16 Fun Facts About Ice Cream

Who doesn’t love ice cream? Here at Strasburg Creamery, we take pride in serving the best premium homemade ice cream in Lancaster County.

July marks the celebration of National Ice Cream Month, which has been celebrated since President Ronald Reagan signed it into law during his presidency in the 1980s.

Here are some fun facts about ice cream to ponder while you enjoy your favorite dessert!

1. It takes approximately 50 licks to finish one scoop of ice cream.

Think you can do it in less? Of course, there are a variety of factors that can affect this, including flavor, temperature, and how long your tongue is!

2. The ice cream cone was an accident.

At the St Louis World’s Fair in 1904, an ice cream vendor ran out of bowls, so a waffle maker rolled his pastries into the cone shape to help!

3. Nationally, vanilla and chocolate ice cream combine for 52% of ice cream sales.

Here at Strasburg Creamery, our top-selling flavor is the beloved vanilla. So popular that there are 2 tubs of this flavor in the case at all times!

4. John Harrison, whose job is to taste ice cream for Dreyer’s, has his tongue insured.

Harrison’s taste buds are insured for a million dollars; he is such a discerning taster that he can taste the difference between infinitesimal variations in butterfat.

6. American Presidents have a long history with ice cream.

Thomas Jefferson is credited with the first recipe for ice cream in America, and Dolley Madison served ice cream at her husband’s inaugural ball.

7. 19th-century chefs made ice cream in all kinds of flavors…like asparagus!

Oysters, asparagus, and parmesan cheese were all flavors of ice cream extant in the early 1800s. We don’t serve any of them, but we do have some mean teaberry!

12. The largest ice cream sundae in the world weighed 54,914 pounds.

Palm Dairies manufactured the behemoth in 1988 in Alberta, Canada. Our piggyback sundaes are big, but not quite that big! (A piggyback sundae is your choice of flavors of milkshake topped with your choice of flavors of sundae. This concoction has the most ounces of ice cream of any of our specialty goodies.)

13. Hawaiian Punch originated as an ice cream topping!

Ultimately, people realized it tasted better as a drink. Watch this!

14. Scientists in 1940 thought that ice cream caused polio because there were more cases of polio in the summer.

Correlation does not equal causation!

15. Chocolate syrup is the most popular ice cream topping.

That may be true, but it is not the only topping we offer here at the Creamery. Our roster of toppings includes hot fudge, butterscotch, marshmallow, pineapple, apple and strawberry

16. The Strasburg Creamery offers the best ice cream in Lancaster County.

Yep. That’s a fact. Stop in today for a cone, or scoop, or sundae! ​