Getting your child to eat healthy snacks is a huge deal when you become a parent. Not simply because every single kid-approved snack comes packed with countless ingredients (many unpronounceable and therefore ultra-processed) or is super high in sugar or salt.
But again, as a parent, you know that finding a snack they like, which “feels like” it’s good for them, is transportable, and which they will eat consistently to stave off hanger is not an easy feat. Which is why many parents unknowingly turn to unhealthy kids’ yogurts which are packed full of sugar and thickeners (and not a whole lot of calcium) – but that do come with your child’s favourite PAW Patrol character on the side.
To help you sift through some of the best and worst kids’ yogurts for their health, take a look below. And remember, just because it is a yogurt does *not* mean it is any healthier than an ice cream or a chocolate bar.
Let’s dig in.
What are the healthiest kids’ yogurts? Ranked from worst to best
Just for clarity, I’ll only be comparing the kids’ yogurts that “appear” healthy, i.e. not those endorsed by chocolate bar brands like Rolo Toffee Yogurts or Smarties Yogurts as they’re clearly not healthy and should either be given to a child as a ‘treat’ or avoided altogether as they are astronomically high in sugar and sat fat.
1. Muller Corner Chocolate Digestive and Strawberry Shortcake
Avoid these for your children. The 2nd ingredient is sugar, then it’s water and wheat flour (?), amongst many other nefarious ingredients. And it all comes to 16.8g of sugar per 100g (more than 4 teaspoons of sugar) – yuck!
2. Wildlife Choobs Strawberry
I remember having these when I was a kid, and would always pester my mum to get them. And no wonder – they’re packed with sugar. There is a mind-bending 10.9g of sugar per 100g in these and, worst of all, there is no actual yogurt in Wildlife ‘Choobs’, just skimmed milk. Essentially, you’re paying for sugar water.
3. Frubes Strawberry Fromage Frais
It’s always disheartening to see sugar listed as the 2nd ingredient in any kids’ yogurt, but here we go again. There are 10.8g of sugar per 100g in Frubes and lots of stabilisers. It really is just a question of whether having a yogurt from a convenient tube is really worth the poor nutrition?
4. Munch Bunch Double Ups
The packaging says ‘Immune support & growth” which is just a wind up. There is a staggering 10.7g of sugar per 100g and only 2.5% fruit puree in the Double Up varieties.
5. Peppa Pig Strawberry Fromage Frais
A child favourite, but these yogurts contain a whopping 10g of sugar per 100g. They also contain looks of colours and stabilisers which shouldn’t be in a clean, healthy yogurt.
6. PAW Patrol Strawberry Fromage Frais
A similar composition to its Peppa Pig brethren, the PAW Patrol yogurts cut a similar figure on the sugar scale with 9.4g per 100g, although there aren’t a lot of thickeners in this one and natural flavourings.
7. Petits Filous Strawberry Fromage Frais
The ingredients aren’t awful in this one and as one of the most popular kids’ yogurts, that’s quite reassuring with 9.4g of sugar per 100g in these pots.
8. Actimel Kids Strawberry Banana Drink
While these are kids yogurt ‘drinks’ and therefore quite thin and not full of lovely gut-friendly lactic cultures, they could be worse (see: Frubes). There is more fruit puree in these drinks than a lot of other varieties, but still 8.5g of sugar per 100g – more than 2 teaspoons of sugar.
9. The Collective Great Dairy Suckies
I really like these ones. They’ve got actual real-life live yogurt (!!), loads of fruit puree, fruit juice and no added sugar, meaning all of the 7.9g of sugar per 100g is all from natural sources.
10. Little Yeos Organic Yogurt Blueberry and Banana
These yogurt pouches are fantastic and because there is just yogurt and puree (all organic) you can serve it to weaning babies, too. Just 5.4g of sugar per 100g in these bad boys.
How to spot an unhealthy kids’ yogurt:
- Avoid anything that has sugar as the 2nd or 3rd ingredient; it should strictly be milk, fruit puree, maybe some cream. The best yogurts will have lactic cultures or ‘live yogurt’ to provide gut-friendly bacteria.
- Choose those with high milk content and high fruit puree content if you can.
- Watch out for thickeners in all their guises, includes guar gum, xanthan gum, etc.
Top tips for making your kids yogurts healthier:
- Always have some full-fat natural yogurt like Fage to hand to swirl in to beef up the gut-friendly bacteria in your child’s yogurt.
- Make your own kid’s yogurt by keeping the pots with their favourite characters on and mixing together 50% full fat natural yogurt and 50% defrosted fruit (I like mixing in frozen blueberries), including any fruit juices from the defrosting. They won’t notice the difference.
- Combining healthy eating with positive rewards can help develop good eating habits in children. After the child eats their healthy yogurt, see if you can encourage a positive association with it (if they don’t take to it immediately) by rewarding them with custom stickers or by building a Healthy Eating Chart to gameify their healthy eating.
My Wellbeing Journal 