The ice cream freezer at the grocery store has evolved, offering a spectrum of choices from decadent treats to seemingly "healthy" options. The better-for-you ice cream market is booming with low-sugar, high-protein, and dairy-free varieties, leaving many to wonder if these options are genuinely healthy or can aid in weight loss. Registered dietitian Julia Zumpano, RD, LD, provides insights into the world of ice cream and its potential health implications.
Can Ice Cream Be Healthy?
Ice cream, in any form, isn't typically considered a health food. Eating a bowl of ice cream every day won't improve your health, regardless of the type. However, choosing ice cream made from simpler, more natural ingredients can make it a slightly less unhealthy choice. Still, even healthier ice creams don't fall into the "health food" category.
Exploring "Healthier" Ice Cream Options
Traditional ice creams are often high in calories, saturated fat, and sugar. However, there are alternatives in the freezer section for those seeking to reduce these components for weight management or dietary needs.
Low-Fat, Low-Calorie Ice Creams
Manufacturers often use artificial sweeteners, such as sugar alcohols, to reduce calories, fat, and sugar in these ice creams. However, there are growing concerns about the health effects of artificial sweeteners like erythritol, which has been linked to an increased risk of heart attack and stroke. Artificial sweeteners may also cause gastrointestinal distress, such as bloating, gas, and diarrhea, as the body can't fully digest them.
"There’s evidence that artificial sweeteners aren’t good for us, especially in larger amounts," says Zumpano. It's also crucial to remember that these lower-calorie options still contain calories, and the calorie count may not be significantly lower than regular ice cream per serving.
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Protein-Rich Ice Cream
The demand for protein-rich products has led to the creation of ice cream with added protein. This added protein can help stabilize blood sugar levels by slowing down the rate of glucose entering the bloodstream. Protein-rich foods also promote satiety, potentially limiting the size of ice cream portions.
“It’s going to help from the standpoint of stabilizing your blood sugar, since protein slows down the rate of glucose entering your bloodstream,” she explains.
“If you’re going to eat ice cream, you can get a little more out of the treat by choosing one with protein,” says Zumpano. “But I wouldn’t suggest relying on ice cream as a main protein source.”
Probiotic Ice Cream
Like protein-enhanced ice cream, varieties with added probiotics have emerged to meet consumer demands for "healthier" food. While probiotics offer potential benefits, ice cream shouldn't be considered a primary source of these beneficial microbes. Zumpano suggests that "you’d be better off eating yogurt" or other foods with naturally occurring probiotics.
Dairy-Free Ice Cream
Dairy-free ice cream, made with ingredients like coconut milk, almond milk, or soy milk, generally contains a similar amount of calories, fat, and sugar as milk-based ice cream. However, it offers a suitable option for those who are lactose intolerant, vegan, or avoid dairy for other reasons.
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Eating Ice Cream Healthier: Practical Tips
Enjoying ice cream while making healthy choices is possible. Here are four tips to consider:
- Portion Control: A serving size of ice cream is typically half a cup, which is roughly one traditional scoop. Be mindful of serving sizes to avoid overconsumption.
- Watch the Toppings: Traditional sundae toppings like chocolate sauce, whipped cream, and candy bits can significantly increase the calorie content of an already indulgent treat. Opt for minimal or nutritious toppings such as fruit or protein-packed nuts.
- Read Labels: Look for ingredient lists with simple ingredients like milk, cream, and sugar, rather than high fructose corn syrup or artificial ingredients.
- Make Ice Cream a Treat: Avoid making ice cream a regular part of your daily menu. "View it as a treat for special occasions as opposed to how you end every meal," says Zumpano.
The Intriguing Research: Ice Cream and Potential Health Benefits
Recent headlines have suggested potential health benefits of eating ice cream, particularly for individuals with type 2 diabetes. A 2018 doctoral thesis indicated that people with type 2 diabetes who consumed more ice cream had lower risks of heart disease.
The 2018 research drew upon data from the Nurses’ Health Study I and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study. These were two large observational studies conducted by researchers at Harvard University which began in 1976 and 1986 and went on for around 20 years. To conduct their analysis, the researchers only included data from participants of these two studies who reported having type 2 diabetes when the studies began - so around 16,000 people total. The participants with diabetes had also provided information about which foods they typically ate over the previous year.
However, it's crucial to interpret these findings with caution:
- Observational Study: This research was observational, meaning it can only show an association between eating ice cream and a lower risk of heart disease, not a causal relationship.
- Confounding Factors: The link between ice cream and heart disease only became apparent when other aspects of a person’s health, including how healthily they ate, were taken into account.
- Potential Bias: Participants who reported eating ice cream before joining the study could have stopped eating ice cream altogether just after joining the study - possible because they may have been made aware they were at greater risk of cardiovascular disease.
- Limited Research: There have not been a lot of studies that have looked at the specific effect of ice cream on health.
- Ultra-Processed Food: Ice cream is considered an ultra-processed food, typically high in calories, fat, and sugar. Ultra-processed foods have been linked to a range of health issues, including increased risk of developing both type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Prior Research Echoes the Sentiment
Several prior studies, as noted in Ardisson Korat’s dissertation, had come across a similar effect. In 2002, a study revealed that consuming a “dairy-based dessert”-a category that included foods such as pudding but consisted, according to Pereira, mainly of ice cream-was associated for overweight people with dramatically reduced odds of developing insulin-resistance syndrome. It was by far the biggest effect seen in the study, 2.5 times the size of what they’d found for milk.
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In 2005, a Harvard paper revealed that men who consumed two or more servings of skim or low-fat milk a day had a 22 percent lower risk of diabetes. But so did men who ate two or more servings of ice cream every week.
In 2014, total dairy consumption now seemed to have no effect, but the ice-cream signal was impossible to miss.
The Reverse Causation Theory
The theory went like this: Maybe some of the people in the study had developed health problems, such as high blood pressure or elevated cholesterol, and began avoiding ice cream on doctors’ orders (or of their own volition). Meanwhile, people who didn’t have those health problems would have had less reason to give up their cookies and cream. In that scenario, it wouldn’t be that ice cream prevented diabetes, but that being at risk of developing diabetes caused people to not eat ice cream. Epidemiologists call that “reverse causation.”
The Yogurt Effect
With a growing reputation as a boon for microbiomes, yogurt was the anti-ice-cream-the healthy person’s dairy treat.
“Higher intake of yogurt is associated with a reduced risk” of type 2 diabetes, “whereas other dairy foods and consumption of total dairy are not,” the 2014 paper said.
The Brain's Response to Ice Cream
Research has explored the relationship between ice cream consumption and brain activity. A study involving healthy-weight adolescents used fMRI to examine brain responses to milkshake receipt in relation to ice cream consumption. The results showed that frequent ice cream consumption was associated with reduced activation in reward-related brain regions, specifically the striatum. This suggests that frequent intake of palatable foods like ice cream might lead to reduced activation of striatal regions in response to those foods.
The "Cleanse" Fad: A Word of Caution
A California ice cream shop claims you can lose weight with a "cleanse" that consists of eating five pints of a frozen non-dairy ice cream-like treat for four straight days. However, experts warn against such practices: "As far as risks, individuals would be ingesting a boat load of processed saturated fat and sugar every day; pretty much the two worst things you can put in your body," said Christopher Ochner, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Adolescent Medicine, and Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Director of Research Training and Development at the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center.
Moderation and a Balanced Diet
Ultimately, ice cream should be viewed as a treat and indulgence. Nutrition health research is fiendishly difficult. It’s prone to every imaginable kind of bias, ranging from data reporting biases of the test subjects, experiment design biases, researcher biases, cultural biases, population selection biases, and on and on.
If your overall diet and lifestyle are healthy, you shouldn’t worry about eating some ice cream a few times a week. It’s the sum total of your your diet and your habits that matter.
Add some protein. Ice cream already has some protein in it, but topping your treat with chopped nuts will give you a boost of protein and fiber, which will make you feel fuller faster. Portion it out. It’s all too easy to indulge more than you wanted to if you’re eating from the tub. Try lower-sugar flavors.
“The dietetics I practice is that all foods fit. Really, that’s what I take away from this study. If you want ice cream as your treat, you’re probably fine, as long as it’s something you consume in moderation,” she says.
Treating yourself No matter how it’s made, ice cream isn’t crossing into the health food category - and that’s perfectly fine. “Accept ice cream for what it is, which is a treat and indulgence,” says Zumpano. Seattle might be known for its coffee and seafood, but when the temperatures rise and Seattleites flock to Alki Beach or Volunteer Park, ice cream takes summer’s centerstage.