New Ben & Jerry's Flavor Rumored To Increase Lactation

Many new mothers who want to breastfeed but have trouble producing enough milk turn to food supplements for a helping hand, but one of the latest supplements for nursing mothers is unexpected: Ben & Jerry's ice cream.

The "Oat of this Swirled" Ben & Jerry's flavor is a brown sugar ice cream flecked with chocolate and big chunks of oatmeal cookies. Oats contain saponins, which may increase the hormones needed to produce milk, according to Scary Mommy's Valerie Williams. Therefore, oats are a potential galactagogue — a food that increases milk production in breastfeeding mothers.

Of course, this means that a more efficient means of increasing lactation would be to eat bowls of oatmeal, but that doesn't sound like nearly as much fun as eating pints of oatmeal cookie ice cream.

There's no evidence that eating "Oat of this Swirled" will actually increase milk production, but it does sound pretty tasty.