The Best Dairy Free Ice Cream
If you are looking for the best dairy free ice cream, this post is for you! We taste-tested 13 different non diary ice cream brands and scored them from best to worst. Read on to find our favorite dairy free ice cream flavors!
Tally has many great qualities. But one of her shortcomings is that she does not like dairy very much.
In the last six weeks, I’ve cut out my (ahem, many) daily bowls of yogurt and granola, cold cereal, and smoothies that included yogurt or milk.
Frankly, it hasn’t been too bad, since she seems to do okay with some cheese and butter and anything that’s baked with milk or buttermilk (like pancakes or waffles).
About a week after I went off dairy, we bought some ice cream on a Saturday night and, because I wasn’t used to thinking about it, I had a big bowl and didn’t think about it until four hours later when we went to bed and then the baby was up ALL. NIGHT. LONG.
So it was time to start exploring dairy-free ice cream.
When my in-laws were here after I got back from New York City, we went to a few grocery stores and bought 13 different kinds and on Sunday afternoon, we had a big taste test, complete with ballots (you can download them here and edit them with the flavors you get, if you’re so inclined).
It was ridiculously fun and we had such a great time sitting around making judgements and taking notes. My girls are dying to do another taste test with some other product (I’m trying to think what to do. . .).
But before I tell you which ice cream flavors we liked best, are you ready for ten million disclaimers?
Because here we go.
First, I’m not a professional taste tester (I know this comes as a huge shock that I’m not moonlighting as an ice cream tester). So you’re getting what you pay for here.
I will say, though, that I am a MASSIVE ice cream fan. I worked at Cold Stone Creamery for three years in high school and after my freshman year of college and I’ve made hundreds and hundreds of batches of ice cream for Cold Stone, plus made thousands of combinations of ice cream for various customers, and ate ice cream for breakfast many many days during high school (since we got a free medium ice cream every time we worked and usually I’d just take it home with me and then take it to school the next day).
And ice cream is a toss-up with cookies for my favorite dessert, so almost any time we have dessert, it involves buying ice cream and we’ve tasted a lot of brands and flavors over the years.
So I do love ice cream and have many opinions about it.
Obviously, the most fair thing to do would have been to do all the same flavor of ice cream (probably chocolate or vanilla), but . . . plain chocolate and vanilla ice creams whether they are non dairy ice cream brands or regular ice cream are not my favorite. So we bought a whole bunch of different flavors that looked good. So we weren’t exactly comparing apples to apples, which isn’t totally fair.
The other issue is that this wasn’t a blind taste test – we knew which brands we were trying each time and we also knew what they were made from, which probably created plenty of bias. So it goes when you’re working with amateurs like us.
Also, I think some of them suffered deeply from being compared to other ones. Meaning, if I’d eaten it alone, it might have been a lot better, but after eating a REALLY good one just before it, it seemed pretty terrible.
So, here are the non diary ice cream brands we tried and what we thought of each of them.
The Best Dairy Free Ice Cream
So Delicious Cashew Milk Chocolate Cookies N Cream (A+)
We started with this dairy free ice cream and at the end everyone (except me) had a scoop of the Tillamook Mud Slide ice cream in our freezer and then another scoop of this one and everyone said there was almost no difference in texture or chocolate flavor. It was phenomenal. Plenty of cookie chunks, amazing chocolate flavor, and a really really good texture. Cashew milk for the win, definitely. We all agreed it made for the best dairy free ice cream.
So Delicious Soy Milk Peanut Butter Zig Zag (A)
This one was a soy milk ice cream (I think the only one we tried) and it was very good. Not QUITE as creamy as the cashew milk ice cream, but really delicious. Great chocolate flavor and good peanut butter swirls. We were starting to think every one of the ice creams would be an A. And then we had. . . .
Ben & Jerry’s Fudge Brownie (C)
We were all inclined favorably toward this one because it’s Ben & Jerry’s and we are all big Ben & Jerry’s fans. But this one was a clear loser. The chocolate tasted really chemically/artificial and the texture was very icy. None of us were impressed. But when my neighbor mentioned to me that she couldn’t eat regular ice cream either, and I sent three of them over to her house, including this one, she said this was their favorite (although I didn’t send either of the other two that were chocolate ice cream, so they weren’t comparing it to the much better ones).
Almond Dream Toffee Almond Fudge (B)
Unlike the Ben & Jerry’s, I was disinclined toward this lactose free ice cream, since it was made with almond milk (which I find to skew pretty icy) and because it was the cheapest at $3.69. But the flavor was excellent and although it was a little icy, it wasn’t enough to really turn me off to it. This is a solid option with lots of swirls of fudge through it.
So Delicious Cashew Milk Salted Caramel Cluster (B)
When I mentioned I was on the lookout for dairy-free ice cream options on Instagram, MANY people mentioned this as their favorite. So I assumed it’d be great. It was more like. . . fine. I thought the flavor was overpowering. In fact, a few days later, I went back to taste it in a vacuum instead of in comparison to everything else, and I still didn’t think it was amazing. But know that this lactose free ice cream is widely loved.
Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey (D)
This was the first true loser of the dairy free ice cream brands. The banana flavor tasted super artificial. My girls wouldn’t even finish their tiny scoops and Bart thought it was the absolute worst of everything we tried (he went and spit out his spoonful).
New Barn Banana & Chocolate Chip AlmondCrème (F)
If we’d thought the Chunky Monkey was bad, this non dairy ice cream was one just AWFUL. It was the very clear loser of every flavor we tried. It had almost no flavor at all, the texture was lousy, and there was very little chocolate. We were using a mini cookie dough scoop to scoop out servings (so about 1 Tablespoon) and I’m not sure ANYONE finished this one. I have a very small freezer and it’s always jammed, and with all these ice creams, it was extremely full, so we just threw the whole pint, minus the six small scoops, in the garbage. It wasn’t even worth the freezer space.
Sprouts Mango (A)
It’s hard to compare fruit flavors with chocolates, especially in a family like ours where we are all strongly inclined toward the chocolate flavors, but this one was excellent. It really tasted like eating a fresh mango and the price was reasonable too ($3.99). The texture of this lactose free ice cream was more like a gelato and this was definitely the winner for the non-chocolate ones.
This one I actually bought before our taste test and had eaten about half of it, and it’s very good. I usually put granola and chocolate chips and cashews in it to make this non dairy ice cream go further, but the texture is excellent and it has a very nice flavor – not too strong and not too weak. Definitely a solid (and affordable) choice. I’ll pick up another one or two of their flavors next time I’m there.
Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia (B)
We were all wary of this one after the last two Ben & Jerry’s dairy free ice cream flops, but this was the best of the three. The cherry flavor was nice and there were a fair amount of chocolate chunks. The texture still didn’t compare at all to some of the other flavors, but it was less horrible in this version.
Many people recommended Nada Moo! and originally this was the only one I bought. But this lactose free ice cream was pretty terrible. All of us gave it our lowest score. There was almost no flavor and very few nuts. But since it’d been so raved about, I wondered if the problem was the flavor, so I went back and bought two more flavors to try, which were significantly better. The pistachio, though, was the other one we just threw away.
So Delicious Coconut Milk Cookie Dough (B)
This was the other one I’d bought before the taste test and I quite liked it, but there weren’t enough chunks of cookie dough and the texture wasn’t QUITE right. The coconut milk ice cream from Trader Joe’s had a much better texture.
This lactose free ice cream was quite good, with lots of cookie chunks, and a nice flavor, but I did think the texture of the cookies was a little gritty.
Luna & Larry’s Organic Coconut Bliss Mint Galactica (C)
This one said “exhilarating mint” but it had such minimal flavor, you could hardly tell it was mint at all, exhilarating or otherwise. Also, not a ton of chocolate flakes. We all gave this middling marks. This brand is well-liked but since it’s fairly expensive ($5.99 a pint), I’ll probably just stick to the brands that were more consistently excellent. (But I’m highly tempted by the Ginger Cookie Caramel)
Nada Moo! That Snickerdoodle Dough (A-)
One of my all-time favorite ice creams is Ben & Jerry’s Cinnamon Buns. Back before I had kids, if Bart was gone over night, I’d go buy a pint and eat it for dinner. Those were the days. This one reminded me a lot of that, with the cinnamon ice cream and big chunks of dough. There was a LOT of cookie dough, which I loved, and the texture of this dairy free ice cream was quite good. Now I see why people love Nada Moo!
Have you tried any dairy free ice cream?
I’d love to hear your favorite dairy free ice cream brands and flavors because clearly, I’m going to try every single flavor I can before this baby stops nursing (or outgrows her dairy sensitivity).
The So Delicious Cashew milk ones are definitely my favorite because of how creamy they are, too. I would suggest you give Ben & Jerry’s one more try – they have a coffee caramel nondairy option that is actually quite good if you enjoy that type of flavor 🙂 Definitely my favorite B&J over any of the flavors you tried.
Ben & Jerry’s non-dairy Coffee Caramel ice cream is my absolute favourite. I have an aversion to So Delicious because their soy-based products have made me very sick, but I might try this cashew-based ice cream… definitely intrigued!
I love the Trader Joe’s chocolate coconut milk ice cream and So Delicious Mocha Almond Fudge ice cream bars! Both have great flavor and texture!
lucky you can still have cheese!! I went without all dairy (and several other top allergens) the entire time I breastfed all my babies. It was rough. The salted caramel cluster was definitely my favorite; I also really liked the coconut cookie dough. I may have only tried those flavors though. Once I found some I liked, I just stuck with them because they are sooo expensive!
I hope Tally outgrows her sensitivities soon!
We just had some friends over who are dairy-free and we bought Talenti’s Raspberry Sorbetto. It was SOOOOOO good. Just as creamy a texture as the ice cream the kids were eating, not icy at all, and hit just the right spot between sweet and tart. I’d highly recommend it.
I’ve also enjoyed Hagen Daas sorbet with other dairy-free friends.
Taste testing root beers is one of our favorite taste testing activities! Do you guys have Rocket Fizz down there? We let each family member choose a bottle of pop every time we go, but sometimes we load up on different root beers and have a taste test!
I found out I am lactose intolerant last week and the first thing I thought was “Janssen better get that ice cream post up QUICKLY!” Yay!
I love that you guys did this. I want to do it with normal ice cream.
Also is Tillamook Mudslide the perfect normal ice cream flavor or what?!? We are giant Tillamook fans over here.
My family has tried the majority of the Ben and jerry dairy free ice cream and we were less than impressed but we finally tried the Ben and jerry peanut butter cookie ice cream and we couldn’t keep that in the house! It was so delicious! Soy ice cream is always my least favorite the texture is not creamy enough!
I agree on Ben and Jerry’s peanut butter cookie dough, it is REALLY good.
I’m mostly vegan, so I’ve tried my fair share of dairy free ice cream. In fact, just about a month ago we did a taste test with my little family for FHE. The cashew cookies and cream was also our favorite, but we also tried and enjoyed So Delicious mint (coconut based I think) and SD Oregon marionberry. They were great, I thought! Trader Joe’s strawberry is a longtime favorite too! And cheap!
I love that you guys did this! And shocked to hear that Ben and Jerry’s was not the clear winner. I really want to try the sprouts mango one! I love mangos!
Thank you for this. I’m rapidly becoming lactose intolerant and I can’t bear the thought of giving up ice cream. Milk I can live without and I used to think I couldn’t live without cheese, but I think I’ll be okay, but surviving summer without ice cream just feels like too much to bear.
I tried so delicious before and didn’t like it. It was a chocolate flavored ice cream made with coconut milk, and I was so disappointed. It had this icy almost watery taste and I figured all non dairy ice cream would be like this. I had resigned myself to never eating ice cream again (a fate worse than death considering how much I love chocolate ice cream) but thanks to you I think I’ll give it another shot. The cashew milk one sounds promising.
My son is allergic to milk and having to quit all dairy while breastfeeding KILLED me! But he weaned over the weekend and I had my first real milk cocoa last night so I can make this comment without crying afterward.
In addition to his milk allergy, I’m allergic to most nuts and peas and some other things, so a lot of my dairy-free options were limited. I had to rely on just almond milk and coconut milk flavors, and I agree that almond milk ice cream is usually too icy and flavorless. Even then, the BIZARRE thing about the dairy-free world is that a lot of the dairy-free ice creams (particularly Halo Top and Breyers, when they make their ice creams dairy free) add PEA PROTEIN. Really?! I mean, chocolate ice cream and peas should just never be combined.
All that is a disclaimer that my favorite flavors were probably just my favorites because the best ones would have killed me. But I just about always loved Luna & Larry’s, especially their dark chocolate and their salted caramel.
Another dairy-free tip is that Trader Joe’s pound plus chocolate bars are all dairy free!!! This fact saved me. Their chocolate chunks are also dairy free, so you can make some good chocolate chip cookies with them.
These are such good tips! Thank you!
I contracted Alpha-Gal this past year from a Lone Star Tick bite. I am now allergic to any mammal product containing the Galactose enzyme and can no longer eat any red meat (beef, pork, lamb, etc..) as well as any dairy product (cheese, milk, yogurt, etc). Quite an adjustment to make but I have tried the So Delicious brand of dairy free “ice cream alternative” and found it to be pretty good when I miss having ice cream.
I know these two suggestions aren’t in those cute tiny containers but I prefer when I can easily grab a serving out. Two that I have found to be sooooo delicious are literally from SO delicious. Hands down the best non dairy ice cream I’ve ever had is the new Double Chocolate Delight cashew milk bars! They are expensive though at almost $5 for only 4 bars:/ but I’m positive if I saw this in a container I’d eat the whole thing at once. The second one is the tiny so delicious coconut milk vanilla bean sandwich. Not as amazing but still soooo good! And more reasonably priced at almost 5 dollars for 8.
Baskin Robbins now makes some amazing non dairy options! Chocolate chip cookie dough and chocolate extreme. Both super creamy and delicious. I also really like the so delicious cashew based flavors!
Ooo, I didn’t know that, Stephen, thanks!
Kathleen
Thanks for a charming and interesting article, Janssen. I love the way you write. Have you ever tried the new-ish Haagen Daz non-dairy flavors? As you might expect of that company, they did not bring any entries to this contest before they had “PERFECT-ed” them, LOL. My two faves are Chocolate Salted Fudge Truffle (to die for!) and Amaretto Black Cherry Almond (really close, if I weren’t such a chocoholic!) Since I am also gluten-free 🙁 I do not eat anything that includes dough or similar. This brand, while more expensive, is so totally worth it.
Also, tho I try to avoid soy so I don’t eventually become sensitized or intolerant of it, Trader Joe’s Soy Creamy Vanilla or especially Cherry Chocolate Chip are pretty decent too. Overall, I agree with your family’s hierarchy and choices. Great job. Now if you want to re-test three years later, you have the opportunity to consider all the newcomers, b/c they’ve had time to do it awesomely!
BTW, one suggestion: Make the font on your site darker, so Boomers like me can actually read it, lol!! XOXO (One for each of your kiddos!)
Not sure if they still have this, but Trader Joe’s mango mochi non-dairy dessert is frightfully delicious, if your local TJ’s stocks it!
You must try (if you haven’t already) Haagen-Dazs non dairy SPIRITS amaretto black cherry almond toffee!!! I’m hooked!
By far the best I’ve had is Haagen Dazs non-dairy! I love the Coconut Cookies and Crème! It’s so good and doesn’t make me miss having dairy.
I’ve really liked the talenti flavors from fruity to chocolate to caramel. I’m trying to branch out my search now for other brands or different flavors. But definitely try the talenti
I have tried the cookies and cream Lactaid lactose ice cream from Walmart. it was really good. it didn’t have the same taste as regular ice cream but it still tasted like cookies and cream.