Ben & Jerry’s Goes Dairy-Free (Video)

Now vegans and the lactose intolerant can participate in the time-honored and most decadent tradition of eating an entire pint of Ben & Jerry’s while recovering from a broken heart. The Vermont ice cream maker has used a certified vegan almond milk base to create two new flavors and convert two classics into dairy-free desserts.

Chunky Monkey and Chocolate Fudge Brownie, two of the most beloved flavors, are now available minus the cow’s milk. Meanwhile, the two new flavors are Coffee Caramel Fudge, which mixes a coffee base with fudge chunks and caramel swirls, and P.B. and Cookies, which contains chocolate sandwich cookies and crunchy peanut butter swirls.

Customers have been requesting non-dairy versions of the ice cream for years, a company press release says, while a Change.org petition with 28,432 supporters also made the case for new dessert options just last year. “By offering a vegan ice cream, [Ben & Jerry’s] could show consumers that non-dairy ice creams don’t need to be relegated to the shadowy sections of grocery freezers,” the authors of the petition wrote. (Sorbet, in Medical Daily’s humble opinion, is second to and shadowed by none.)

Though Kirsten Schimoler, the company’s “flavor guru,” acknowledges the difficulty of creating new flavors with a non-dairy base, she claims success: “We wanted to bring the same fun with all of the creamy, funky, and chunky swirls plus the Ben & Jerry’s flavor excitement to our Non-Dairy fans and we nailed it!”

So far, no reviews of the sweet treats have appeared, but one thing is certain: the dairy-free version of Chunky Monkey offers little change in terms of calories. The new count is 260 calories per serving compared to 290 per serving for the original. No matter, raise your spoon and prepare for a brain freeze.