I know what you’re thinking: What kind of tongue-numb, yoga pants-wearing basic b goes full ride-or-die for a low-calorie ice cream? Well I’m here as a grown woman who has never once contorted her body into half tortoise and who enjoys a dense scoop of rocky road (full-fat style) on the regular to say: Halo Top is as good as actual ice cream.
I know. It’s an earth-shattering thing to say aloud, let alone write in a sophisticated culinary magazine. And I won’t put my good name behind all of Halo Top’s seven flavors—the Lemon Cake fully tastes like the cafeteria pudding served at the hospital where my grandma died. But give me a Mint Chip or a Birthday Cake pint and I will house the entire thing before The Night Of opening credits have even finished. And the fact that it only costs me 240 cals or so of damage is—to use an apt cliche—the cherry on top.
Don’t ask me how they do it (sugar alcohol? sorghum? soft skin of newborn babies?)* I don’t want to know what evil sorcery lies inside this cardboard container of creamy deliciousness. I just want to keep on eating five pints of ice cream a week without morphing into a Biggest Loser contestant. That’s the American Dream I believe in. And if that makes me a basic b then so be it. Halo Top/Yoga Pants 2020.
*Editor's note: Sorry, Lauren. It's Stevia.