It's shocking when an agency, which is supposed to protect the interests of consumers, misleads them. It happened recently when the Directorate of Consumer Affairs of the Delhi government released an advertisement in national newspapers asking ice-cream aficionados to check the month and year of packaging and manufacturing, apart from other product details, on the packs they buy.

The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has unambiguously exempted ice-cream manufacturers from printing the date of packaging and manufacture. Although it is mandatory to print the name and full address of the manufacturer, batch or code number, name and type of the product and the ingredients in volume of contents in litres or mililitres, ice-cream is sold by volume, not weight. One litre is equivalent to 540 gm.

The basic ingredients of an ice-cream are milk, cream, fat, sugar and flavouring agents. Milk and cream are supplemented with condensed or dry non-fat milk solids to make up for necessary solid non-fat content.Milk fat imparts rich flavour. In some ice-creams, it is substituted with vegetable fats like butter, butter oil, cream, milk, milk powder, coconut oil, palm oil.

Milk solid non-fats are in the form of proteins like casein and whey, lactose, minerals, vitamins and fats. Proteins have water-bonding and an emulsifying quality.

The main solid contents of an ice-cream - carbohydrates - make ice-creams sweet and soft. The BIS has stipulated that carbohydrates constitute 13-16 per cent by weight of an ice-cream.

Some manufacturers add stabilisers and emulsifiers to keep ice-creams from melting easily. Stabilisers and emulsifiers check formation of ice-crystals and enhance smoothness of the finished product, causing retention of air, which slows down melting.

The stabilisers used include guar gum, sodium alginate, locus bean gum and carrageen. Mono-glycerides and di-glycerides constitute emulsifiers. But BIS has emphasised that these should be clean and free from any taste or odour and protected from dust and contamination during storage.

Besides matured fruit, fruit extracts, cocoa, spices and chocolates are added as colour and flavour additives. Fruit used are supposed to be free from piths and seeds. The fruit may be fresh, frozen and canned. Currants, figs and prunes may be used in the dried form. Fresh fruit juice is required to be used immediately after preparation. Use of chemical preservatives other than sulphur dioxide derived from gelatin or dry fruit is prohibited.Ideally an ice-cream should have an air content of nearly 50 per cent. An ice-cream becomes fluffy with excessive air, and extremely dense with less air.

A good ice-cream doesn't disintegrate into a lumpy mass, and bleeding serum. It melts homogeneously, though not immediately. At the same time it's not gummy or soggy. But howsoever good an ice-cream may be, one should buy only as much as is the immediate requirement because it's not advisable to refreeze ice-cream or it crystallises.

And one should buy from only that ice-cream seller who displays his name and address along with the name and address of the manufacturer, if any, legibly and conspicuously on the stall, vehicle or container, as stipulated by the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.