Pinkberry

Last night Brianna and I hopped the PATH train to Jersey City's Loew's Theatre to see The Decemberists in concert. [Note: I think that is the most linkalicious sentence EVER on UFF!] Anyway, before we did that, we stopped at the newly-opened Pinkberry, a heathy frozen-yogurt restaurant chain based in L.A. (Bri had the inside scoop - pun intended - on this treat. She LOVES ice cream, possibly more than I do.) Anyway, I diligently Googled the brand before hitting the store, and found lots of good press. And I love the name: "Pinkberry" is really fun to say. (The Nefarious Dr. Funstuff speculates that all words with a "k" are particularly fun to say, and he's a nefarious doctor, so who am I to argue?)

The store itself is sparse, and has a wall of bright and bubbly Japanese kitchen stuff reminiscent of my favourite desk accessory, the Sunshine Buddy. Pinkberry offers two flavours of yogurt: Original and Green Tea. They also have myriad toppings, including Fruity AND Cocoa Pebbles (in addition to the usual fruits and chocolate chips). They also offer carob chips which seems a bit odd to me, probably because my mom used to try to pawn off carob chips on us as being the same as chocolate chips, and, not so much.

Bri ordered Original yogurt with Fruity Pebbles and strawberries. I had Green Tea with raspberries and yogurt chips. The servings are generous, and 5 oz will cost you a mere 125 calories. The yogurt is *delicious* - it's slightly tart, and the green tea flavour was subtle and authentic. I'd probably go for a crunchier topping next time -- after all, it's kind of hard NOT to order Fruity Pebbles when that's an option.

A small cup with 2 toppings costs around $6, so Pinkberry certainly isn't cheap. It was worth the splurge, as I've never tasted anything like it. In fact, I'm inspired to try sour cream in my ice cream machine this summer to see if I can replicate Pinkberry's perfectly non-sweet taste.

Other notes from the evening:

• A Pinkberry employee chastised me for snapping this picture in the store:
  
  
  
  (Interestingly, I was once chastised for taking a picture at Starbucks, because clearly the inside of Starbucks is top-secret and God only knows what classified information might get into the wrong hands.)
  
  
• The Decemberists' concert was excellent! Lovely music, and a very high-energy performance.
  
  
• Going to Jersey City really wasn't so bad.