Six Stories to Satisfy Your Sweet Tooth

[Music] Americans we love ice cream each person eats about 24 quarts of it per year and that's for one big reason it tastes amazing but someone had to teach Ben and Jerry's how to do it turns out that guy he works at Penn State this is dr. Bob Robert hold on okay this is dr. Bob Roberts he teaches ice cream courses at Penn State I do I have two courses ice cream short course and ice cream 101 side note these are the type of books ice cream professors read ok back to the story part of the reason that ice cream is so good in the US is that we've been teaching ice cream for 125 years and Bob he's been teaching at Penn State for 25 of those and he's had some pretty famous students companies like Unilever nestle Breyers Ben and Jerry's you name the company they've sent people that's because the Penn State Creamery is on the forefront of ice cream technology ice cream is a formulated food there is no naturally occurring ice cream you have to put the ingredients together and process it to make ice cream Bob in his department they spend their time figuring out how to make ice cream even better when we look at studying ice cream we study ice cream from cow to the cone so we look at what happens on the farm what happens with the milk wait there's a farm we have a herd of about 250 or so milking Holsteins and yes they are on campus so yeah he knows ice cream but he says that he's not an ice cream purist I'm not sure what an ice cream purist is but I wouldn't eat frozen yogurt if I had the opportunity to ice cream yeah well that does make sense considering he is the authority on ice cream Bob what's your favorite flavor mmm don't see the leche yeah cakes cookies and brownies no we're not going to show you how to make them because they can be made with ease thanks to Betty Crocker who was born in 1921 in Minnesota well kind of in 1921 the Washburn Crosby company now known as General Mills ran a contest for people to complete the puzzle for the most coveted prize a pin cushion yes one of your very own surprisingly a lot of people wrote in to claim their prize but with a little PS they wanted baking advice so the customer service department began to reply and to make their tips seem more genuine they sign their letters Betty Crocker Betty because it was a cheery all-around American sounding name and Crocker after a board member not being a real person didn't stop Betty Crocker from having a very successful radio show the Betty Crocker cooking school of the air with a different accent in every state but the lies don't stop there let's talk about that added ingredient the egg you don't need to add a fresh egg to powdered cake mix but science says it makes us feel like we aren't cheating and were better providers so thanks Betty Crocker for making us all feel like we know how to bake [Music] popcorn movies a match made in theatre heaven but there was a time when this was banned [Music] popcorn has been around for over 8000 years but when it hit American streets in the mid-1800s it took off it was cheap and could be mass-produced on the go not to mention it smelled amazing it was the go-to snack at circuses sporting events and fairs in fact the only place you wouldn't find popcorn was at the movies you see going to the movies used to be a major event the only people that went were fancy rich folks because he had to be educated enough to read fancy like there was even a coat-check but there was definitely no concession stand there was however popcorn street vendors who set up shop outside theaters they made a killing selling to waiting theater goers theater goers that started smuggling their pop treats inside not cool early movie theaters kindly asked patrons check their popcorn before entering then in 1927 films started adding sound meaning everyone went to the movies the Great Depression followed making movies a cheap escape huge crowds plus crunch muffled sound equaled another revenue opportunity for theater owners by 1945 over half the popcorn consumed in America was being eaten at the movies a marriage that has continued ever since [Music] [Music] cotton candy who knew sugar and air could taste so sweet well a guy named James Marcin an amateur inventor whose occupation and taste buds didn't exactly aligned he was a dentist and during his lifetime James even became the president of the Tennessee Dental Association don't forget to floss but he was also a confectionery enthusiast with a passion for culinary advancement he paired with John C Walton an old friend and fellow confectioner together the two designed incur patented what they called the electronic candy machine the device rapidly spun and melted sugar through small holes until it was fluffy at nearly 70% air they called the Nutri fairy floss they introduced their product at the 1904 World's Fair selling it in small wooden boxes for 25 cents each that's about six dollars today fairy floss was a huge success in six months they sold over 68,000 boxes crusing in today's money around four hundred and forty thousand dollars but despite the success of the sugar spun business Mars and return teased a job as a dentist so next time the dentist tells you you're eating too many sugary treats well blame him you you [Music] everybody loves ice cream even those who say they don't like ice cream still no why should we use ice cream as a way to support our community [Music] my name is Michael Mikey Cole and I own Mike he likes an ice cream I did not always sell ice cream I was born in the Lower East Side of New York City's Village two blocks from the shop bustling drugs at one point I ended up getting caught and I'm going to jail for six months a few years ago my mother got sick I promise to her that I wouldn't be locked up anymore I'd do the wrong things ice cream was something that just came into my life at a time when I didn't really know what I was kind of doing this is pop culture inspired ice cream we object and chill couple shuffle Ice Ice Baby employ mint condition southern hospitality and we have smooth operator a bunch of famous people have come by here futures our fan walking know as a fan Hillary Clinton's a fan we have a lot of other fans out I still live two blocks from the store part of our job is to still be heavily in the community and so kids come in here with a a on a report card to give them a free scoop of ice cream it's to show them that we are the same as done so I'm just a little older but I'm still the same child at heart and if you can find something that you like and you're passionate about go for it to just go for it you know don't don't not go for your games go for every last on the slab [Music] [Music] you probably recognize these ice-cream pellets as the ice cream of the future they're dippin dots a summertime steep but this confectionery treat didn't start as well ice cream it started as cow feed dippin dots were invented in the 80s not by an ice cream brand but by a microbiologist Curtis jones specialized in cryogenics in 1987 he was working for a biotech company in Kentucky trying to figure out how to make food for farm animals more efficient his big breakthrough came when he flash froze cattle feed 350 degrees below zero which produces small pellets serendipitously Curtis loved making ice cream next thing he knew he was using liquid nitrogen to freeze ice cream at extremely low temperatures and ended up with small beads of it when eaten the natural heat of the mouth melted the beads and thus dippin dots was born a year later he formed the company out of his parents garage in Illinois but there was a problem Curtis had nowhere to sell the product dippin dots need to be stored at such a cold temperature that it made it impossible for grocery stores to house the tasty treat so he got creative and marketed his product to alternate locations now they're sold at amusement parks festivals zoos and other summertime destinations but whether or not they really are the ice cream of the future it will just have to wait and see [Music]

Channel: Great Big Story

Views: 1,034,031

Rating: 4.9152412 out of 5

Keywords: great big story, gbs, lag, documentary, docs, great big reels, weird & fun knowledge, food, junk food, sweets, ice cream, betty crocker, baking, penn state, college, schools, food & drink, New releases, cake, cookies, cotton candy, dippin dots

Id: TS8ANVmc-iU

Length: 11min 29sec (689 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 10 2018