My local grocery store has started stocking a “limited edition” apple pie ice cream (message me for the details, don’t want to be shilling). It’s one of my favorites – not only does it have chunks of real apple and graham cracker crust, but the ice cream itself has a delicious apple flavor. The whole thing tastes like you took a slice of apple pie with vanilla ice cream and blended it chunky style.

I always figured there was some boring food-science reason you couldn’t make a decent apple ice cream, but this shows it’s perfectly possible. So why isn’t it more common? Apple pie is one of the most popular deserts, and you find apple flavoring in plenty of drinks and candies. What gives?

  • Akasazh@feddit.nl
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    2 days ago

    I’ve wondered about the same but with kiwi fruit it’s delicious and refreshing yet you don’t see any flavored drinks or ice cream with that flavor.

    • inconel@lemmy.ca
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      2 days ago

      Kiwi and pineapples have enzyme to break proteins down, causing it taste better if they have contact to diary products long enough. Canned pineapples don’t have this issue but I haven’t seen canned kiwi, maybe that explains no kiwi ice cream

    • cynar@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      I suspect it’s related to the difficulty in processing. Kiwi fruit are quite small and non-trivial to extract the flesh from. This would make it more expensive to extract.

      This is less of an issue now that a few decades back. However, most people are quite conservative on their juice choices. Low sales still mean higher cost, which reduces sales.

  • EmoDuck@sh.itjust.works
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    3 days ago

    I’ve recently had a similar discussion on why orange ice cream isn’t that popular, but exists in form of water ice

    Our conclusion was that acidic flavors, like orange and apple just aren’t good combined with cream, instead being better served as a sorbet

    • leftzero@lemmynsfw.com
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      24 hours ago

      Lemon ice cream is great, though.

      Also, apples, acidic…? I hate all apples except Granny Smiths because they taste sweet and cloying as fuck… Granny Smiths are the only ones I’ve ever found with a nice acidic taste…

    • Fish [Indiana]@midwest.social
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      2 days ago

      Orange creamcicle flavored ice cream is pretty easy to find. But I think it’s usually vanilla ice cream with layers of orange sherbet. Strawberries are acidic and strawberry ice cream is a popular flavor.

      In my experience, apples just don’t taste very good when frozen. Maybe that’s why they don’t sell frozen apples at most supermarkets?

    • ChicoSuave@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      I make ice cream as a hobby and found orange ice cream is too rich to eat even a scoop in one sitting. It’s completely possible but it’s hard to eat.

  • bdonvr@thelemmy.club
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    2 days ago

    Is it the one I saw at ALDI? (or possibly the same supplier)

    It was pretty freaking good ngl

  • s_s@lemm.ee
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    2 days ago

    Apples turn brown when you freeze them.

    • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      While that is the case, modern industrial ice cream rarely contains the actual fruit. Just take standard Neutro mix, regenerate it with water, not milk, and add some food coloring (a light green), an acidic component like citric acid, and “natural” “apple” flavor.

  • schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de
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    3 days ago

    Where do you live? Where I live (Austria), apple ice cream is maybe not 100% universally available at all ice cream vendors, but common enough that I have no problems getting it if I want to.

    • Jordan117@lemmy.worldOP
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      3 days ago

      Southeastern US. This is my first time seeing apple-anything ice cream on the shelves, from major national brands at least.

      • schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de
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        3 days ago

        Hm. I rarely buy ice cream in stores so I am not sure whether there is apple ice cream in stores here, but at ice cream parlors it is definitely reasonably common here.

  • SlamWich@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    The ice cream joint neat my house makes a honey apple gelato that’s pretty incredible, not sure why we don’t see it around more

  • ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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    2 days ago

    The same reason they took it back out of skittles and no one gets apple flavored suckers. It isn’t up to snuff.

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.net
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    2 days ago

    I really wish I had one of those fancy ice cream makers like they have on cooking shows like Iron Chef because I would definitely see what happens if you tried to make apple ice cream. I don’t know if I can get fancier than just basic ingredients with mine… Maybe if I made an apple compote? 🤔

    I think it just works better making apple pie ala mode ice cream Cold Stone style with some vanilla ice cream, pie filling, graham cracker crust and caramel.

    • 🐍🩶🐢@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Do you have a KitchenAid stand mixer or anything like that? Best thing I ever learned is making ice cream with dry ice. I just put the base in the mixer, start it with the paddle, and start putting in crushed up dry ice, one spoonful at a time. I managed to get dry ice in the little cubes or pellets, put it in a cloth sack, and then use a hammer or blunt object to break it up into small pieces.

        • 🐍🩶🐢@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          It was the best custard ice cream I ever created. Made the base with a sous vide. Chef Steps has(?) the recipe, but I did some experiments with blueberries that was next level the best shit I ever made that I will unlikely ever be able to duplicate again.

    • jol@discuss.tchncs.de
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      2 days ago

      This should be higher. Even broken iPhones from 3 years ago sell for tens or hundreds of euros.

  • Allero@lemmy.today
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    2 days ago

    Making ice cream with actual apples involved is a nightmare due to acidity influencing other ingredients. But making it apple-scented is trivial.

    But you raised a very good question…

  • JASN_DE@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Are we talking Apple or apple pie? Because from your post I can’t really tell.