Ice cream glossary.
From affogato to twist: the terms that matter in ice cream hospitality. Each in one sentence, with a source and the way to the right solution.
- Affogato
A scoop of vanilla or fior di latte gelato with hot espresso poured over it. “Affogato” is Italian for “drowned”.
- Air and water cooling
The refrigeration unit of an ice cream machine releases its heat either into the room air or into water. Air cooling is mobile and simple; water cooling stays stable even in hot rooms and with long queues.
- Frozen frappé
Our name for a coffee base that is frozen creamy in a granita machine and drunk through a straw. Not to be confused with the Greek frappé made from whipped instant coffee.
- Frozen yogurt
Frozen yogurt from the soft serve machine. There is no separate legal definition; in Germany, yogurt ice cream is ice cream with at least 35 % yogurt.
- Gelato
Italian-style ice cream; generally with less air and fat than ice cream and served a little warmer.
- Granita
A Sicilian frozen dessert of fruit juice or coffee and sugar, with coarser crystals than slush and often eaten with a spoon.
- Milkshake
A thick, cold blended drink made from ice cream or shake mix, milk and flavouring.
- Overrun
The share of air whipped into the mix during freezing. At 100 % overrun, one litre of mix becomes two litres of ice cream.
- Pasteurisation (soft serve machine)
The machine regularly heats the mix inside the machine and cools it down again. According to the maker, Nissei machines heat to 72 °C for at least 35 minutes and then only need dismantling every six weeks.
- Pump and gravity
Two ways of getting the mix into the freezing cylinder. The pump pushes mix and air in and makes the ice cream creamier; with gravity the mix flows in by itself and the ice cream is denser.
- Slush
Half-frozen drinkable ice with a texture like slushy snow; under the German guidelines a water ice.
- Soft serve
Ice cream whose mix is whipped with air and chilled in the soft serve machine. It is dispensed at about −6 °C, hard ice cream at −18 °C. Soft serve is not a flavour but a way of making ice cream.
- Sorbet
Ice made from fruit, water and sugar, without milk. It tastes especially fresh and is often served between two courses.
- Twist
Two flavours from two freezing cylinders and a third tap from which both come out together, for example vanilla and chocolate swirled.
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