That distinction between ice cream and frozen dairy dessert can be important to some people. There’s actually a standard of identity for ice cream under 21 CFR 135.110, which also covers frozen custard, that must be met to be able to call a product ice cream in the U.S. If a product doesn’t meet the criteria in the standard, it cannot be labeled as ice cream.
So next time you’re standing in front of the freezer, if that distinction matters to you, just spend 15 seconds glancing to see if the package says ice cream or frozen dairy dessert. You won’t have to wonder about it. Ten products below all have frozen dairy dessert on the front of their packages. Most are well-known brands that many people probably didn’t realize didn’t qualify as ice cream. It’s nothing scary, it’s not even a health-related designation, it’s just labeling.
What the law actually says
It’s a very specific term with very specific criteria laid out by the FDA at 21 CFR 135.110. Basically, it needs to have at least 10 percent milkfat, a minimum of 10 percent nonfat milk solids, a minimum of 4.5 pounds of weight per gallon, and at least 1.6 pounds of total solids per gallon. If it has bulky ingredients like cookies or candy, the milkfat can dip to 8 percent as long as there are at least 16 percent milk solids in the finished product. Foods that don’t meet those qualifications, including any that have coconut oil or any other non-dairy fat, can’t be called ice cream.
Part 135 is the entirety of FDA regulation on ice cream, frozen custard, goat’s milk ice cream, mellorine, sherbet, and water ices. The agency has no definition for frozen dairy dessert, which is why it was created as a sort of default term for anything not included under Part 135.
1. Breyers Blasts!
This product may be branded Breyers, but the short ingredient pledge doesn’t apply to their Blasts line. Milk, Corn Syrup, Sugar are the first three ingredients in Birthday Blast. Cream is the number 4 ingredient and corn syrup is number 2. There are 4 stabilizers and emulsifiers, including Carrageenan, Tara Gum and Guar Gum. All in all, the ingredient list has 40 ingredients. If you’ve been a Breyers fan all your life, this is a spin-off of sorts, labeled Breyers Blasts! Frozen Dairy Dessert.
The Greenest recommends
Cream, skim milk, sugar, egg yolks, vanilla extract. Five ingredients, no gums, and the package says ice cream.
2. Breyers Coffee
This is why Coffee Flavor Frozen Dairy Dessert, Coffee, despite having just 11 ingredients, is not ice cream. This product, which has one plain flavor and no mix-ins so the bulky flavors escape hatch doesn’t apply, fails the legal definition of ice cream. It opens milk, corn syrup, sugar. The list is nothing but straightforward, understandable ingredients, not one gum to be found, yet cream doesn’t make the top three spots, taking fourth place instead.
The Greenest recommends
Tillamook Old-Fashioned Vanilla
Labeled ice cream, not frozen dairy dessert. We checked the label ourselves before recommending it.
3. Edy’s and Dreyer’s Oreo
It is labeled Oreo Frozen Dairy Dessert. The ingredients include Dairy Product Solids, which is a very vague term that could mean lots of different things and is not specific, like cream or milk, and Sugar at numbers 1 and 2, not Cream, which is at number 6. It also has Corn Syrup at number 3. There are 15 ingredients in all. It has 4 stabilizers and emulsifiers such as Cellulose Gum, Cellulose Gel, and Guar Gum, and they’re not until the second half of the list. That’s all that’s on the package.
The Greenest recommends
Fresh cream, milk, egg yolks, cane sugar and vanilla beans. Made the old-fashioned way.
Watch: how to read any ice cream carton in 15 seconds, front, back, and Nutrition Facts.
4. Turkey Hill Moose Tracks
Interestingly, Turkey Hill carries both ice cream and a frozen dairy dessert in their freezer case. This particular dessert is labeled as a Moose Tracks Frozen Dairy Dessert. There are a total of 25 ingredients. The first three ingredients are Milk, Moose Tracks Fudge, Corn Syrup. That’s right, corn syrup is the 3rd ingredient. Cream is listed as the 15th ingredient. It also has five stabilizers/emulsifiers including Carrageenan, Cellulose Gum, Cellulose Gel.
The Greenest recommends
McConnell’s Fine Ice Creams Vanilla Bean
California Central Coast dairy, hormone free, cream and milk first.
5. Turkey Hill Rocky Road
In Rocky Road Frozen Dairy Dessert, corn syrup, both in the product and in the Marshmallows, is the number 3 ingredient whereas cream is number 10. There are a total of 18 ingredients with the top 3 being Milk, Sugar, Marshmallow. There are 4 stabilizers and emulsifiers in the product including Carrageenan, Cellulose Gum, Guar Gum.
The Greenest recommends
Straus Family Creamery Dutch Chocolate
Five organic ingredients: cream, nonfat milk, cane sugar, Dutch cocoa and egg yolks.
6. Turkey Hill Stuff’d
On the front of the package, it reads Stuff’d Frozen Dairy Dessert. However, Stuff’d does use the same fudge as Moose Tracks. According to the label, Stuff’d begins with Milk, Moose Tracks Fudge, Corn Syrup and doesn’t reach Cream until number 15. There are 24 ingredients in all, including 5 stabilizers and emulsifiers, such as Carrageenan, Cellulose Gum and Cellulose Gel, but it’s the placement of Corn Syrup in number three that says it all.
The Greenest recommends
Cream, skim milk, strawberries, sugar, egg yolks. Real fruit and no red dye.
7. Blue Bunny Vanilla
According to the label, Coconut Oil is a nondairy fat, and other food fats are not allowed by the ice cream standard. Therefore, this product can only be labeled Vanilla Frozen Dairy Dessert. The first three ingredients are Buttermilk, Sugar, Coconut Oil. Cream is a distant number 7. Corn syrup is the number 6 ingredient. There are three stabilizers and emulsifiers, carrageenan, Cellulose Gum, Soy Lecithin. There are a total of 26 ingredients.
The Greenest recommends
Cosmic Bliss Organic Grass-Fed Vanilla Bean
Organic grass-fed milk and cream with cane sugar. A direct swap for a coconut-oil base.
8. Blue Bunny Butter Pecan
Not only is it not actually ice cream, as the label says Butter Pecan Frozen Dairy Dessert, but it’s got six stabilizers/emulsifiers including Carrageenan, Cellulose Gum, Cellulose Gel, which is the most of any product on this list, starts with buttermilk and whey, with corn syrup at number 4 and cream at number 6, and has 24 ingredients. Again, it’s loaded with additives compared to some of the other items on this list. The title says it’s a dairy item, but it is quite different from ice cream. Go ahead and check for yourself.
The Greenest recommends
Milk, cream, raw honey, cacao nibs, egg yolk and coffee. No stabilizer list to read.
9. Friendly’s Brookie Dough
Despite its name, the Brookie Dough Frozen Dairy Dessert, Vanilla languishing in your freezer does contain dairy. However, corn syrup is the second-highest ingredient while cream is the 16th. The first three ingredients include Sweetcream Buttermilk, Corn Syrup, Sugar. It also has 6 stabilizers and emulsifiers, including Carrageenan, Cellulose Gel, and Guar Gum. The full ingredient list has 36 ingredients, and corn syrup is an ingredient of the fudge ribbon as well.
The Greenest recommends
Jeni’s Splendid Gooey Butter Cake
Cream cheese does the emulsifying, so there are zero gums in it.
10. Kroger Store Brand Vanilla
Frozen Dairy Dessert, Vanilla. Frozen Dairy Dessert is the label you’ll find on most store brand desserts, those being the cheapest of the cheap. Standing in front of the freezer door you’ll find that there are 18 ingredients listed with Dairy Dessert, Milk, Sugar, Corn Syrup starting off the list. Corn syrup is 3, Cream is 4. There are 4 stabilizers and emulsifiers including Carrageenan, Cellulose Gum and Cellulose Gel.
The Greenest recommends
Real peppermint extract, no artificial mint flavor and no Blue 1.
The sliding scale almost nobody has seen
21 CFR 135.110, the sliding scale
| Percent milkfat | Minimum percent nonfat milk solids |
|---|---|
| 10 | 10 |
| 11 | 9 |
| 12 | 8 |
| 13 | 7 |
| 14 | 6 |
It’s the 10 percent milkfat that people cite, but it’s really just the top line of a chart. The regulation goes on to give a table: at 1 percent increments of milkfat above the 10 percent minimum, the nonfat milk solids requirement drops a point at a time, down to 6 percent at 14 percent milkfat.
Thus a 14 percent milkfat product would only need 6 percent nonfat milk solids. And a 10 percent one would need all 10 of its own percentage in nonfat solids. The richer the fat, the less of the rest the rule insists on.
This is worth knowing, since it helps explain how two tubs of ice cream can both meet standards and taste nothing alike. One product meets the standard in row one, another in row five.
Chocolate counts two and a half times
Also in the same section is some math that seems like a joke and isn’t. When a regulator works out whether a product clears the milkfat bar, it subtracts the bulky ingredients first, and some of them get weighted on the way out.
If you are using chocolate or cocoa solids, multiply that amount by 2.5. If you are using fruit or nuts, multiply that amount by 1.4. If you are using dried fruit and fruit juices, increase them back to their pre-dried weight and multiply by 1.4.
This is because bulky items require more sweetening and the additional sweetener is allowed in order not to dilute the proportion of milk products. So chocolate ice cream has more leeway than vanilla ice cream before the item becomes ineligible, and cocoa itself is considered a bulky flavor.
Frozen custard is a legal term too
The same section that defines ice cream also defines frozen custard, and the dividing line is eggs.
Ice cream may have no more than 1.4 percent egg yolk solids (by weight), excluding bulky flavorings. Frozen custard must contain at least 1.4 percent. The percentage for custard will decrease proportionately with the addition of bulky flavors, but it cannot drop below 1.12 percent.
Anything above 1.4 percent is not breaking a rule. It just has to be identified for what it is. The custard shop across the street isn’t pulling a marketing trick. It’s using the term the rule dictates.
Sherbet, mellorine, and the rest of the freezer case
The list in Part 135 is quite short, and the categories next to ice cream are much more specific than you might think.
Sherbet must weigh at least 6 pounds per gallon (compared to ice cream’s 4.5), and its milkfat is capped as well as floored: not less than 1 percent and not more than 2. Total milk solids range from 2 to 5 percent. If it is a fruit sherbet, it also must have a titratable acidity of at least 0.35 percent (expressed as lactic acid), the regulation that, in effect, demands that sherbets be tart.
Mellorine is the one worth knowing, because it is where a product goes when the fat is not all dairy. The standard allows animal or vegetable fat, or both, with only part of it milkfat. It asks for at least 6 percent fat and 2.7 percent protein once bulky flavors are set aside, and in no case less than 4.8 percent fat or 2.2 percent protein, with that protein coming from milk solids. A coconut-oil product that cleared those numbers would have a legal name. It is not ice cream, but it is not nameless either.
One more from the general provisions: every particle of the mix has to be pasteurized, held at 155 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes or 175 degrees for 25 seconds. That one applies to everything, no matter what goes on the front of the box.
How to check a tub in 15 seconds
Check the name of the product. The product will be required to be identified by name on the front of the package. Products identified as frozen dairy dessert do not meet the standards for ice cream. Products identified as light ice cream or reduced fat ice cream are ice cream made to a slightly different standard.
Check the ingredient list for corn syrup or non-dairy oil. Ingredients are required to be listed by weight, so the first three ingredients will tell you the basis of the product. Products made this way aren’t deceptive, are perfectly safe to eat and are clearly identified.
What this is and is not
That designation is a label, not a seal of approval. An ice cream that meets the standard is not necessarily any healthier than another.
Next time you’re in the frozen aisle at the grocery store, grab a carton of ice cream from the freezer and flip it around for 15 seconds and look at the label. You’re holding a carton of ice cream. It’s easy to confuse frozen dairy dessert with ice cream. They’re side-by-side in the same freezer. They cost about the same. But frozen dairy dessert is not ice cream. Different ingredients can be added, as long as the product conforms to other legal requirements. Reading the label takes about 15 seconds and will tell you exactly what’s in that carton.
Joseph has been writing and editing for a wide variety of publications over the last decade.
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In your substitutions, you sure seem to favor vanilla! I did see the strawberry, the mint chip and coffee but if you are craving a rich, gooey chocolate fudge ice cream theres no way vanilla bean will do! We need substitutions of like flavors to like flavors, please. Thank you fir the insight but i personally don’t care for fanilla!
Fair point, and thank you for saying it. Vanilla took over the list because it’s the simplest flavor there is, so it makes the cleanest comparison between brands. But that’s an explanation, not a defense. If you want chocolate, you shouldn’t have to settle for vanilla bean.
The good news is that the base is what matters, and the brands we recommended use the same base across their flavors. So for a rich chocolate fix that’s still legally ice cream:
Straus Family Creamery Dutch Chocolate is already in the piece. It’s five organic ingredients: cream, nonfat milk, cane sugar, Dutch cocoa and egg yolks.
Häagen-Dazs Chocolate is the same five-ingredient approach as their vanilla bean: cream, skim milk, sugar, cocoa processed with alkali, and egg yolks.
For anything with a fudge ribbon or brownie chunks, the base can still be excellent, but check that the carton says “ice cream” rather than “frozen dairy dessert,” and that cream or milk is first on the ingredient list, not corn syrup. That’s the whole test.
One bonus for chocolate lovers: the federal standard gives chocolate extra room, because cocoa counts as a bulky flavor. So a true chocolate ice cream has more leeway to stay real than vanilla does.