Latest Fact Sheet

Season 4, Ep 1 - Icecream

ICE CREAM - FACTS

· The food standards code defines ice cream as a “sweet frozen food made from cream or milk products or both, with a minimum of 10% milk fat”.

· A standard ice cream has 10% fat, while a premium ice cream is anything from 12% and up.

· When ice cream melts, it reduces in volume, this is caused by the air escaping. Air plays an important role in the structure of ice cream. Tiny air bubbles are whipped into ice cream as it’s being frozen and it adds to the creamy texture of ice cream.

· We tested the amount of air in ice cream products and found the two-litre ice cream products were around 50% air, while the premium ice cream was 37% air.

· Low fat ice creams tend to be better source of calcium and protein, but they can have the same amount of sugar as regular ice creams, if not more.

· Ministry of Health guidelines recommend us to eat three servings of dairy per day for calcium and one of the recommendations is ice cream, however we’re advised to opt for dairy products with less sugar such as reduced-fat milk, yoghurt and cheese.

· Sugar is a crucial ingredient in ice cream. It adds sweetness but also lowers the freezing point of ice cream which stops it freezing into a solid block of ice.

· The dairy products that go into ice cream also contribute saturated fat. Premium ice creams are around 10% saturated fat, standard ice creams 7% and low fat ice creams 2% saturated fat. When we asked people to compare the taste of a regular ice cream with a low fat ice cream 47% preferred the regular ice cream, 35% preferred the low fat and 18% liked them both the same.

· New research suggests that some people are better at tasting fat than others. Weight problems could be related to our ability to taste fat.

· Last year New Zealanders spent over $150 million dollars on ice cream with us each consuming, on average, 27 litres a year. Together with Australia, we’re the second biggest consumers of ice cream in the world, after the USA.

· Last year, NZ exported $43 million dollars worth of ice cream and ice blocks and imported $20 million dollars worth.

· In most countries, vanilla, chocolate and strawberry are the top three favourite flavours but hokey pokey has been a traditional favourite in New Zealand. However, our poll of 50 people found that newer flavours like cookies and cream were more popular than hokey pokey.

· Brain freeze or ice cream headache is commonly experienced by people eating ice cream. Also known as sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia, it’s a splitting headache caused by cold ice cream rapidly cooling blood vessels in the roof of the mouth. As these blood vessels warm again, they expand and send a pain signal to the brain along a major facial nerve and the brain interprets the pain as coming from the forehead.

· Apparently it’s impossible to get an ice cream headache in a cold environment.

· Some chocolate-coated ice creams on a stick contain as much as 33g of sugars. An equivalent amount of standard ice cream in a bowl contains 19g of sugars.

· Synthetic colours used in flavours from orange chocolate chip, French Vanilla and boysenberry have raised questions about effects on children’s behaviour. The flavourings under the spotlight are Sunset Yellow, Quinoline Yellow, Allura Red, Tartrazine, Carmoisine, and Ponceau 4R. They have been deemed to be safe in NZ but the European Union specifies that products which include them must carry a warning. Anyone suspecting an intolerance could talk to their doctor.

· Sugar-free ice creams usually contain sorbitol or maltitol. These are sugar alcohols that are not quite as sweet as sugar and they contain less calories because we can’t digest them as easily. Therefore, they may have a laxative effect.

· The ultimate question is how much ice cream you can have. Dietitians tell us that the answer really depends on your lifestyle, how much you exercise, your weight and what else you’re eating. If you’re generally active and you’re not overweight, you can get away with one or two scoops of ice cream once or twice a week.

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