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I Tried 8 Vanilla Ice Creams and Ranked Them From Worst to Best
May 2, 2025
From Häagen-Dazs to Tillamook, here’s how 8 top vanilla ice creams stacked up in a taste test.
Vanilla ice cream is often considered to be a humdrum choice. It's no wonder, considering a real-life synonym for vanilla is "boring" or "nondescript". The ice cream brand Van Leeuwen even points out the insulting assumption that "if beige could yawn it would be vanilla".
But any true ice cream lover knows these accusations hold no truth whatsoever.
There's a reason why vanilla remains as one of America's top ice cream flavors year after year. Yes, this partly has to do with its versatility. You can top vanilla ice cream with syrups, fruit, nuts, sprinkles, chocolate chips, or even something salty like potato chips and still know with some certainty that it will turn out tasty. But when made well with fresh, quality ingredients, vanilla ice cream can even shine all on its own.
In order to suss out which store-bought offerings can stand alone and which are better left at the sundae bar, I recently dug into eight different brands. From Ben & Jerry's to Häagen-Dazs, let's get the scoop.
Edy's ½ Fat Slow Churned Classic Vanilla
PER ⅔ CUP: 130 calories, 4 g fat (2.5 g saturated fat), 50 mg sodium, 23 g carbs (3 g fiber, 17 g sugar), 3 g protein
This Edy's Classic Vanilla ice cream is a light spin-off, meaning it contains just half the fat and a third fewer calories compared to other options–a fact which I realized too late. So, into the taste test it went anyway, and I was actually excited to see how a lighter rendition stacks up.
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