Muller Light Fruit Halo

I have just returned from a trip to the shops to buy something nice for my lunch. Whilst browsing the yoghurt section to find a nice sweet to round off my meal, I saw something new in the Müller area. MüllerLight Fruit Halo. It claims to be virtually fat free and made with Fromage Frais & Strawberry Sauce. 'Mmmmm', I thought, 'that'll make a nice change'........

Packaging
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You get three pots of dessert contained within a long cardboard pack. I am going to deduct one point for this because I think it's a waste of cardboard which will go straight in the bin - not very environmentally friendly, is it? And sometimes people just want to buy one, or five or a random amount!

On the front of the packaging is blue on the left hand side & red on the right. It has the Müller light logo at the left with 'Fruit Halo - Strawberry & Vanilla' underneath. There is a photograph of a couple of strawberries & a vanilla flower and it says, "Virtually fat free vanilla flavoured fromage frais topped with lightly whipped strawberry sauce" in pale yellow writing with a red outline.

The back of the pack shows the ingredients & nutritional information and contact details.

The pots are made from clear plastic so you can see the product inside. The artwork from the package has been reworked and appears on the pot. The nutritional information & ingredients are also repeated on the back of the pot, which is a plus point, as this doesn't normally happen on prepacked yoghurts.

Nutritional Information
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Typical Values per 100g
Energy 341kJ (80kcal)
Protein 3.6g
Carbohydrates 15.8g
Fat 0.3g

Ingredients
Fromage Frais, Water, Strawberry Puree (11%), Sugar, Modified Starch, Lemon Juice, Gelatine, Emulsifier E472b, Stabilisers: Carrageenan, Guar Gum, Acidity Regulators: Sodium Citrates, Citric Acid; Flavourings, Colours: Vegetable Extracts, Beta Carotene, Turmeric.

This works out at under 125 calories & 0.6g fat per pot. You'll notice that although they are really low if fat, they are quite high in sugar. It really depends what you're looking for in a diet, if its low calorie or low fat. It certainly wouldn't suit a low carb diet, that's for sure!

Product
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The product in the pot comes in two layers. The top, which takes up about 1.5cm of the pot, is a strawberry sauce and the bottom which takes up around 6cm, is the fromage frais.

When you open the pot you get an instant waft of strawberry. Unfortunately its not that nice fresh strawberry smell but an overly sweet, sickly fake strawberry smell.

The strawberry sauce is a dusky pink colour & does not actually contain any pieces of fruit. It's just a pureé, although there are seeds in it. The sauce is actually full of little bubbles; it looks and feels quite frothy. When you taste it, it is very, very sweet although does taste of strawberries at least. It's quite thin & will run slowly if the pot is tipped in an odd direction. I thought that the strawberry pureé although made from strawberries tasted odd & fake thanks to the gelatine & other not very natural chemicals.

The fromage frais is my favourite part & is a thick creamy consistency with a lovely subtle vanilla flavour. Its a pale yellow colour & has no bits in it. If you can get just this bit on the spoon it has a wonderful smell of vanilla which is not sickly but really rather nice.

Verdict
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Although the strawberry sauce alone tastes too sweet & sickly to me, when eaten with the fromage frais it is quite nice. The subtle vanilla flavour of the fromage frais compliments the strawberry & takes the sweet edge away. I could happily eat the fromage frais all day on its own & although I have not tried the Vanilla Müller Light, I will try it now to see if it tastes like this!

Personally, I wont be buying these again. The taste of the strawberry is too off putting & there are too many additives & colourings to make it healthy. Id rather compromise on fat or calories and have something a little better tasting.

Info
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I bought my Müller Light Halo's from the Coop for £1.59 for a 3 pack. For more info on these or any other Müller products go to www.muller.co.uk