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?

  • Allero@lemmy.today
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    19 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…

  • robolemmy@lemmy.world
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    20 days ago

    Cinnamon apple jelly should be more common too! (Not apple butter… fuck Apple butter).

    Apple cinnamon all the things!

        • Drunemeton@lemmy.world
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          19 days ago

          While you’re there try the Apple Fritter! It’s like monkey bread* made with apple cinnamon bits, then deep fried and dipped in glaze.

          *=Monkey Bread is just pull-apart bread made from large chunks of dough.

  • teft@lemmy.world
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    20 days ago

    It’s a popular flavor in new england. Gifford’s has apple pie seasonally at their ice cream stands. They also have pumpkin pie ice cream which is my favorite.

  • schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de
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    20 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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      19 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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        19 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.

  • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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    19 days ago

    Pure speculation on my part, but it’s probably a safe guess to assume some market studies and/or trial runs they did on the flavor showed it wouldn’t make enough profit. It’s always about the money. I’m sure many people would buy it and enjoy it, but we are talking about corporations run by people with expensive college degrees in min-maxing everything for profit.

    • Jordan117@lemmy.worldOP
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      19 days ago

      Maybe, but you definitely see more niche flavors like pistachio, coffee, mango, pineapple-coconut, rum raisin, etc. Hard to believe apple would be less popular, unless it’s more expensive to make for some reason.

    • SgtAStrawberry@lemmy.world
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      19 days ago

      As I have lost the only vegan cheese dip in existence (in my country at least) do to that, I can totally believe it.

      I’m still sad about the cheese, it was perfect for tacos and all things melted cheese.

      • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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        19 days ago

        That’s a bummer. I have noticed products like that will often vanish. Or drop dramatically in quality when they swap out quality ingredients for cheaper ones.

    • shalafi@lemmy.world
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      19 days ago

      Jesus. So you expect companies to produce products that lose money?!

      Or, do you expect them to remove more profitable products, which by definition are widely loved, from the limited shelf space and replace them with less profitable products, which by definition, fewer people enjoy? You’d fail running a lemonade stand.

      • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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        19 days ago

        Profits are fine. Have you not been paying attention to skimplflation, CEO bonuses, etc? That’s the min-max mindset I’m talking about here.

  • EmoDuck@sh.itjust.works
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    19 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

    • ChicoSuave@lemmy.world
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      19 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.

    • Fish [Indiana]@midwest.social
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      19 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?

    • leftzero@lemmynsfw.com
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      18 days 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…

  • SlamWich@lemmy.world
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    19 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

  • Aarrodri@lemmy.world
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    19 days ago

    I came in thinking this was a dad joke sub…lol… and was like wait … this a not a punch line… now we need to find a dad joke for this question…

  • Swordgeek@lemmy.ca
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    19 days ago

    Little boutique place near us has an “Apple Cheddar Pie” ice cream in the fall. It’s never quite as good as you expect. Gotta try it again this year, to see how they’ve changed it.

    (On the other hand, their Lemon Curd Blueberry is one of the greatest things ever served in a cone in the history of humankind.)

  • Altima NEO@lemmy.zip
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    19 days ago

    It’s probably not as common because other flavors are significantly more popular. Chocolate, vanilla, and berry flavors are staple flavors. There’s only so much milk, production capacity, and retail shelf space to go around.

    I’ve noticed, though, local ice cream shops are usually more willing to take a risk worth novelty flavors.