I was going to start with a cheesy intro about how as spring nears, I begin to crave the cool relief of ice cream, but that’s just a straight-up lie. I could eat a pint of ice cream literally any day, all year long, and it’s for precisely that reason that I can’t eat ice cream whenever I crave it.

That is, until I met my soul mate: Halo Top Creamery. Halo Top makes seven flavors of real and nutritious ice cream pints that you can happily indulge in all year long. Let me tell you why they’re better than all of those other so-called healthy ice cream alternatives.

The Nutrition

So you ate a whole pint? That’s alright, because unlike Froyo, Halo Top Pints are actually better for you than ice cream — they have only 240 calories, 8 grams of fat, and 16 grams of sugar. While Halo Top may be high-carb, much of this comes from fiber, and the high protein content doesn’t hurt either (for a full nutritional breakdown, click here).

The Ingredients

What sets Halo Top apart from brands such as Weight Watchers and Skinny Cow is a short ingredient list that always begins with cream and eggs. Halo Top is real ice cream, guys. Halo Top saves calories by using natural sweeteners, such as Stevia and erythritol, and flavorings like real vanilla beans and lemon peel (read more about their ingredients here).

Halo Top pints include a disclaimer that they may get a little hard because they don’t contain any anti-freezing preservatives, but no worries. Just leave it sitting on the counter for a few minutes and you’re good to go.

The Taste

Some brands, like Arctic Zero, save calories by skimping on flavor, but because they use real ingredients, Halo Top ice cream — not so surprisingly — has real flavor. Not only are their pints perfectly sweet, they actually have the flavor they’re supposed to (as in, their fruit flavors don’t taste like toothpaste or cough syrup).

Halo Top’s variety of flavors, from plain vanilla to mint chip, is an added bonus. While healthy homemade banana ice cream tastes great, it still always tastes like banana.

The Texture

Along with real flavor comes real texture — the use of real milk, cream and eggs is obvious here. Although they do use *small* amounts of thickeners, Halo Top does not become chewy, but instead maintains ice cream’s signature creamy, melt-in-your-mouth texture.

The Downside (*sigh*)

At $5.99 per pint, this ice cream will have to remain an occasional treat, but at least it will be for the sake of your wallet and not your stomach. When you are ready for a pint, you can find a place to buy it or order it online.