The Irish eat even more ice cream than the Italians. Marie-Claire Digby reports on efforts to make it into a healthier food.
Bacon-and-egg ice cream may be a big hit in a certain restaurant in Bray, Berkshire, but in Bray, Co Wicklow, we're far more fond of the good old Iceberger. Swedes and Finns are the only Europeans who eat more ice cream than the Irish: we each get through 10 litres a year, compared with an EU average of 6.6 litres. (The US figure is a staggering 24 litres.)
There is no doubt, then, that we like our ice cream - and now its mood-altering, feel-good properties have been confirmed by research for Unilever, the multinational whose portfolio of ice-cream brands includes HB, Carte D'Or, Magnum and Ben & Jerry's. When scientists at the Institute of Psychiatry, in London, used magnetic resonance imaging to measure the effects of eating ice cream on the brain, they found that it increased activity in the area concerned with pleasure.
Unilever's quest for pleasure has extended to backing a study to be undertaken this summer by researchers at the Northern Ireland Department of Agriculture and Rural Development on the well-being of dairy cows. A trial herd will be kept as stress-free as possible, fed a free-range diet supplemented with feed containing local oilseed, and have their behaviour monitored for signs of good health, including, believe it or not, social interaction. The intention is to produce milk with less saturated fat than ordinary milk, which in theory could allow the company to make its ice cream a little healthier.
"One aspect of ice cream of the future will be about improving the health and wellness of the consumer. As part of this, we are looking at how we use key ice-cream ingredients, to make ice cream better for you without sacrificing taste or texture," says Don Darling, Unilever's vice-president for development.
The company, which spends €50 million a year on research and development, has just spent 18 months assessing its portfolio of 2,000 ice creams, to work out how it could improve their "nutritional profiles".
Advances have already been made: the company has already replaced most of the artificial additives and colourings in its children's range with natural ones. Next year it will cut sugar content by up to 20 per cent and increase fruit content by at least 10 per cent. This is welcome news for parents, especially; it may also make those battles of the reasonably healthy Mini Milk versus the black-tongue-inducing ice lolly become a thing of the past.
Low-fat versions of popular brands are also on the way: Carte D'Or Light (with 50 per cent less fat and 30 per cent fewer calories) and Magnum Light will offer a healthier option. And Hazelbrook Farm ice cream, made in Cavan, is now also available in a low-fat formulation. Some eight million glasses of Irish milk a year are used to make HB ice cream, and it is good to know that we can all indulge more often.