• Question: Whys ice cream cold?

    Asked by catheriney to Debbie, Glyn, Jon, Kat on 20 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Jonathan Stone

      Jonathan Stone answered on 20 Mar 2013:

      Well for it to be ice in the first place it needs to be below freezing, so less than 0 degrees C. It feels cold because the atoms in the ice cream have less energy than your tongue. So heat from your tongue conducts towards the ice cream. And because ice has quite high thermal conductivity…heat flows from your tongue to it very quickly.

    • Photo: Kathryn McMahon

      Kathryn McMahon answered on 20 Mar 2013:

      Because we make it cold by freezing it! Ice cream is just a mix of cream, milk, eggs, sugar and flavours like chocolate. When you make it, you start off with all the ingredients at room temperature and its quite runny. To make it into ice cream you put it in the freezer, take it out every half hour or so and stir it until it becomes solid ice cream. Try making it at home!
      Some of my friends have made it with liquid nitrogen from the laboratory – this is a super cold liquid that will freeze the ice cream instantly (and your hands if your not careful!). It makes really good ice cream, but its a bit dangerous!

    • Photo: Glyn Barrett

      Glyn Barrett answered on 20 Mar 2013:

      Ice creams are cold to make them taste so much more delicious on a hot summer day 🙂

    • Photo: Debbie Crockard

      Debbie Crockard answered on 20 Mar 2013:

      because they are in the freezer 🙂

      And the other stuff like the molecules slowing down because they have less energy at a lower temperature which turns them from being a liquid to a solid. As they molecules get more energy from the heat of your mouth or the surounding environment they speed up and melt – becoming a liquid again.

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