Tru Fru is a fruit snack brand that mostly sells fruit (fresh or dried) dipped in chocolate. The brand claims their product line is "Made With Clean Ingredients," and it's marketed as a healthy snack option.
But is Tru Fru healthy or not? What ingredients are included other than chocolate and fruit? Does the brand use any questionable additive ingredients? And which Tru Fru flavor is the healthiest?
In this article we'll answer all of these questions and more, as we analyze the ingredients in Tru Fru based on clinical studies, to give our take on whether or not it's a healthy snack option.
We'll pick the healthiest Tru Fru flavor, and compare the brand to other popular fruit snacks in terms of healthiness.
Ingredient Analysis
The ingredients in Tru Fru Hyper-Chilled Raspberries (White & Dark Chocolate) are shown above.
Raspberries are unsurprisingly the first-listed ingredient, and it's a healthy choice that the brand uses real fruit.
This fruit is rich in nutrients, vitamins and phytochemicals that most Americans don't consume in their diet, as documented in a 2010 medical review.
Cocoa is clinically shown to have anti-cancer effects, as we documented in our Blueprint reviews article.
While this snack has some health-promoting ingredients, there are three areas of concern in our opinion.
Milkfat and whole milk powder are included, and the brand fails to clarify if the dairy is sourced from conventionally-raised animals or pastured animals. When a brand fails to clarify, we assume the former.
Milk from grass-fed animals was shown to be nutritionally richer in a medical review published in the Foods journal.
Natural vanilla flavor is a broad descriptor that may include chemicals such as include solvents and preservatives, according to a 2009 medical review.
We would much prefer if the company actually used whole vanilla.
Cane sugar is included at a relatively high dose of 6 grams (g) per serving, or 48 g in the whole bag.
Added sugar consumption in excess is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease according to a 2014 population study.
We consider whole food sources of sugar like fruits and maple syrup to be healthier than refined sources of sugar like cane sugar.
Overall, we do not consider Tru Fru healthy given the inclusion of flavoring, refined sugar and dairy from animals that may be conventionally-raised.
This is a healthier snack product than most snacks available in the US, but isn't one we would recommend.
What's the Healthiest Flavor?
Tru Fru is sold in a variety of flavors.
We consider the Hyper-Chilled Bananas (ingredients shown below) to be the healthiest option:
We apologize for the low quality of this image. It's the ingredient image published by the brand.
First, there is 50% less added sugar in this product than in the Raspberry product (3 g vs. 6 g).
Vanilla is used as a whole food flavoring ingredient, which is a much healthier option than "vanilla flavoring" in our opinion.
Vanillin, the dominant phytochemical in vanilla, was shown to have anti-obesity and gut-health-promoting effects in a medical review published in the Frontiers in Microbiology journal.
We also believe that any of the products containing dark chocolate are healthier options than those without.
Dark chocolate was described as a "functional food" in a medical review due to its anti-diabetic and anti-inflammatory effects, as we documented in our review of Hu Chocolate.
Tru Fru vs. the Competition
There are a number of snack products branded as healthy options, that contain both fruit and chocolate.
Here's our take on the healthiness of Tru Fru compared with some of its competitors:
Nutic
Nutic sells chocolate covered fruit, but some of their products (like their Chocolate Covered Blueberries) contain artificial food dyes like Blue 2 Lake and Red 40 Lake.
Some clinical studies have shown artificial food dyes to be harmful to humans and animals, as we discussed in our article on is Halo Top healthy.
Winner: Tru Fru (by a lot)
Kirkland Signature
Kirkland Signature is the famous house brand of Costco, and the brand sells chocolate covered fruits like mangoes.
While Kirkland Signature chocolate and fruit snacks contain natural flavors and added sugar, there is no dairy sourced from conventionally-raised animals.
Winner: Kirkland Signature (by a little)
Larabar
Some Larabars use chocolate and fruit as the base ingredients.
The brand's Chocolate Raspberry Truffle contains a small amount of added sugar, but is free of flavoring additives and dairy from conventionally-raised animals.
Winner: Larabar (by a little)
Make Healthy Chocolate Snacks at Home
A YouTube creator named Joe Duff has a video that's only two minutes long, with instructions on how to make healthy chocolate-covered fruit at home:
Our Clean Fruit & Chocolate Pick
HOLOS is our top healthy fruit and chocolate snack pick.
This brand sells packaged mixes along with a glass jar, including a Cocoa flavor with cocoa powder and fruits like white mulberries and goji berries. All you need to do is add milk or almond milk.
What makes HOLOS stand out in our opinion is that it's composed of whole food ingredients, contains probiotics, and is free of artificial sweeteners.
Interested consumers can check out HOLOS at this link to the product page on the brand's official website.
