Is McDonald's Ice Cream Real Ice Cream?

In the age of artificial intelligence, it can be hard to tell what's real and what's not. Food, though, is an undeniably tangible thing, so we can take comfort in the fact that our eyes are not deceiving us. But in a society where corporations can use vague terms and half-truths as a means to sell products, it's reasonable to question what's in our food. One thing folks want to know about McDonalds ice cream is whether it's the real deal.

In order for your frozen dessert to actually be considered ice cream by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's standards, it must contain a total of 20% milk solids, with no less than 10% milk fat (which can come from milk or cream). In the case of McDonald's ice cream, the ingredient list includes milk, sugar, cream, corn syrup, natural flavor, mono and diglycerides, cellulose gum, guar gum, carrageenan, and vitamin A palmitate. But while milk and cream are listed in the top three ingredients by volume, it doesn't contain the amounts required to legally be called ice cream. Instead, it is marketed as "reduced fat ice cream," which has 25% less fat than regular mixes.

The Shamrock Shake is obviously the best McDonald's ice cream offering  (don't worry, we ranked them), but would you believe it's made with reduced-fat ice cream? Though everything coming from McDonald's notoriously finicky ice cream machine has less fat than regular ice cream, it still has that rich coveted mouthfeel (albeit, notably less so). The texture comes from ingredients like cellulose gum and guar gum, which add thickness without adding fat. Aside from the difference in fat content, the real difference between regular ice cream and the soft serve variety has to do with the amount of air incorporated into it during freezing — otherwise known as overrun. While regular ice cream's overrun typically falls somewhere between 20% and 30%, soft serve ice cream can have as much as 60%. This makes for a cone that feels light and airy as opposed to rich and decadent. 

The question folks should really be asking is whether or not the vanilla in McDonald's ice cream is real. The answer to that is a resounding "no." Although McDonald's vanilla soft serve lists "natural flavors" under its ingredient list, it isn't talking about real vanilla beans but rather vanillin — a synthetic flavor designed to imitate vanilla. This sleight of mouth actually landed McDonald's in some hot water in 2020, when a class action lawsuit was filed against the corporation for using misleading language.