Which Vanilla Ice Cream is best?

Scene: Pregnant lady waddles down the freezer aisle and proceeds to fill her cart with 5 gallons of ice cream. Then trudges to the pickle aisle.

OK, only the first part of this actually happened. But Jill (the amazing and no longer pregnant wife in our duo) still maintains it was the most stereotypical thing she did while pregnant.

We decided if we were going to have ice cream taste tests we had to start with vanilla. And right off the bat, it was tricky.  There is so much branding when it comes to something as simple as vanilla ice cream; homemade, creamy, old fashioned, slow churned, classic, etc.  Which is why we do The Food Showdown; to cut through all the branding and get to what we consider the core of the matter: what tastes best.  But we tried to pick each brand’s respective basic Vanilla.

Fun Fact:

Vanilla is slightly addictive (hence why they add it to a lot of products)

Not So Fun Fact:

Artificial Vanilla partially comes from a beaver’s butt. You can Google it if you don’t believe us… or maybe don’t and just continue to live blissfully ignorant of that fact.

Vanilla Ice Cream Taste Test Contestants:

Here are the 5 brands of vanilla ice cream to choose from on this showdown, ranked in order of most expensive price per oz to least expensive price per ounce

• Breyer’s Homemade Vanilla ($0.125)
• Blue Bunny Vanilla Bean ($0.114)
• Dreyer’s Classic Vanilla ($0.108)
• Tillamook Old Fashioned Vanilla ($0.107)
• Safeway Select Vanilla ($0.06)

To keep this vanilla ice cream taste test fair, we followed our normal protocol, found here. Also, these ice creams were all purchased at the same time and stored together in the same freezer and removed at the same time by a plump pregnant lady.

Interesting Fact: Tillamook is sold in 1.75 quart cartons, while the rest are 1.5 quart. Gives you a “mind swirl” ( ← Get it? Swirl… like Ice Cream? I’ll see myself out.) when just looking at the price. It looks more expensive but you are actually getting more. Or on the flip-side, the other brands look cheaper while you aren’t getting as much ice cream for your pregnant wife. (I wanted to point that out, because not all heroes wear capes.)

Before I tell you the results, I’ve got to say that every panelist agreed that if they were to be served any of these ice creams, they would not be upset.  They were all good. Sometimes panelists have very negative comments about a brand: ‘tastes chemically,’ ‘disgusting’ or ‘way too sweet.’ However, this was a more challenging taste test because no one was mad at any of the ice creams. Cause – ICE CREAM!!!

The Results:

Which vanilla ice cream is best?  Going into it, I would not have guessed what won, as it just doesn’t have that big of a name in the ice cream world (they are cheese champions), and it was the second cheapest!  Once again proving that higher price does not always equate to best tasting.

So the official winner was: Tillamook!

Standings:

• 1 – Tillamook Old Fashioned Vanilla
• 2 – Blue Bunny Vanilla Bean
• 3 – Breyer’s Homemade Vanilla
• 4 – Safeway Select Vanilla
• 5 – Dreyer’s Classic Vanilla

Tillamook was creamy and smooth with just the right amount of real vanilla. It was also great for scooping. Even Lt. Dan would have liked this ice cream. (I like to keep my references very recent.)

What brand did we miss that’s your favorite?  Do you agree with our standings? Discuss below!  And if you happen to be a pregnant woman, you can skip the 5 gallons and go for the Tillamook… just don’t forget the pickles.