History of Sweet Retreat & Treat Ice Cream

 

Fro-yo girl here. Sweet Retreat used to have multiple locations in the South Bay (Bay Area). I think the one at 846 Blossom Hill Rd. in San Jose is the last one standing. The first one probably opened in the 1990s. Sweet Retreat is known for soft serve mix-in style frozen yogurt.

The customer picks the size and the mix-ins (candies, frozen fruit, nuts, cookies, etc.). The mix-ins are blended in a Swirl Freeze machine that looks like a drill using Treat Ice Cream’s tart vanilla froyo base. The base is tangy, thick, smooth, and creamy. The use of real fruit also makes it taste natural. It’s expensive (a small is $7.90 + $2 for each add-in), but the portions are very generous.

Former Sweet Retreat Locations

• 15545 Union Ave, Los Gatos was old school. I’m not sure when it opened (before 2006, possibly in the 90’s), but it closed in 2017.
• 6061 Cahalan Ave, San Jose, might have opened in the 1990s, closed in 2016 due to a fire
• 97 E 3rd St, Unit C2-1, Morgan Hill, opened in 2019 and closed in 2023
• 744 S Wolfe Rd, Sunnyvale, not sure when it opened or closed, but all the reviews were all written in 2006

Sweet Retreat also offers hard-scoop ice cream from Treat Ice Cream. Treat Ice Cream had a factory in San Jose, CA. Treat Ice Cream was founded in 1951. It was acquired by Marianne’s Ice Cream in 2021. Marianne’s owners plan to continue to produce Treat Ice Cream. The original owner of Marianne’s, Sam Lieberman, learned the ice cream trade from the original owner of Treat Ice Cream, Al Mauseth.

Mix-in style real fruit ice cream is having a moment right now. Sweet Retreat was ahead of its time.

You know you love me. X0 X0, fro-yo girl.

Looking for more frozen yogurt news, discussion boards, and resources? Check out the International Frozen Yogurt Association website at http://internationalfrozenyogurt.com/. The IFYA is the independent voice of the frozen yogurt industry.

Yogurtland’s New Offering: Zoom, the All-New Way to Froyo

Fro-yo girl here. I recently noticed that Yogurtland Chino Hills, CA and West Covina, CA now offer Yogurtland Zoom. Zoom is a blended froyo product. You select the frozen yogurt flavor and the toppings and Yogurtland blends it together for you (similar to Dairy Queen’s Blizzard or McDonald’s McFlurry) using a machine.

I visited Yogurtland West Covina (1000 W Covina Pkwy). Zoom is priced by weight at the same price: 45 cents an ounce. There are taller Zoom cups, longer spoons, and signs with instructions and recipes.

I decided to mix Lucky Mint Crème froyo, Double Cookies & Cream froyo, chocolate chips, white chocolate chips and Oreo cookies. I put everything in the cup (you don’t have to fill the cup) and handed it to the Yogurtland associate. The cup is placed into a blending machine and everything is mixed together. It doesn’t take long.

I liked what I blended together – the flavors were complementary. However, I noticed the add ins weren’t blended in well. The chocolate chips still seemed to be intact and there were big cookie chunks too. Other places do a better job blending the yogurt and toppings. The frozen yogurt comes out softer too. I like unblended frozen yogurt and toppings better.

Yogen Fruz is the leader in the mixed/blended froyo category. In Southern California, you can get custom blended frozen yogurt at Yogen Fruz in Tarzana, Humphrey Yogart in Sherman Oaks, 21 Choices in Pasadena and Claremont, and CDM Yogurt in Newport Beach (Orange County). You can also find custom blended frozen yogurt at Blush in Burlingame, CA, Tucker’s in Alameda, CA, Sweet Retreat in San Jose, CA, Oregon Frozen Yogurt in Oregon, WI, Angora Café in Boston and Loving Cup in San Francisco. Frozen Peaks, with locations in New Jersey and New York, offers FP Swirl, their custom blended frozen yogurt.

While a custom blended frozen yogurt can be tasty as it more evenly distributes the toppings so that there are toppings in every bite, it does change the flavor of the frozen yogurt (which can be good or bad). Some toppings don’t taste as good when they’re blended – for example, graham cracker crumbs become gritty when blended into the frozen yogurt, and mochi isn’t transformed, it just becomes smaller. The seeds get separated from the berry flesh. Cookies, candy and sauces make the best add ins. I’ve also noticed that on more than one occasion when a machine is used to blend the yogurt and toppings, sometimes the previous mix contaminates the next mix. The water flushing doesn’t remove all of the previous mix. The texture is also less smooth after toppings are blended in. Getting the right mix of frozen yogurt and toppings including the correct proportions can be tricky. 

Here are some of my recipes:

• Fresh strawberry froyo + frosted animal cookies + sprinkles + white chocolate chips
• Sumatra coffee froyo + crushed Butterfingers + Oreos
• Peanut butter froyo + Nutter Butter bites + peanuts + chocolate chips
• Matcha green tea froyo + Plain tart froyo + Fruity Pebbles 
• Coconut froyo + mango froyo + pineapple sorbet + coconut + fresh pineapple

Do you like custom blended frozen yogurt? Have you tried it? Would you be willing to try it?

You know you love me. X0 X0, fro-yo girl.

Looking for more frozen yogurt news, discussion boards, and resources? Check out the International Frozen Yogurt Association website at http://internationalfrozenyogurt.com/. The IFYA is the independent voice of the frozen yogurt industry.

Mix-In Fro-Yo

Fro-yo girl here. Though uncommon, some fro-yo shops have a special mixing machine that creates mix-in fro-yo. Think Dairy Queen Blizzard only with plain fro-yo instead of ice cream and frozen fruit instead of candy bits. The mixing machine is considerably cheaper than the soft serve machines most fro-yo shops have and the mix in method results in a different texture and taste. Using frozen fruit adds a pleasant icy quality to the thicker, chunkier and softer mix-in yogurt while using whole fruit can also add texture (e.g., seeds, larger pieces of fruit).

These are the four places to get mix-in fro-yo in the Bay Area:

Poco Café: 1688 Hostetter Rd, San Jose, CA
My favorite mix-in fro-yo and also the best value, choose from a wide variety of fruit flavors. The end result is chunkier than other places. Some of the plain frozen yogurt base didn’t get mixed in with the fruit but I think that added to the homemade charm.

Yogen Fruz: 3 Embarcadero Center, San Francisco, CA
Called Blend It, you get to select up to two types of frozen fruit and the base (non-fat vanilla, low-fat vanilla, non-fat/sugar-free vanilla or chocolate). It’s the smoothest of the mix-in fro-yos with a more pronounced flavor of the base yogurt. It’s the only place that provides multiple choices for the yogurt base.

Tartini: 20488 Stevens Creek Blvd, Cupertino, CA
Tartini Twister has a creamy vanilla fro-yo base and comes with your choice of frozen fruit.

Sweet Retreat: 6061 Cahalan Ave, San Jose, CA (and other locations in San Jose, Morgan Hill and Los Gatos)
The mix in yogurt is called the “create your own yogurt” option. It starts with their plain fro-yo base. Unlike the other shops, you can add candy and/or frozen fruit to the mix-in yogurt.

Note, Penguino’s in the Metreon (SF) also has a create your own flavor, mix-in fro-yo. I refuse to try it though, because their soft-serve fro-yo is horrible.

You know you love me. X0 X0, fro-yo girl.