Vegan Magnums

Shut. The. Front. Door!

Magnum, as in ‘The ice-cream you used to have on holiday” Magnum, have started doing a vegan range. And what’s more – they don’t contain soya. I think I might need to sit down…

 

I think it shows a real turning point in allergy/dietary acceptance when a big player launches a product like this. Once upon a time, such is the scale of units of their traditional cow’s milk ice creams, the units of such a specialist product like vegan ice cream they would expect to sell would barely make it relevant. However by launching two flavours (classic and almond) and making them available in major supermarkets, this is a statement of intent.

It’s worth pointing out that they appear to be aimed to vegans rather than people with allergies. What I mean by that is that, while they don’t contain any animal products as listed ingredients (milk, for example), they still say “may contain”. I suspect because they’re probably made in the same factory as the normal products. We’re lucky that Piglet (as far as we’re aware!) doesn’t often seem to be set off by trace levels of allergen.

So how are they? Well I must admit I had fairly low expectations. Suspecting that these might be more of a marketing product (i.e. “look we even cater for vegans” rather than made out of a love of dairy-free ice cream) and not even entirely sure from the ingredients what ice-cream it even was; all seemed like negative omens. To my surprise, I was blown away by how good they taste: It tastes like a proper magnum. I mean, sure, a bit less milky, but sweet creamy ice cream encased in rich cracking slabs of dark chocolate. Utterly delicious!

I’m still not 100% sure what the ice cream is made of. There’s coconut oil fairly high up on the ingredients but it doesn’t have the strong coconut taste of some coconut based dairy alternatives. It also has pea protein (a fairly widely available non-whey protein alternative for smoothies and gym enthusiasts alike) but rest assured doesn’t in any way taste of pea. It is, much like the original – from what I can remember, very sweet and the vanilla is pretty powerful, but I’m very impressed and will definitely get these again. What makes it even more exciting is that the almond ones look even better!

Excuse me while I just pop out to the shops…