This recipe tastes similar to a Wendy’s vanilla Frosty.
It’s like one of those thick vanilla milkshakes you’d find at a fast-food restaurant… but without all the empty calories and sugar to make you feel sluggish. The recipe actually came about by accident: I was working on a Tiramisu ice cream, and when I stopped to sample the unfinished mixture at one point, I discovered it tasted astoundingly like a real vanilla milkshake. Then, when my roommate came home from work and tried it, she proclaimed:
Holy crickets, it’s like a Wendy’s vanilla frosty!
Except, she didn’t really say “holy crickets” because, honestly, who talks like that? Holy crickets is just the PG version of her comment. In any case, I scrapped all plans for Tiramisu ice cream, and we poured ourselves ice-cold vanilla frosties instead.
Vanilla Frosty Recipe
(yields about 3 cups)
- 2 cups milk of choice (480g)
- 1 cup Morinu silken firm tofu (or 1 cup soaked cashews for a soy-free option. For other substitution options on this recipe, see nutrition link below.) (240g)
- 1/2 tbsp lemon juice, or more if you actually want a lemon-flavored frosty
- just under 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 2 tbsp xylitol or sugar of choice (23g)
- 1/16 tsp pure stevia, or 2 extra tbsp sugar
- don’t add any ice cubes, as this will dilute the flavor
In advance: Freeze the 2 cups of milk in ice cube trays or little dixie cups. (It might be a good idea to freeze multiple servings at once, so in the future you won’t have to wait before proceeding with the rest of the frosty recipe.) Pop the frozen milk into a blender or food processor with all other ingredients, and blend until desired consistency is reached. If your blender isn’t super-strong, you might have to thaw the milk a little before blending.
A note about the milk: Silk almondmilk works well in this recipe, and I’m sure many other types of milk will be good as well, but I can only vouch for the Silk because I haven’t tried the recipe with any others. I’d probably steer clear of the less-thick milks like ricemilk… then again, who knows: maybe it’ll work fine!
View Vanilla Frosty Nutrition Facts
And an aerial view, to show the thick frosty texture.
Have you ever had a Wendy’s Frosty?
After sports practices in middle school, my team used to go to Wendy’s. I wasn’t big on their strange square burgers, but I always looked forward to a broccoli baked potato and a Wendy’s chocolate frosty. Even before going vegetarian, I was a veggie lover! And a chocolate lover… I didn’t even know frosties came in other flavors until my roommate mentioned it yesterday.
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Katie this looks delicious, milkshakes are my absolute favorite treat, and somewhat guiltily, I have to admit, the fast food chain ones were my favorite! One question though…will you marry me? :p
LOL!
I’m freezing the soy milk tonight now that I’ve fixed the dying refridgerator, I really hope the soft tofu will work as good as the firm because I accidently bought the wrong one! Any reason I shouldn’t try it?
Report back with results if you do try it! 🙂
Well I just made a half batch and I must say I was pleasantly surprised! I’m not sure how the texture would differ with the firm tofu but I ate it right down with the soft tofu and you certainly wouldn’t notice if the blender missed a bit with how soft it is! I used Edensoy plain soy milk which I use exclusively and since I don’t have an ice tray I used a silicone muffin tray to freeze it! 😀
I just tried it with soft tofu as well, as that’s all I can find around here. I LOVED it, and my NOT healthy eater brother liked it too!
I was drinking it and going on and on about how good it was, and he was rolling his eyes so I poured him some, and made him try it. He said “That’s actually pretty good. Much better than those gross smoothies you normally drink.” In my brother’s language, that’s a pretty big compliment, especially since he knew he was drinking something with tofu! He actually finished his glass!
I know! I’ve now made 3 different variations all with soft tofu and they are amazing! Someone suggested using hot chocolate powder to make a chocolate version which was perfect, and I just did a strawberry variation where I used frozen strawberries and little soy milk to loosen it up, everything else was the same as the original recipe. I’m not even that into strawberry milkshakes but this recipe can’t seem to go wrong 😀
I would love to make this with full fat organic milk and organic sugar cane. MMMMM taste so good.
I can’t wait to try this! As teens my friends and I would dip our french fries in our frosties!
Thank you for posting this. I love to try a healthier version of a frostie.
Thanks so much for posting this. I would love to try a healthier way to make a frosty.
You are WONDERFUL! My husband is diabetic and I can use your recipes and use splenda or truvia and they are awesome. He misses out on so many sweet treats and now we can have chocolate bars courtesy of your recipe and Frosty’s plus lots of other goodies! He is thrilled and I am also. Thank you, thank you!
I love this recipe! It was amazing with yogurt, almond milk and agave! Thank you so much. 🙂
My sister ADORES Wendy’s Vanilla Frosty. And now I get to join in on the fun. Thanks for sharing your version of it! 😀
I just tried and loved this recipe! I made a half recipe to see how I liked it and I will definatly be making whole ones from now on. It was so good! Thanks for the aweswome mistake!
Is there a substitute for firm silken tofu? I am unable to find that in stores here. Would plain silken tofu work?
Thanks
Is there a substitute for firm silken tofu? Would plain silken tofu work?
Thanks
YOU GUYS! If you don’t want to wait hours for your milk to freeze, I put the milk in a plastic bag, then put that in a bigger plastic bag that’s filled with ice and salt. I shook it for about 10 min. It’s the same technique used to make homemade ice cream fast, and I actually do use the technique to make Katie’s voluminous ice cream, though I only shake it for about 4 min to make like a soft serve consistancy, but when you shake it for 10 min, it’s almost rock hard frozen like the ice cubes! You can then brake it into smaller chunks to put in the blender. TRY IT!
Yum yum yum! I just made this but omitted the tofu and substituted it with 1 cup’s worth of coconut milk ice cubes. SO SO good. Thank you for all of your amazing recipes.
I have been dying to make this (as well as some other recipes that call for the Mori-nu brand tofu) and I FINALLY found it!!! HOLY COW is this amazing!!!!! I was a tad skeptical at first (lemon?) but one taste and I was sold! It was incredible as is, but I needed some more protein so I added a scoop of vanilla and it was still delicious! I used Blue Diamond unsweetened vanilla almond milk and froze in the smaller semi-round trays and it worked perfect in my magic bullet-I just reduced the recipe in 1/2 to make a single serving size. Thanks again Katie! You ROCK!!!
THIS IS AWESOME! the taste is JUST LIKE a vanilla frosty from wendys!!!! Thanks for the PG version of what your friend said..it made me giggle! : )