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Comment by ghostpepper | Hacker News Reader

(Semi-)Serious question: does McDonald’s soft serve “ice cream” contain dairy?

"Vanilla Reduced Fat Ice Cream Ingredients: Milk, Sugar, Cream, Corn Syrup, Natural Flavor, Mono And Diglycerides, Cellulose Gum, Guar Gum, Carrageenan, Vitamin A Palmitate."

-- https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/vanilla-cone.html...

It does contain dairy, but they can't legally call it ice cream. (Or at least they can't call their shakes "milkshakes": https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/faq/desserts-and-shakes.h... )

Q: Why don't you call your 'shakes,' 'milkshakes'?

A: Great question. Our shakes contain milk from our reduced-fat soft serve, which makes them thick and creamy. Dairy regulations actually vary from state to state on what can officially be called a 'milkshake.' We like to keep it simple and refer to them strictly as 'shakes.'

(Note they say "reduced-fat soft serve" and not "ice cream")

I really don't want keep defending a corporation here but it's quite clear form that messaging that it may be consider ice cream in some states.

If we're going to dunk on corporations can we do it for legitimate reasons?

They can't call it ice-cream because legally it isn't in at least some states. They likely aren't using enough cream, or they're adulterating it with other ingredients that some states don't permit. What exactly are you refuting?

In order to call it simply “ice cream”, it would need to have at least 10% fat content. They could choose to call it “reduced fat ice cream”, but I’m guessing they’ve decided that that doesn’t sound as appetizing to consumers as “soft serve” since to most people, “soft serve” is just a type of ice cream. Marketing finds a way. said in the voice of Ian Malcolm

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