What Is The Difference Between Ice Cream And A ‘Frozen Dairy Dessert?’

I was at Coborn's in Sartell the other day when something in the frozen section caught my eye.

On the left was Kemps Frozen Ice Cream, which was clearly labeled as such on both the sign advertising the sale price and on the carton itself.

On the right was Blue Ribbon brand, which I would have assumed was also ice cream. However, it was clearly labeled instead as a 'Frozen Dairy Dessert' on both the sign and the packaging.

I had never heard of such a thing so I did a little digging after I got home. The difference between the two lies in the ingredients and the way the product is produced.

According to Perry's Ice Cream, the FDA requires a product to 'contain a minimum of 10% dairy milkfat and have no more than 100% overrun and weigh at least 4.5 lbs per gallon' in order to be called ice cream.

PERRY'S ICE CREAM:

 "Overrun is the amount of air that is whipped into ice cream during the freezing process. With 100% overrun, for every gallon of ice cream base, you would end up with two gallons of finished ice cream."

Perry's notes that premium ice creams (like theirs) tend to be denser and creamer due to lower overrun.

On the label of a carton of Kemps Chocolate Ice Cream, the ingredients are listed as Mik and Nonfat Milk, Sweet Cream Buttermilk, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sugar, Whey, Corn Syrup, Cocoa and less than 2% of Mono and Diglycerides, Guar Gum, Calcium Sulfate, Carob Bean Gum and Carrageenan.

The Blue Ribbon Chocolate Frozen Dairy Dessert ingredients are listed as Buttermilk, Sugar, Corn Syrup, Skim Milk, Dairy Product Solids, Cream, Coconut Oil, Milk, Cocoa and 2% or less of High Fructose Corn Syrup, Natural Flavor, Cellulose Gel, Cellulose Gum, Tara Gum, Carrageenan, Guar Gum, Carob Bean Gum, Mono and Diglycerides and Xanthan Gum.

So, as you can see above there are several differences between the two. While both desserts are considered perfectly healthy, some Frozen Dairy Dessert eaters on Reddit have mentioned that the product does not freeze in the same way as an ice cream would, which they attribute to the higher amount of air.