Event: Pre-Opening Tasting at Pinkberry Yogurt, Highland Village

Ah Yogurt!  Both regular and frozen varieties (FroYo!!!) When I was a kid, I always remember both kinds having a slight tartness to them due to the probiotic active cultures within them.  According to nutritionists, this helps your immune system and helps you digest certain substances within your intestine, and in fact, we could not digest certain foods without these active cultures.  Anytime you take antibiotics, you are supposed to eat yogurt to restock those intestinal flora and it prevents... lets call it indigestion.

What makes Pinkberry good

However, since the 1990s, I've noticed that most yogurt in the United States, with some exceptions, began to taste more like pudding and frozen yogurt.  This was largely due to reduction in the active cultures and additives to take away the "yogurt taste".  I didn't really take notice of this until a trip to Vancouver, BC in 1991 and when I bought yogurt there, I noticed it tasted like it used to.  In any event, nutritionists and health food types alike have been challenging the yogurt sold in the United States and in many cases are now pushing the more traditional forms of it, such as Greek Yogurt, and many of them are gaining in popularity on those pudding style yogurts sold in the dairy case.  And now, frozen yogurt is taking that turn thanks to the Pinkberry Yogurt chain.  According to some Pinkberry has been reinventing the frozen yogurt concept since it first opened in West Hollywood, CA in 2004.  Others are saying, more appropriately, that it is returning it back to its proper roots, but doing so with style

I was invited, along with Shanna of Urban Swank, Eric Sandler of Eater Houston and Maya Fasthoff of Restaurant Traveler to sample their new seasonal flavour, Chocolate Hazelnut and taste some of their other flavours and toppings recently.  To say it was fun, sweet and enjoyable is an understatement.  And I will also add--several of their flavours had that tart twang like frozen yogurt had when I was younger, and I was glad to find it again!

Some of us happy Food writers/bloggers getting a taste

Pinkberry Highland Village will be having its Grand Opening on Friday, September 6, between 6:00 PM and 10:00 PM.  They will be giving away free samples of their different yogurt, and will have a drawing for a chance to win free Pinkberry Yogurt for a year.  The Houston Franchisees: Meredith & Matthew Emory have already opened 2 locations--one in the Woodlands, and one in Clear Lake.  This is their big venture into the Inner Loop in the old location of Grotto, right across the street from Central Market.  A number of my fellow FroYo fanatics have been anticipating this opening, so I considered it wonderful that I had a chance to preview this location.

Meredith Emory
of Pinkberry Houston

Per Eric--the company rep, Pinkberry has been in business for nearly 8 years. It started in LA and was based around three pillars: pleasing architecture, an all-natural high quality product and top notch service. The flavours are arranged from tart to sweet--and they sell six of them at a time.  The flavours also run from a healthy snack to decadent dessert and others in between.  All of their fruit toppings are hand-cut, fresh in house daily.  Their toppings come from around the world.  For example, at this tasting there were some European style dark chocolate crispies and Nutella, North American Style crunchy granola and milk chocolate pieces, and Asian style Mochi balls made from rice dough as topping choices.

Every 3 months they introduce a new seasonal flavour.  And yes, there is a theme based on the time of year.   The seasonal flavour will usually be a refreshing fruit flavour for Spring and Summer, and a hearty, comforting flavour for Fall and Winter.  The Fall flavour they introduced is chocolate hazelnut for fall and when winter rolls around it will be gingerbread.  Pinkberry develops all their flavours in house.

For those of you concerned about the quality of ingredients, take note: their yogurt is made from hormone free milk, is non-fat and all natural.  There are no trans fats or artificial ingredients, and all their yogurt is pro-biotic:  having millions of active cultures per gram.  But what about the taste?

Several ways to enjoy the chocolate hazel nut Pinkberry yogurt, coconut and
mango flavours too, and a small selection of their great toppings! 

We were primarily focused on tasting different ways to enjoy the chocolate hazelnut yogurt--though we got to try all of the flavours that will be offered on Sept. 6.  One version, Chocolate Hazelnut Classic, had chocolate hazelnut wafer rolls, roasted hazelnuts and chocolate sauce.  It was like Nutella™ in yogurt form very yummy.  Another was also a dessert style--with dark chocolate crisps and mixed nuts.  Again, delicious.  The third was a chocolate hazelnut trio--which included thick Nutella™, strawberries and banana slices.  This one was my favourite, along with the classic style.  There was a chocolate hazelnut crunch style which included honey almond granola, banana and almonds--like a breakfast sundae.  And a chocolate hazelnut truffle, which included milk chocolate crunch and strawberries.

Mochi Balls!!!

After trying all the suggested servings for the seasonal flavour, we were allowed to try the other flavours and have some fun with different toppings.  The original yogurt had that nice tart yogurt twang that I remember from the past, and though not everyone cares for it, to me it is what yogurt should always taste like.  We also had coconut, pomegranate, and mango in their fruit flavours--the coconut was subtle, and came in at the end, while the pomegranate and the mango had stronger fruit flavour with a milder yogurt twang.  All the fruit flavoured yogurts have the real fruit of that name in them--not some natural substance that tastes like that fruit but isn't.  There was also a peanut butter yogurt that tasted like peanut butter and worked well with chocolate like a Peanut Butter Cup--that would be more my son's taste.  Personally, my favourite of the non-seasonal flavours was the pomegranate with Mochi ball toppings and the Mango with the same.  However, that chocolate hazelnut flavour is mighty good and is a great dessert flavour to be sure.

A few other notes for your information:

Pinkberry has catering available for events.  They also have in store fundraising available for schools/charities certain nights as well (take note Wesley Academy Wranglers) where 20% of all proceeds will be donated to your charity or cause.  Also on October 3rd, Pinkberry will debut their Mobile App  for iPhone and Android (No luck to use Blackberry Users).  They will also debut on Oct. 3rd a Frequent Buyer Card, where if you buy 10 dishes of their yogurt, you will get the 11th for free.

Pinkberry Highland Village is located at
3838 Westheimer Road  (across the street from Central Market)
Houston, TX 77027
11 AM to 11 PM Daily, starting Saturday Sept. 8th

And remember to Eat Happy, Y'all!!!
早安，你们!!!