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Dunkaroos are a classic kids snack that consists of a cookie and frosting dip. They were created in the early 1990s and became a lunchbox staple for kids everywhere. While the original flavor was chocolate chip cookies with vanilla frosting, there are now many different flavors to choose from. But, are Dunkaroos vegan?
Dunkaroos Vanilla Cookies And Chocolate Frosting might be vegan, but contains natural flavors which can contain animal-sourced ingredients.
Below is a table showing Dunkaroos flavors and its vegan status.
| Flavor | Vegan Status |
| Vanilla Cookies And Chocolate Frosting | Maybe, contains Natural Flavor. |
| Vanilla Cookies and Vanilla Frosting with Rainbow Sprinkles | No, contains Milk. |
| Dunkaroos Sugar Cookie Dough | No, contains Milk and Eggs. |
| Dunkaroos Cereal | Maybe, contains Vitamin B12, Vitamin D3 and Natural Flavors. |
| Go-GURT Dunkaroos – Birthday Cake | No, contains Milk and Gelatin. |
| Go-GURT Dunkaroos – Strawberry | No, contains Milk and Gelatin. |
| Dunkaroos Sugar Cookie Mix | No, contains Milk. |
| Dunkaroos Complete Rainbow Sprinkles Pancake Mix | No, contains Milk. |
| Dunkaroos Vanilla Frosting with Rainbow Sprinkles | No, contains Milk. |
Dunkaroos Ingredients
Below is a list of ingredients from all the flavors that I could find.
- Artificial Flavor
- Baking Powder
- Baking Soda
- Blue 2
- Blue Lakes 1 & 2
- Canola Oil
- Caramel Color
- Cinnamon
- Citric Acid
- Cocoa Processed With Alkali
- Coconut Oil
- Corn Flour
- Corn Grits
- Corn Meal
- Corn Starch
- Corn Syrup
- Cultured Grade A Low Fat Milk
- Distilled Monoglycerides
- Dextrose
- Eggs
- Enriched Flour
- Folic Acid
- High Fructose Corn Syrup
- Hydrogenated Palm Oil
- Iron
- Kosher Gelatin
- Modified Cellulose
- Modified Corn Starch
- Molasses
- Monocalcium Phosphate
- Monoglycerides
- Natural And Artificial Flavor
- Niacin
- Nonfat Milk
- Palm Kernel Oil
- Palm Oil
- Polysorbate 60
- Red 3
- Red 40 Lake
- Red Lake 40
- Reduced Iron
- Riboflavin
- Salt
- Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate
- Sodium Stearoyl Actylate
- Potassium Sorbate
- Soy Lecithin
- Sugar
- Sunflower Oil
- Thiamin Mononitrate
- Tricalcium Phosphate
- Water
- Whole Grain Corn
- Whole Wheat Flour
- Yellow 5 Lake
- Yellows 5 & 6
[Source]
As always I’ve highlighted the ingredients that we need to take a closer look at.
Non-Vegan Ingredients
Milk
Milk is unfortunately a very common ingredients candy and snacks today. Dunkaroos is no different because many of the flavors contains nonfat milk, which is a non-vegan ingredient.
Eggs
Eggs is also a non-vegan ingredients since it comes from hens. It does not matter if they are free range or organic, the eggs would always be a non-vegan ingredient since it’s animal-produced.
Kosher Gelatin
Kosher gelatin is a type of gelatin that has been certified as meeting the requirements of Jewish dietary law. Gelatin is often made from bones and is not a vegan ingredient.
Questionable Ingredients
Palm Oil
Now palm oil is a very controversial ingredients not only to vegans, but a lot of people who are aware of the severe deforestation that is taking place for palm plantations. Why is this a problem? Well it’s effecting the environment and the wild life suffers. It’s not any forest that is being cut down, it’s rain forest and the homes of mainly orangutans are being destroyed.
So many products contains palm oil today because it’s cheap to buy and it’s the best vegetable to produce per square meter, also making it a very profitable vegetable oil. This attracts many companies to this industry and for some time the production of palm oil has gotten out of control when it comes to the deforestation.
As a way to somewhat regulate this industry a non-profit organisation was created called RSPO. It stands for Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. They help companies produce and buy sustainable palm oil. Dunkaroos is produced by General Mills Inc and they are a RSPO member. So In that sense the palm oil in Dunkaroos would be vegan-friendly.
Sugar
The second questionable ingredient is sugar and this one is a tricky one for many vegans. The most common sugar types used is beet- and cane sugar. Beet sugar is vegan-friendly and so is raw cane sugar. However in candy and snacks the cane sugar is often refined and this where the problem begins for vegan.
When it’s refined, the sugar is also bleached and a common method to do this is to use bone char from dead cows. Exploiting animals in the production process does not align well with veganism.
Artificial Colors
There are several artificial colors that can be found throughout the flavors of Dunkaroos. These colors are known for being tested on animals, mostly rodents and a lot of vegans are staying away from these colors. Essentially it’s up to you if you want to consume these colors.
It’s also worth to mention that there are other testing methods such as computer simulations that can do a great job instead of the animal testing.
Natural Flavors
This ingredient is not an easy one, because it can contain many ingredients and the company only has to call it natural flavors. This means that ingredients both from animal sources and plant sources can be hidden inside this ingredients making it very hard for vegans knowing if it’s safe for them to consume it.
Tricalcium Phosphate
Tricalcium Phosphate is mostly derived from rocks, but it can also be sourced from animals.
Conclusion
Veganism is becoming more and more popular because of the awareness of animal-cruelty and our climate changing to the worst. Companies are noticing this change and are making more vegan-friendly products which is amazing.
Unfortunately none of the Dunkaroos flavors are vegan, except maybe one but it contains natural flavors which has an unknown source of the ingredients.
Thanks for reading, take care!
