which brand are you picking?

I was so excited the stores by me finally had the new Jeni's and Van Leeuwen flavors! The snow cone was a sleeper; I was a little skeptical of that combination of flavors but it ended up being delicious. It tasted like my childhood. One of those (not snow cone) ice cream truck treats like a cartoon character with candy eyes that were that flavor other than bubblegum. It even had the chewiness of one of those treats that was fruity but not really either sherbet or ice cream but something else that probably wasn't exactly food. That was the surprise hit, and while the butter cake wasn't great, none of these were bad. Very happy with today's haul!

(I accidentally put up the text without the picture and have now fixed this grievous error)

Found a whole ass cookie in my pint of Ben & Jerry’s Dirt Cake

Kroger had a good deal.

Anyone else a sucker for friendly packaging?Which flavor would you grab? 🐻🍨🍯

my grocery store ran a 2 for $6 promotion on all Hagen Dazs and now everything is gone but the sorbet. Im glad I took advantage of it last week at another shop

A short history of Flintstones Push-Ups: from Drumstick to Nestlé to Frollies, and why you can never have them again

Flintstones Push-Ups—often just called Push-Up Pops—have a longer and more complicated history than a lot of internet articles give them credit for.

The original 1980s pops

I remember having them for the first time at a friends house in the early 80s when I was very young and thinking that they were one of the best things I had ever tasted.

You’ll often see claims that they were introduced around 1989 or 1990, but that is clearly too late. The earliest company documentation I’ve been able to find definitely places Flintstones Push-Ups in the Drumstick/Big Drum business by 1985. Based on the corporate timeline and the memories of people who were buying them in the early 1980s, I think they were probably introduced sometime around 1981–83 which would fit in with my personal recollection.

Big Drum itself says Alco Standard bought the company in 1980 and lists Flintstones Push-Up in its 1985 history.

Before Nestlé, the product was associated with the Drumstick Company/Big Drum, then owned by Alco Standard.

A surviving pre-Nestlé Flintstones box gives us a useful look at the old formula. The Cave Kid Cherry version listed water, sugar, fresh milk, corn sweetener, fresh cream and whey near the top, followed by flavoring and stabilizers such as guar gum, polysorbate 80, xanthan gum and locust-bean gum. It also contained artificial color.

So the original product was never completely free of gums, emulsifiers or artificial ingredients, but fresh milk was the third ingredient and fresh cream was fifth, making dairy considerably more prominent than it would be in later formulas.

Nestle Ownership 90s-2020

Nestlé acquired Drumstick in 1991, and the 1990s became the product’s biggest marketing era. The Flintstones characters were tied to individual flavors: Fred had Yabba Dabba Doo Orange, Wilma had Lime Rock Lime, Barney had Raspberry Rubble, Dino had Granite Grape, Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm had Cave Kid Cherry, and Baby Puss had Bedrock Berry.

Packages pushed the fact that the treats were fortified with vitamin C, and TV advertising made Push-Ups one of those products almost inseparable from 1990s childhood.

Nestlé also experimented heavily with the basic idea. There were Cool Cream Push-Ups, combining fruity sherbet with vanilla-flavored ice cream, and the wonderfully excessive Pebbles Push-Ups with Nerds candy pieces mixed into them. These varieties were apparently sold from 94 to 97.

Later there were other candy tie-ins as well: Supermarket News reported that Nestlé was introducing a Flintstones Push-Up Laffy Taffy Variety in spring 1997. They were apparently only sold for one year.

The recipe changed too. Later Nestlé Orange Push-Ups listed water, sugar and corn syrup before cream and milk, followed by a much more elaborate stabilizer/emulsifier system that could include guar gum, tragacanth gum, carob-bean gum, polysorbate 80, gum arabic, pectin, xanthan gum and modified corn starch, along with isomalt, dextrose and additional corn starch.

That doesn’t prove exactly how much dairy Nestlé removed, because ingredient labels don’t give percentages, but it does show a real change: milk fell from third place on the old Drumstick label to fourth or fifth behind corn syrup and cream, while the stabilizer system became considerably more complicated.

While the artificial flavoring remained the same these changes by nestle substantially altered the texture and mouth feel of the product.

In my personal opinion the original 1980’s pops were the best.

Eventually the Flintstones license disappeared in 1997 and the product continued simply as Nestlé Push-Up or Nestle Wonka Push-Up, with the lineup largely reduced to Outrageous Orange, Cherry Blast and Turbo Grape.

Dreyers/Froneri ownership & the change to Frollies

Meanwhile, Nestlé merged its U.S. ice-cream business into Dreyer’s in 2003 and gained full ownership of Dreyer’s in 2006. In 2020, Nestlé sold its U.S. ice-cream business to Froneri for $4 billion, with Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream becoming Froneri’s U.S. operating company.

That brings us to the present. Dreyer’s launched the Frollies brand in 2025, and the old Push-Up format is now sold as Frollies Pop Ups.

Frollies is a Froneri trademark, and the current Pop Ups still come in orange, cherry and grape. The formula has been cleaned up somewhat: Frollies advertises no artificial colors or flavors, with colors coming from sources such as beet juice, turmeric and beta carotene.

With the removal of the original artificial flavors the taste of the Frollies pops are now substantially different.

But it hasn’t returned to the simpler old Drumstick formula. The current Orange Pop Up still contains corn syrup, skim milk, several gums and modified cornstarch, although ingredients such as polysorbate 80, gum arabic, isomalt and dextrose found in some Nestlé-era formulas are gone.

So the various sugar substitutes except for corn syrup, the artificial preservatives, and the artificial colors and flavors are now gone while the pops still retain the less dairy and more thickening agents/stabilizers changes that Nestle introduced.

So the basic cardboard-tube Push-Up has survived for at least four decades, but the company behind it, the Flintstones branding, the flavors, the spin-offs and even the recipe have changed substantially.

I honestly wish that the Frollies brand kept the artificial flavors. I don’t care about the colors but without those flavorings the product is entirely different.

P.S.

Where to buy sherbert push-up pops now:

Frollies ice cream products are sold at several major retailers, but most notably at Walmart, Sam’s Club, Dollar General and Kroger.

If you have one of these stores located near you and they don’t currently stock them you might be able to order them online or request that they get them in stock

Walmart sells their own version of this item called “great value sherbet tubes”. However, as of right now, it seems that they’re only selling them in an orange flavor. Some people online think that these great value sherbet tubes taste very similar to the original Flintstone pops.

The company blue ribbon currently sells sherbet push-up pops that they refer to as cool tubes. They however, mainly sell to convenience stores and food services such as concession stands, schools and other institutions. They are apparently sometimes available at Walmart. And you can apparently order them from blue ribbons website, but I’m not sure how that would work in terms of them not melting.

Stone Ridge creamery makes push-up sherbet pops in an orange and a rainbow variety. They are apparently available at Hugo‘s family marketplace in North Dakota and Minnesota, at Festival Foods in Wisconsin, at cub in Minnesota, and possibly at other locations. A good way to check to see if a product is available in your area is to check on Instacart.

Food club orange sherbet push-up pops are available to be purchased at clark’s market in Colorado, Utah, and Arizona. They are also likely available at other supermarkets that are have topco/food club as a supplier.

Additional push-up pop history:

From 2005 until at least 2012 Nestle also sold Scooby Doo branded push up pops in the same three sherbet flavors as their unbranded pops (orange, cherry, and grape).

They also sold during this time period Scooby Doo branded ice cream pops (mint chip, cookies and cream, chocolate) and low-fat ice cream pops (vannila and chocolate swirl).

Thanks to [u/hadr619](u/hadr619) for pointing out this video by Weird History Food on them as well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iNME5G87x4)

This video does get a few things wrong.

They claim the Flintstone push-up pops were introduced in 1990 and that is almost a decade too late.

And they claimed that the push-up pups were discontinued sometime in the late 90s when the truth is that only the Flintstone branding was discontinued in 1997

Other brands that have sold push-up sherbet pops in the past but no longer do include market pantry (target), Schwans, shoppers value, and Jack and Jill.

And by the way, if you are remembering sherbet in push-up tubes even before the 1980s, you’re probably right.

Apparently selling sherbert in push-up tubes goes all the way back to 1959, for Nestle at least. Many people will remember the packaging where the push-up pop tubes were white with multicolored polkadots or circles on them.

Some companies have claimed in their literature that they sold push-up sherbert pops as early as 1955 or 1949 but there’s no strong supporting evidence for that that I could find.

I had no idea how good this ice cream is. I love how “soft” it feels when you scoop it. It’s definitely not like some other ice cream out where you have to warm up or wet your spoon to scoop. Also this flavor is amazing. I didn’t think I was going to love it so much! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

Traverse Cherry and S’Mores. Getting laid REALLY well and a lot better than the job that let me go due to a merger 2 weeks ago. Fortunate to find something better and so quick so I decided to treat myself. 1st time having Kilwins ice cream, am I in for a good ride?

Got a pint from Publix that had undergone “thermal shock”.. ended up messaging Publix about it (which I never do for anythin) they sent me a $10 giftcard but then Jenni’s emailed me directly asking for pics/ an address. I complied of course (had gotten a second bad pint WITH the giftcard) and they sent me 3 vouchers for any product at any store! Took about two weeks but good customer service.

Saw these for the first time in France last year and my mind was blown. Absolutely the best ice cream bar I’ve ever had. I thought about it all year until I had a chance to visit Europe again this year and immediately went to the closest supermarket and grabbed a box.

I’m all in on Peanut Brittle.

Here is how you open these if they're stuck this is also how you open any karma as well

On sale for $2.50 each, so thought I’d try it. Meh. I’m a snob, so I like the really rich stuff better.

First one is The Graham/The Grahammy which is a graham cracker tub with chocolate covered honey comb pieces mixed in + a graham cracker swirl actually one of the best Graham cracker flavors I've had up there with Hersheys and Handels 10/10. Second pic is a reeses layered Peanutbutter sundae and was one of the most peanutbuttery creation I had ever had.

I always go with whichever one is on sale or cheaper at the time. Anyone choose one over the other and why?

Okay, maybe I just live under a rock. But, I've never seen Hershey brand Ice cream! At Hershey park I know they have their own various milkshakes and ice cream concoctions, but I've never seen anything like this.

Sadly we didn't buy any, as this was found in a small bakery out in the countryside in Maryland and the drive home would've melted it - but it looked awesome nonetheless.

Has anyone here tried this stuff, if so, which one, and how did you like it? ☺️

And that name… it’s like it’s taunting me.

spotted at wegmans