Who doesn’t need a treat from time to time? Finding low oxalate desserts can seem overwhelming. Lists of “high” oxalate foods often ban common dessert ingredients like chocolate and nuts.
Never fear! There are plenty of low oxalate desserts you can enjoy if you need a low oxalate diet.
Read on to learn more about low oxalate desserts, and how low oxalate desserts fit in a healthy diet for kidney stone prevention!
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Table of Contents
Who Needs Low Oxalate Desserts?
First, it is important to figure out if you even NEED low oxalate desserts in the first place. Not everyone with kidney stones needs to restrict how much oxalate they eat. In fact, a low oxalate diet isn’t even necessary for everyone with calcium oxalate kidney stones.
The American Urological Association recommends that ONLY people with high urine oxalate levels follow a low oxalate diet. (1) A 24-hour urine test will measure the amount of oxalate in your urine. Healthy eating for kidney stones is MUCH more than oxalate. Sodium, sugar, protein and fluid may also be important.
There is no single diet for kidney stones. Nutrition must be personalized to YOU, and your 24-hour urine test.
Unfortunately, generic one-size-fits-all nutrition education is frequently given to people with kidney stones. Studies have found that dietary recommendations given to people with kidney stones is commonly incorrect, or inappropriate for that person. (2)
To learn more about what a kidney stone diet looks like for YOU, check out Kidney Stone Nutrition School. Or, my guide to kidney stone nutrition.
Sugar, Desserts & Kidney Stones
There is much more than oxalate to consider for kidney stone friendly dessert choices.
Sugar may make kidney stones worse. People who eat a lot of sugar, especially from sugary drinks, tend to have more kidney stones. (3) (4) Sugar can increase the amount of calcium in your urine, making calcium kidney stones more likely. (5) In fact, I am much more concerned about how much sugar my kidney stone patients are eating than how much oxalate.
Does this mean you can never eat dessert again? Of course not! Desserts (and low oxalate desserts, if necessary) can 100% fit in a healthy kidney stone diet. The key is moderation.
The American Heart Association recommends that men limit added sugar to 36 grams per day. Women should limit sugar to 25 grams per day. This definitely leaves from for a dessert not and then!
Be careful, sugar sneaks into our day in all sorts of surprising ways!
Sugar Substitutes & Kidney Stones
Sugar substitutes are okay for people with kidney stones. No research has found a bad (or good!) connection between artificial sweeteners and kidney stones.
Lots of research is coming out about the potential health consequences of sugar substitutes. However, most of these studies are small and lack scientific rigor. (6) Sugar substitutes are considered safe by the Food & Drug Administration. My general recommendation is that sugar substitutes are okay in moderation.
I get lots of questions about oxalate in stevia, the sweetener used in the product Truvia*. Although the stevia plant has a lot of oxalate in it, the oxalate is removed during processing. So, stevia sweeteners are oxalate free.
Work with your dietitian to figure out what the best sweetener option is for you!
What Is a Low Oxalate Dessert?
There is no official definition of a “low oxalate food”. Therefore, there is no official definition or cut-off for what a “low oxalate dessert” is.
I find that urine oxalate levels come down to safe ranges if dietary oxalate is limited to 100-200mg of oxalate per day – along with eating enough calcium. All of these low oxalate dessert ideas will easily fit into this daily goal of 100-200mg of oxalate per day.
Of course, if you don’t have high urine oxalate on a 24-hour urine test in the first place, you don’t need to concern yourself with finding low oxalate desserts.
Favorite Top 10 Low Oxalate Desserts
On to the good stuff! If you do need a low oxalate diet, here are my favorite low oxalate dessert recommendations!
Vanilla Ice Cream
0mg oxalate per 1/2 cup
Simple, classic and delicious! Ice cream has the added benefit of calcium. A 1/2 cup of vanilla ice cream has 85mg of calcium.
Calcium can help reduce how much oxalate is absorbed from your food and ultimately reduce urine oxalate levels. Counterintuitively, consuming enough calcium is important for people with calcium kidney stones.
Other tasty low oxalate ice cream flavors include strawberry, caramel, pistachio, banana and peppermint.
Strawberry Sherbet
0mg oxalate per 1/2 cup
Can you tell I am a frozen dessert fan? Sherbet is fantastic low oxalate dessert option.
Apple Crisp
2mg oxalate per 1/12 of a 9×13 pan
A must on my menu every fall! A bowl of warm apple crisp truly warms my soul.
Crisps, crumbles and cobblers made from other low oxalate fruits like peaches, pears, blueberries, blackberries, cherries or strawberries are also good options. Plus, eating more fruit (and vegetables!) can help prevent kidney stones. (7) (8)
Check out my Low Sugar Apple Crumble recipe!
Oatmeal Cookies
3mg oxalate per 1 medium cookie
Strict low oxalate food lists often ban anything with flour. This is silly. Oxalate (and most things in nutrition) is all about portion size.
Unless you eat an entire package of cookies, the flour in cookies will not add much oxalate to your day. Shortbread, butter and oatmeal cookies are all lower oxalate cookie options!
Read more about bread and flour on a low oxalate diet.
Lemon Italian Ice or Sorbet
0mg oxalate per 1/2 cup
A summertime classic! Italian ice is a great way to cool down and enjoy a low oxalate dessert.
Luigi’s Real Italian Ice* is DELICIOUS! I’m also obsessed with this NO sugar added Watermelon Lime Sorbet.
Bowl of Low Oxalate Fruit
Oxalate varies based on fruit choices
Fruit might just be the perfect low oxalate dessert. As a bonus, people who eat more fruits (and vegetables!) tend to have fewer kidney stones. (7) (8) Dessert is the perfect time to sneak in an extra serving of fruit.
My favorite low oxalate dessert fruits are bananas, melon, blueberries, strawberries, pineapple and mango.
Fruity Candy
0mg oxalate per 10 gumdrops
Candy such as gumdrops, jelly beans, Lifesavers, Good n’ Plenty and gummy bears are truly just made from sugar. No oxalate to be found here!
DO NOT worry about the oxalate content of higher oxalate flavors of candy, such as raspberry. The amount of actual fruit juice in candy is minimal (if any), and will not add a significant amount of oxalate.
Butterscotch Pudding
0mg oxalate per 1/2 cup
Butterscotch, tapioca, banana or vanilla pudding are all low oxalate desserts.
Like ice cream, pudding has that extra benefit of calcium. A 1/2 cup of butterscotch pudding has abut 85mg of calcium.
Blueberry Pie
5mg oxalate per 1/8 slice of an 8-inch pie
Seriously, who doesn’t love pie!? Pie made from low oxalate fruit like blueberries, cherries, apples, strawberries and most cream pies easily fit into the low oxalate desserts category.
Try my Healthy Blueberry Cobbler!
White Chocolate
1mg oxalate per 1 ounce
Chocolate is often “banned” on low oxalate diets.
Actual cocoa is pretty high in oxalate – 4 teaspoons of cocoa powder has 67mg of oxalate! However, the amount of actual cocoa that ends up in your dessert varies quite a bit. A 1/2 cup of chocolate pudding only has 2mg of oxalate in it, because so little cocoa ends up in the dessert.
White chocolate has no cocoa powder in it, therefore, it is essentially oxalate free. One ounce of white chocolate has about 1mg of oxalate. Compare this to 5mg in one ounce of milk chocolate (not much!), and 39mg of oxalate in 80% dark chocolate.
If you’ve never tried Lindor White Chocolate truffles*, you are missing out!
Be aware that white chocolate tends to have more sugar than dark or milk chocolate. Just like all desserts, enjoy chocolate in moderation to keep sugar in check.
High Oxalate Desserts
On the flip side, here are some higher oxalate desserts you may want to limit if you need a low oxalate diet.
Dark Chocolate Desserts
Desserts that have a lot of actual cocoa in them will be higher in oxalate. Hot chocolate and dark chocolate are two examples.
Desserts with Almonds
By far, almonds are the highest oxalate nut. One ounce of almonds has 122mg of oxalate. Desserts that have almonds in them will be a higher oxalate choice. Watch out for desserts made with almond flour too!
Of note, almond extract is rarely made from actual almonds. Even if it is, the amount of almond extract typically used in an entire batch of desserts will likely not add a significant amount of oxalate.
However, not all nuts are high in oxalate. Read more about lower oxalate nuts and seeds.
Raspberry Desserts
Raspberries have a fair amount of oxalate – about 50mg per cup of fresh raspberries. All other types of berries (and cherries!) are much lower oxalate options. If a dessert has a lot of actual raspberry in it like raspberry pie, it may be better to choose another berry dessert.
Rhubarb Desserts
Although not very common, desserts with rhubarb are another high oxalate dessert. A 1/2 cup of fresh rhubarb has 540mg of oxalate.
If you need a low oxalate diet, rhubarb crisp or pie should be limited.
How To Enjoy Low Oxalate Desserts Healthfully
For most people with kidney stones, I am much more concerned about all the sugar in desserts than the oxalate. In either case, the key to enjoying any dessert in a healthy diet is moderation.
When you do enjoy a sweet treat, do so mindfully. Take time to ask yourself if you actually even want the dessert. So many times, we eat because we think we should, habits, social pressures, or external cues such as advertising.
If you do really want the dessert, then by all meals enjoy it! Take time to really taste and savor your treat. Serve yourself a small piece and ask yourself if you really want more.
And please, don’t serve yourself a side of guilt with your dessert!
Happy Eating!
Melanie
This was extremely helpful.. i have a sweet tooth and im trying to navigate this new world.
Hi Melanie,
Since reading the footnotes in the Journal of Pharmacology on sugar substitutes – I understand Stevia is the safe sugar substitute.
I love Crystal light Lemonade- because it is has citric Acid and Citrate in it – to lower the Oxalate, but it is sweetened with Phenylalanine. Please clarify Crystal light drinks…..
Thank you
Hi Annetta -The artificial sweeteners in Crystal Light don’t stress me out. I love this article from a fellow dietitian about the science behind artificial sweeteners!
Hi Melanie,
Speaking of DESERTS – please tell me if plain Ground Cinnamon is high in Oxalate? and what about other sugar substitutes – Aspartame and Phenylalanine are these high in Oxalate?
All sugar subs are oxalate free. This post about oxalate in spices will help on the cinnamon questions!
Hi – is chocolate extract (liquid, like vanilla extract) high in oxalates?
My guess would be that the oxalate in this wouldn’t be significant, especially in amounts you would realistically use.
We are finding some of the best advice from 30 (or more) years ago is no longer considered good. Also just learned that diet may not be the answer to the cause or control.
All of my information is based on the most recent science. But yes, nutrition and diet is CERTAINLY not always the answer.
Is eating cooked and strained raspberry sauce any lower in oxalates than eating the fresh fruit with seeds? My kidneys have turned into a gravel factory and I’m about to die without any raspberries as they’re my favorite fruit.
Thanks,
Paula C.
Hi Paula! Removing the seeds might take away some of the oxalate, but likely not a significant amount. That being said, PLEASE make sure that oxalate is even the cause of your stones (even if you have calcium oxalate stones, this isn’t necessarily the case!) and that even those higher oxalate foods can DEFINITELY fit in a kidney stone prevention plan for anyone. I’d love to help you learn more about this in Kidney Stone Nutrition School!
I eat a Tums before I eat any food that doesn’t come from an animal source. It is the calcium carbonate in the Tums that the crystals attach to, then leave the body without being absorbed into the blood stream. A glass of milk which also contains calcium will perform the same function.
Hi Cheryl! I’d recommend being careful with Tums or any other calcium supplement. For MOST people with stones, calcium supplements can actually raise the risk of calcium stones – whereas naturally occurring sources of calcium can reduce risk. I dive into all of these specifics in this article!
Hi. I’ve been suffering from kidney stones for years and thought i was controlling my levels well (based on a diet my urologist gave me 30 years ago). until my recent blood work from my new urologist showed my oxolates level to be high. There are so many variations on what is good or bad that is hard to know what to do. it’s additionally hard for me a I’m also diabetic.
I downloaded your Oxolate list and was surprised to see Stevia sweetener listed as high (42mg per packet). Yet in your article here you say that Stevia sweetener is low. Can you clarify please. I only use 1 packet per day in my coffee but if it’s that high, then I’ll have to stop.
Thanks for your help.
Hi Suzanne! Thanks for your comment! Stevia (the plant) is high in oxalate, however in processing the oxalate is removed. So Stevia (the sweetener) is nearly oxalate free!
Thanks Melanie. That’s good to hear. Back to the drawing board now to figure out where I’m going wrong. you’d think after all these years I’d be an expert. lol
Is fruit juice from a juicer higher in oxalate than just eating fruit?
It could be! As you are likely eating a much higher AMOUNT of fruit in juice form, than if you just ate the fruit itself. For example, only 4 fl oz of juice is the same as 1 piece (or serving) of fruit. Most people drink much more than 4oz at a time!
Lindor White Chocolate suggested above has cocoa butter in ingredients right, isnt that rich in oxalate
Nope!
Thank you for the dessert tips Melanie! I’m a baker by blood lol so dessert is part of life. It’s nice to know what is helpful to eat and what to avoid especially during holidays and birthdays.
You are so welcome Bonnie!
“Sugar makes kidney stones worse.” Are you referring to ADDED sugar only, or ALL sugar, including the sugar found in fruits (which folks on a low oxalate diet may eat a lot of!)? Thanks.
I’d love an answer to this, too!
Yep! ADDED sugar is really what we are concerned about. Eating plenty of fruit (and veggies!) is actually generally highly protective against stone formation. Naturally occurring sugar – like in fruit – is usually not a concern. IF you have diabetes or blood sugar problems, this carbohydrate does need to be accounted for. Also, note that “natural” sugar like honey, agave, etc is still added sugar!