Austin, Texas – Yogurt Planet (Self-serve frozen yogurt)

Restaurant: Yogurt Planet
Cuisine: Desserts/Frozen Yogurt/FroYo
Last visited: July 20, 2010
Location: Few locations – Allandale/Brentwood
Address: 4601 N Lamar Blvd
Price Range: $10 or less

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very good 5: Excellent 6: Tres Excellent!!

Food: 4.5
Service: 2
Ambiance: 3
Overall: 4
Additional comments:

• Locally owned and operated
• Few locations in Austin Texas
• Local favourite
• Non fat, low fat, sugar free options
• Creative flavours
• Rotating flavours
• Lots of flavours and ingredients
• Self-serve yogurt machines and toppings
• Self-serve sampling!
• Busy/open late
• Pay by weight
• Fresh fruits
• Smoothies available
• Live and active cultures in yogurt
• Most yogurt is Kosher certified

**Recommendations: Red Velvet, Yellow Cake Batter

Yogurt Planet is a locally owned and operated frozen yogurt chain originating in Austin, Texas. It was my first time trying a self-serve frozen yogurt place and I was ecstatic! Being from Vancouver, BC we still haven’t witnessed these types of yogurt place. However, I did hear that the new Metrotown location for Qoola in Burnaby, BC does offer self-serve frozen yogurt and Scoop! on W4th in Vancouver offers self-serve toppings. I love this self-serve concept and can’t wait until more places catch on.

Yogurt Planet offers lots of creative flavours like New York cheesecake, cookies n’ cream, pumpkin, eggnog, Macadamia nut, pistachio, Snickerdoodle, Root Beer Float and Kaluah just to name some. The flavours they offer is almost like ice cream or gelato flavours. The flavours vary from location to location and they do rotate weekly so it’s best to call in if you’re waiting for a particular flavour. I sampled all the flavours and on the whole they were all great. I heard it’s not the best frozen yogurt place in Austin, but it is very good and it was very good for me. I also tried Tart Frozen Yogurt in Austin, Texas and the yogurt was great, but the flavours are not as exotic.

Each yogurt dispenser has 2 flavours so you can either 1 of the 2 flavours or get them together as a twist. If you want 2 flavours from 2 separate machines then you have to just get them individually. The cups are all one size and they’re all large cups so you can easily go overboard like I did. Every flavour has a label with nutritional information on them so you can see the amount of fat, sugar and calories in each one. They have low fat, non-fat, and sugar free options. The low fat options taste like soft serve ice cream! But if you’re in Austin, Texas and you want ice cream then just head to Amy’s Ice Creams, an Austin institution for ice cream!

On the table:

**Red Velvet and Cake Batter – 6/6

• $.39 per ounce
• I ended up with the red velvet and yellow cake batter, but I got the 2 separately rather than in a twist. I wanted the option of enjoying them separately.
• This was their low fat frozen yogurt. The non-fat frozen yogurts were good too, but these flavours I wouldn’t be able to find easily.
• Eating them together was like eating a red velvet cupcake in soft serve ice cream form. It’s not tart at all.
• I could have gone for some toppings, but the flavours were already so rich on their own that I didn’t need any.

Red Velvet

• Low fat, 3.5g of fat for 1/2 cup
• It’s pretty sweet compared to the other tart flavours, but it’s not too sweet otherwise.
• It tastes like creamy chocolaty malted ice cream and the texture was like cake batter.
• It was rich and thick as it should be. 3.5g isn’t that low in fat, but it is lower compared to ice cream.

Cake Batter

• Low fat
• It’s not as sweet as the red velvet, but it was just as amazing. It’s creamy and thick just like cake batter and it’s not icy in texture.
• This one reminded me of TCBY frozen yogurt.

Pistachio

• I tried this, but it works better as ice cream or gelato. The pistachio taste was very faint.

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