[megwini]

Those of you who have had it know what I mean. It tastes much softer than hard-packed ice cream, almost like a mix between soft serve and hard ice cream and it reminds me of frozen custard, but it's not. Does anyone know how they do it? I'm wondering if there's any easy way to make regular store-bought ice cream more like this soft, creamy texture, or even if you're making your own ice cream homemade how you could do it. I just wasn't sure how they do it. I like ice cream as an occasional treat but always find myself going out for it since store-bought ice cream is always hard as a rock. Now that I'm trying to eliminate dairy and found some DELICIOUS ice cream made out of coconut milk, I have even more incentive to want to do this at home, so I can make it dairy-free!

[Chrztina]

This was my cousin's facebook update a few weeks ago - "And in news you can use, Coldstone icecream has instant pudding in it, making it melt-proof."

[bronzeager]

I'm sorry to tell you, but it's probably the loads of fat in it. That's what makes most ice creams "premium," they're made with cream rather than milk. So you may not be able to replicate it exactly.

If you would like to try banana-flavored ice cream, there's a recipe on this web site that's enormously popular. Ice Cream with Just One Ingredient It's supposed to be very creamy, and its only ingredient is banana, but you could try mixing in stuff too I guess. I haven't tried it, just because I prefer my bananas banana-shaped and my ice cream chocolate.

ETA: I was reading through the banana-based ice cream comments and one person says you can make it lots of different flavors by adding things, and keep the creaminess as long as you keep the mix at least 1/2 banana.

[Aclai4067]

I like to stir up my icecream with the spoon until it reaches milkshake-like consistancy. My sister and I have always done it (and our mom has always told us to stop playing with our food). But it makes it so much creamier; it's so good! I think the mashing they do at ColdStone has that effect as well

[KatVee]

I think it might also be the cold stone that they mix everything on in addition to all the fat.

[megwini]

Originally Posted by Meg

It's probably the extremely high fat content in Coldstone ice cream that makes it so creamy (about 50-60% of the calories come from fat). Other factors could be the temperature they serve it at and how much air is beaten into the mixture as it's frozen. But I'm guessing it's the fat. Fat doesn't freeze like milk and other ingredients do, so the ice cream would stay softer. If you want to try it at home, use a lot of cream and eggs to boost the fat content. If you're going nondairy, try a lot of coconut or another oil.

Well, for me it's not just the creamy, it's the softness too, which is why soft serve is my favorite ice cream, which actually isn't that high in fat, right? It just somehow has more air in it? But I find regular hard ice cream too.. hard for me, and I like it softer. I could definitely try adding some coconut oil though. This is the stuff I got: http://coconutbliss.com/coconut-bliss-products It's really good, albeit not quite creamy enough for me. (But then again, boxed ice cream hardly is). I like that it's mostly organic and dairy-free, albeit expensive. But since ice cream SHOULD be an occasional treat, having it be more expensive *would* deter me from buying it too much!

Anyway, now I'm rambling. I'll try the coconut oil!

[mandalinn82]

The softness has to do with the temperature when served. Cold stone raises the temperature (though pretty slowly) with their ice cream mixing on the big cold marble stone. That makes it a little more melty. They also store their ice cream at a slightly higher temperature, so it is softer.

[dyeguy87]

I was actually a GM for one of their stores for about half a decade. What makes it super creamy is in how it is made! It is a super premium ice cream which is actually a technical term meaning it has a butterfat content of over 14%... which means its SUPER Fattening but tastes phenomenal. What they do is mix the ice cream in a very specific type of Ice Cream machine (the machine is actually imported from ITALY!). What this particular machine does is ensures that the ice cream is actually almost 80% air! Whenver a new crew member is trained on how to make ice cream you always tell them when they are extracting the ice cream from the machine, DO NOT PLAY WITH THE ICE CREAM, open the door and let the ice cream come out, move the pan under the machine to ensure it gets in the pan evenly but do not touch it with a spatula. Playing with the ice cream will actually reduce its air mixture and make it less fluffy. Once you get the ice cream out of the machine its time to temper the product. 4 hours in a blast freezer with temperatures in excess of -30 degrees Farenheit will actually freeze everything in place so the air mixture stays very high. From there it goes into a regular freezer with a temp right around zero degrees. This will allow the ice cream to become not hard as a rock and scoopable for your customers. AND that is what makes cold stone ice cream creamier than most other ice creams!

[AwShucks]

Oh wow. Thanks for that information! I love to hear how things are made. I always loved that feature on the Mr. Rogers TV show!