I’m a sucker for vegan ice cream, and am sometimes mocked in my own household for going through cartons so quickly. So when the good people at Snow Monkey offered to send me samples of their new plant-based ice cream, I said how soon will that refrigerated delivery truck be here?
Soon the truck pulled up with my cartons of cacao and goji berry dessert. But wait, is it dessert? Snow Monkey has an intriguing tagline, “Ice cream you can eat for breakfast.” I guess their point is that this frozen treat is healthful enough to qualify as a reasonable way to start your morning.
The Snow Monkey vegan ice cream has arrived!
The Nutritional Lowdown
So what’s in this miraculous foodstuff? Mostly fruit, protein powder and a little sunflower butter. r, Snow Monkey started with these two flavors. Both have the same main ingredients: banana, water and apple puree, and both contain hemp seed protein powder, sunflower butter, acacia tree gum and guar bean gum. The cacao flavor also includes maple syrup and cocoa powder. Goji berry has mixed berry juice concentrate and goji berry powder. A 2/3 cup serving of the cacao flavor contains 130 calories, seven grams of protein, 3.5 grams of fat and 16 grams of sugar. The goji berry is pretty similar nutritionally. See? It’s like a frozen health food smoothie.
I found Snow Monkey a satisfying dessert. It’s not as decadent as a coconut or nut-based vegan ice cream, but is clearly superior to sorbet, which usually tastes like fruit juice concentrate. Snow Monkey has managed to make something richer and more complicated than sorbet, thank goodness. And I appreciate it lacks the high fat content — especially saturated fat — of coconut-based desserts.
See? Snow Monkey looks like normal ice cream.
The Backstory
Rachel Geicke and Mariana Ferreira are the force behind Snow Monkey. They met as undergraduates at Boston University, where they were both athletes in search of healthy but delicious treats. They’ve created Snow Monkey to make lots of picky eaters happy, whether they be vegan, paleo, prone to food allergies or anti-GMO. Their mission is to “change the way people eat by reimagining staple favorites as delicious fuel for a healthy life.”
Okay. Two is a good start, but I’m ready for that refrigerated truck to pull back up with their newer flavors — passion fruit, cinnamon and matcha green tea. Thanks, Snow Monkey!
