Frosty Favors: 35 Luscious Facts About Ice Cream

Soft serve ice cream became popular after Tom Carvel's ice cream truck got a flat tire. He started serving the melting ice cream to vacationers. Two years later he opened his first soft serve ice cream shop at the same site where his truck broke down.

2. Astronaut Ice Cream never actually flew into space, even for a single mission. By 1972 technology had improved to the point that astronauts aboard Skylab were able to enjoy real ice cream, and today the main consumers of astronaut ice cream are backpackers, hikers, and survivalists.

3. Since his childhood, Rupert Grint’s ambition was to become an “Ice Cream Man” and he has since bought an ice cream truck with the money he earned from the Harry Potter movies.

4. Rival ice cream truck drivers in Glasgow in the 1980s sold drugs from their trucks, shot at each other, and committed arson in the Glasgow Ice Cream Wars.

5. In Japan, they sell squid ink ice cream, in the Philippines, you can get crocodile egg ice cream, and in Maine, you will find lobster ice cream.

In July 1984, President Ronald Reagan called ice cream "a nutritious and wholesome food" and established National Ice Cream Month.

7. All Ben & Jerry's Employees get to take home 3 free pints of ice cream every single day!

8. Under the American Blue Laws of the time, ice cream sodas weren't allowed to be sold on Sundays. To circumvent this rule, they invented the ice cream sundae.

9. John Harrison, the official taste-tester for Dreyer’s Ice Cream, has his tongue insured for $1 million.

10. Ice cream testers use golden spoons to be able to taste the product 100% without a slight percentage of ‘after-taste’ from typical spoons.

The name "Häagen-Dazs" is completely meaningless. The Jewish creator of the ice cream wanted a "Danish sounding" name to honor the Danish treatment of Jews during World War 2 and started saying gibberish names until he found one that he liked.

12. Clint Eastwood ran for mayor in the city of Carmel in California, campaigning against an ordinance banning the sale of ice cream and he actually won.

13. The FBI assigned a surveillance team to Sacha Baron Cohen while the filming of Borat due to reports of a "Middle Eastern man traveling in an ice cream truck."

14. In 1940, scientists concluded that consumption of ice cream was the leading cause of the polio epidemic, solely based on the stats that there were more cases of polio in the summer, which was also when children ate most ice cream.

15. The world's first batch of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream was made by Ben & Jerry's, inspired by an anonymous note left on their flavor suggestion board.

Ben and Jerry's has a real physical graveyard in Vermont for retired ice cream flavors.

17. Star Spangled Ice Cream was created as a politically conservative alternative to Ben & Jerry's, which was seen as too liberal.

18. Cold Stone's "No Drip" ice cream doesn't melt because it contains Instant Pudding Mix.

19. During a riot in Northern Ireland in 2010, a police officer diffused the situation by playing ice cream van music.

20. Ben and Jerry's sell a sundae named 'The Vermonster'. It contains 20 scoops of ice cream, 4 ladles of hot fudge and 500 grams of fat. It is 14,000 calories.

In 2008, PETA requested that Ben & Jerry's use human breast milk instead of cow's milk for their ice cream.

22. Millionaire Howard Hughes was fond of Baskin-Robbins' Banana Ripple ice cream. His 'helpers' had to order 200 gallons from the factory before it was discontinued. A few days later Hughes announced that he didn’t like it anymore.

23. For TV commercials, ice cream sundaes are often constructed out of scoops of lard or mashed potatoes that are covered in motor oil.

24. In Canada, more ice cream is sold in the winter months than in the summer.

25. February 4th is the National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day in USA.