At last, I get to try Pinkberry...

I love the new natural tart froyo that's become all the rage due to Pinkberry's enormous success in Southern California. I do find it kinda humorous that when I first started eating froyo in the 80s when in college, all the purveyors would try to get rid of that tart flavor and now, 20 years later, it's totally back in style.


My first experience with froyo V2.0 was down in L.A. about 4 years ago at some place in Little Tokyo (might have been IceBerry but I can't quite recall). It was really good. Then a few months later, Pinkberry (plus many others of that ilk) became the froyo sensation of SoCal, with stories of people risking parking tickets to hop out and get their yogurt fix. My sister (never one for moderation) used to get Pinkberry EVERY DAY when she worked down in Newport Beach.

Then two years ago, we finally got Fraiche in Palo Alto with the tart flavors made from organic local milk. And then Red Mango opened, by the Korean winner of Survivor, no less (the main purveyors of froyo V2.0 are all Korean enterprises). I've also had it at Cafe Delatti in Los Gatos, plus some obscure place in Chinatown in San Francisco (which was the cheapest of the whole lot).

And finally, the original trendsetter Pinkberry opened in Santana Row in San Jose last month and I tried it out today. They have three flavors - original, green tea and pomegranate. I had a small half original, half green tea with strawberries and mango. Next time I'll stick to original only - the green tea was initially good but got slightly gritty. The toppings were generous and oddly enough, I finished the froyo first, and had leftover toppings. This has never happened before.

So was Pinkberry worth the wait? Oh yes - count me as a newly minted fan. The shop was super cute, almost sparklingly white and the toppings bar was the most attractive that I've seen. The original flavor was nice and tart, but not wincingly so (pomegranate was too tart for me). The strawberries seemed to have been marinated - it was a great topping.

In the froyo2.0 wars, I'm going to have to rate Pinkberry tops for now. With Fraiche coming a close second (but that may be because it actually has shaved Callebaut chocolate as a topping - and it's 5 mins away from home). Red Mango was just not tart enough, even though I did meet the Survivor winner/owner at his new outlet in Valley Fair a few weeks ago.

I wonder how often I can make it down to Santana Row to visit Pinkberry...