Soft serve ice cream isn't made of just milk and sugar

Soft serve ice cream is a staple of summertime, but you might be surprised by some of the ingredients (that you've probably never heard of) that go into each serving.

Like Polysorbate 80. Now, it has nothing to do with sorbet. Rather, it's an emulsifier that prevents milk proteins from coating fat droplets.

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Carrageenan is a carbohydrate that comes from red seaweed, and it's used to stabilize and thicken the ice cream.

Mono and diglycerides help combine ingredients containing fat with ingredients containing water.

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Last but not least, guar gum is another thickening agent. The substance was banned from being used in diet pills in the 1980s, but it's been found to be safe in small amounts, like that which you'd find in soft serve.

That doesn't mean you'll shed some weight if you eat tons of ice cream. Big companies simply use these ingredients because they're shipping their products all over the world and want it to be uniform and taste the same wherever you go.

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