Don't cry over melted ice cream

     Last month I posted on several occasions that July was National Ice Cream Month.  I hope you had the opportunity to celebrate that noteworthy event with something cool and creamy.  Mrs. Christine Watson did by purchasing some ice cream sandwiches for her children at Walmart, that bastion of savings for the American cost-conscious consumer.

     Her son didn't finish all of his and left it sitting outside for at least 12 hours on a hot day.  Mrs. Watson was surprised to find that it had hardly melted at all.  She was perplexed as she wondered how something that was supposed to be the genuine article, ice cream, could stay solid for such a length of time.  In a test of various name brands like Haagen-Dazs, Klondike, and Blue Bunny she discovered that they all melted within 30 minutes but the Walmart Great Value ice cream remained in a nearly solid state.

     So how is an "unmeltable" ice cream sandwich possible?  It all depends on 3 things: temperature, ingredients and science.  "The warmer the temperature, the more energy an object has and the faster it absorbs energy," according to Laura Van Wert.  Once an object, like ice cream, hits its threshold of energy it starts to melt.  "Likewise, ingredients--creams, sugar, eggs and such fixings as chocolate chips--affect how quickly ice cream melts.  For example, low-fat ice cream melts slower because cream is replaced with water and more whipped air, which require more absorption of energy to melt."

     But there is also another explanation.  Preservatives and gum stabilizers such as guar gum, corn syrup and cellulose (that's wood pulp added to thicken products) along with a lack of real cream and buttercream keep Great Value ice cream sandwiches from melting.  

     So I guess moms all over the country can thank Walmart for ice cream that doesn't melt.  If you want to call it ice cream...