoothies are made from a yogurt base with real fruit, like pineapple, mango, and blueberry. If you want to try rolled ice cream, you might go with the cookies and cream ice cream, rolled and topped with Oreo cookies and chocolate sauce, or you might try their wild blueberry rolled ice cream, made with both blueberries and blueberry sauce. They also have a variety of cheesecake flavors like tiramisu, coconut cream pie, red velvet, and, of course, a rich and creamy classic cheesecake. Their frozen yogurt bar is home to flavors like pistachio, island mango, chocolate, blueberry, and more, and the toppings bar has all your favorite choices ranging from gummy sharks to rainbow sprinkles and fresh fruit. There’s something for everyone to enjoy.
Chilly Billy’s, Duluth
Chilly Billy’s has undergone some transformation in the past few years, and while they’ve downsized and consolidated, you can still find them in the food court at Miller Hill Mall. Chilly Billy’s serves a variety of flavors, like salted caramel pretzel, mountain blackberry, and staples such as vanilla and cookies and cream. Frozen yogurt flavors rotate, so stop in often to make sure you find your favorites. The Chilly Billy’s toppings bar is extensive, with fresh fruits, graham crackers, Nerds Gummy Clusters, marshmallows, nuts, whipped cream, and more.
One of the most fun things about being a lifelong learner is having conversations that lead to oddly specific research on the differences among frozen dairy desserts, ice cream, and frozen yogurt. And while frozen yogurt might not be the healthier alternative to ice cream that many people believe it to be, it is still a delicious and fun treat with nearly endless possibilities. Visitors can try it for themselves at Tiny Treats and Chilly Billy’s.