Brio Ice Cream

Brio Ice Cream was the sponsor of the 25k on Sunday. 

The founders of Brio are twin brothers Ron and Arnie Koss.  Ron devoted 10 years to the product development, engaging some of our best nutritionists and dietitians, as well as renowned ice cream product developers who once led the way for Ben & Jerry’s. Ron and Arnie report that the inspiration for Brio was their mom, Judith Koss. "She loved ice cream and she wanted it to be healthy," said Arnie. "We thought, 'Great idea!' and 'Why not?'"

When Judith actually needed supplemental nutrition to support her health, ice cream as a delicious healthy snack and meal supplement made perfect sense to Ron and Arnie.  "Liquid nutritional shakes had very little appeal to our mom," explained Ron. "And when you don’t like something or don’t have much appetite, an 8 fluid ounce can seems like a lot to drink."

That story right there hits really close to home with me.  I remember my Mom's battle with breast cancer.  Near the end, most foods did not appeal to her and her doctor wanted her to supplement with nutritional shakes as well.  I don't think she ever finished one.

We were given free individual cups of ice cream post race.  I tried the Vanilla-Caramel and while I was gobbling mine down, I looked at the nutritional label in surprise:

That's a lot of nutrients for a half cup of ice cream!  It is advertised as "25 percent fewer calories, half the total fat, 65 percent less saturated fat, 75 percent less cholesterol and 10 percent less sugar when compared to similar flavors of super premium ice creams."  While all that is great, I think it's the added nutrients that push it over the top.  The FAQ page is one of the more informational ones I've seen.

So nutrition aside, how did it taste??  Really good!  I thought the texture was a little firmer.  The lower sugar and fat made it more similar to gelato in my opinion. I took the taste test to the next level when I found it at the local grocery store, Don Quijote.  They had buy one get one free, so I bought Coffee Latte and Tropical Mango.  Les and I sampled both and they were good, too!