Dallas frozen yogurt meltdown: Yogurtville in Plano

by Teresa Gubbins

Opened: June 2009

Profile: This second outlet of Yogurtville, a standard self-serve fro-yo place in Carrollton that opened in fall 2008, is much like the original. (Another branch just opened in Allen.)

Ambiance: Storefront at the southwest corner of the ultra-busy Preston and Park has cheap plastic lime-green and red furniture, and a laminate wood floor. The clientele on a Thursday night was mostly Plano teens, although I appreciated the out-of-place guy in his 40s wearing Euro-style glasses and colorful Ed Hardy sneakers. The shop is fortuitously located in the same center as Market Street, so even if you don't love the yogurt, you get the opportunity to shop at a great, fully-stocked supermarket.

Utensils: One-size-only extra-large paper cup, plastic spoons.

Price: 35 cents per ounce.

Yogurt: Eight machines, 16 flavors, from the same pool every other YoCream-supplied fro-yo shop has. Original tart, of course, plus the core crowd-pleasing basics like van-choc-straw, peanut-butter, and cookies n cream.

But this Yogurtville had an unusually large representation of uncommon flavors such as espresso, strawberry-banana, almond roca, and birthday cake.

All good except for the fact that, from machine to machine, the consistency varied. Raspberry tart was very cold and hard, while coconut splatted out all melted. It's not the end of the world but when you're mixing flavors, it's preferable when all the flavors have a similar firmness.

Overall, the texture seemed more watery -- almost as if the yogurt had been mixed with a higher proportion of water.

The other issue: Some of the flavors seemed off, and this was most obvious in the "original tart" which tasted like ... doughnuts. Seriously. It didn't taste like any of the other original tarts sampled so far.

Verdict: Recommend. Various shortcomings in flavor and texture do not surpass the convenient location and moderately reasonable price. Plus, Market Street is nearby.