How America fell out of love with ice cream
How America fell out of love with ice cream
America’s age-old love affair with ice cream appears to be winding down.
Consumption of regular dairy ice cream, which does not include frozen yogurt, sherbet or non- and low-fat ice creams, has been falling for years, according to the US Department of Agriculture.
Probably because of shrinkflation and because they're taking all the good stuff out of it. Seems like most of it is no longer ice cream but "frozen dairy dessert".
I feel like you could take this story and change “ice cream” to anything and for me 90% of the time its true. Quality has been sacrificed for profit.
I noticed that for the first time a few years ago, when I had Breyers frozen dessert sitting in the sink for two hours.
Initially, I put it there thinking that it would just melt away like ice cream normally does. Nope.
In 1986, the average American ate 18 pounds of regular ice cream, according to the USDA. By 2021, the most recent year of the data, that was down a third to just 12 pounds per person.
12 pounds per person still feels like a lot.
I agree. I don't eat anywhere near that so one of you must have increased your consumption by a third to pretty close to 24 pounds.
I also think it's weird that they are measuring in mass when it is almost always sold by volume.
Per what time period? Life time?
Per year if I’m reading the article correctly.
per year.
I get the whole health conscious thing, but part of the blame shouldn't be aimed at consumers. Hitting all the major brands with the grocery shrink-ray from 1/2 Gal to 1.x Qts and raising the price didn't do them any favors. Same with the newer formulations that barely let them be called true ice cream anymore.
If I had fuck you money, and Ben and Jerry didn’t insist on making their tasty shit like 1500 calories a pint, I’d totally keep them in business single handedly.
Recently, I was at the grocery store and the family in front of me at at a minimum of 9 tubs of ice cream. (2L ones). Turns out they are from Connecticut visiting Canada. According to the check out lady, people from the states load up on our local ice cream and cheeses. It seems to be quite common.
The brand of ice cream that they got has a factory + store front about 10 minutes away from me. We drive past it all the time, it's been extremely busy with these hot temps. With lines going out the door and into the parking lot just to have an ice cream cone.
Sure, it's anecdotal, but there's still plenty of people in love with ice cream.
About ten years ago while visiting the Canadian side of Niagra Falls, my other half wanted a pizza and to stay in at our beautiful room overlooking the falls. So we got a fancy pizza with pretzel crust from Little Caesars and holy hell it was good - soon as we got back to America I tried to order the exact same pizza a week later and it was completely different. Different crust, cheese, etc - I was so disappointed lol
Canada and US have different food and safety laws. Milk is quite a bit different, the laws are pretty strict that US cannot export their milk to Canada. There's hormones and such the US inject their cows with (in order to produce more milk) that are illegal in Canada. It affects the flavour and how healthy the milk is.
Canada has higher standards of what is acceptable to eat. I believe during covid they did not reduce their standards to meet demands. In the US, if the animal was sick it's not supposed to be suitable for consumption. But in order to meet demands, they loosened that restriction. Meat quality went down during covid. In Canada the price of meat went up.
The US is also more likely to use fillers and such to cut costs. Like how back in the medieval age, they would cut their flour with saw dust. Basically that. But it isn't necessarily the law to put that anywhere or what the filler is. There are many products in the US that cannot be sold as that product in other countries. Example: wonder bread can not be sold as bread due to all the sugar. Subway has to be classed as a desert place due to all the sugar, a specific brand of ice cream cannot be classed as ice cream due to lack of cream (and because of all the sugar), so on and so fourth.
It doesn't surprise me that it's so different. About 15 years ago I had a burger at a McDonald's Donald's in Mexico and it was so different, it was so good. It was like eating at an actual higher end burger joint. The lettuce and tomatoes were fresh, the patties were juicy, the buns weren't a sweet, wet mess. And it was bigger, too.
Wow big day in the news
I stopped buying ice cream when people started licking them in the grocery store
I used to like ice cream, but diabetes put a screeching halt to that. I've tried the healthier alternatives, but they're horrible. Keto ice cream is just the worst.
Literally the only keto ice cream i can eat is the Mint Chip by Rebel. Every other brand or flavor tastes horrible. My husband doesn't like any of them either, not even mint chip. I have tried probably 3 brands and 10 flavors across the keto ice cream universe. I have some serious trust issues with the keto community recommending absolutely horrible keto versions of food saying it "tastes justlike regular x!" And it is nowhere close. Ever. It did get me to just give up and eat better overall lol.
Actually, one bizarre research finding is that, "among diabetics, eating half a cup of ice cream a day is associated with a lower risk of heart problems".
No one's quite sure why or how or whether it's some sort of odd correlation (but it does seem to resist all attempts to p-hack it out of significance), and there's not much appetite among researchers to look too closely into it because everyone knows that ice cream is bad for you.
When you break it down all ice cream is is frozen milk. Things like heavy cream help stabilize it. Sugar/chocolate/vanilla is most commonly added to make it taste more interesting.
If you’re a diabetic you could cut out the sugar and add alternatives. Make your own ice cream it’s super easy.
Dam, I eat probably 50-60lb per year, trying to do my part.
While I have no basis for this
I think the reason Ice Cream fell out of favor is because it's a "Normal sugary sweet".
It's easy to eliminate.
Meanwhile, sugar has increased in just about everything else we eat.
Meanwhile, sugar has increased in just about everything else we eat.
I think you mean FAKE sugar. Holy hell is it everywhere. And it's so damn sweet.
I actually enjoy having a sodastream just so I can still buy the occasional energy drink or soda, and add some extra carbonated water to tone down the sweetness.
You know how much I'd love to see a coca-cola with "low cane sugar" as an option? Just give me cane sugar....... but less of it!!
I really wish instead of switching from real sugar to artificial sweetener, companies would simply use less sugar. But no, artificial sweetener is CHEAPER than real sugar, and makes the item taste sweeter, so it's a win-win, right?
I've been buying a lot of this one brand of Frozen Yogurt lately. They make a bunch of different items (Sandwiches, bars, etc.) Honestly to me tastes about as good as any ice cream, but way less calories... Might be a little less sweet, but I'm ok with that tradeoff!
We fell out of love with paying for air.
It's not you ice cream. It's the rainbow sherbet is on sale, two for one of the giant tub.
Okay, so maybe it is you.
Who weighs their ice cream? I'm surprised this measured by weight and not something like pints or calories.
Anyways, I wonder if this has to do with the rising trend of plant based diets. I still eat ice cream occasionally but the vegan ice cream I get wouldn't be counted as ice cream in this data (understandably so)
Pretty much anything measured in large quantities is by weight. It’s the most accurate and consistent method.
I stopped eating most dairy (except cheese — love that shit) cause milkshakes, ice cream, etc started making me get congested.
No other symptoms, just congestion, and never with cheese. Oh well. At least I still have my cheese.
I've never heard of anything like that. Did you go see a Dr?
Nah, I’ll mention it next time I go though. It doesn’t really bother me, I like ice cream but not enough to foot the doctor’s bill just for that.