ice cream

Meaning

1. 1nouncountable or uncountable

   A sweet frozen food made from cream or milk, sugar and flavoring, eaten as a dessert or snack.

   Grammar: Uncountable for the food (some ice cream) but countable for portions (two ice creams).

   Patterns

   • a scoop of ice cream
   • ice cream with something

   We bought ice cream after the beach.

   She ate a big bowl of chocolate ice cream.

   Two ice creams, please, one vanilla and one strawberry.

Word forms

Common combinations

scoop of ice cream

Add a scoop of ice cream to the warm pie.

vanilla ice cream

Vanilla ice cream is the usual choice for pie.

ice cream cone

He dropped his ice cream cone.

ice cream parlor

The ice cream parlor opens in spring.

homemade ice cream

Homemade ice cream needs a lot of stirring.

Synonyms and how they differ

gelato

Gelato is the Italian style, which is denser and usually has less fat and air than American ice cream.

sorbet

Sorbet contains no dairy at all, whereas ice cream is made with milk or cream.

frozen yogurt

Frozen yogurt is tangier and often lower in fat than ice cream.

ice lolly

This British treat is frozen juice on a stick and has no cream.

Word family

ice noun

frozen water

cream noun

the rich fatty part of milk

creamy adjective

smooth and rich like cream

ice-cream adjective

used before a noun, as in an ice-cream van

Commonly confused: ice cream or sorbet?

Practice

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “ice cream”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.

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