Ice cream is naturally gluten free and is — in my opinion — absolutely essential to good living. But, as so often happens, various kinds of contamination creeps  in and spoils our fun. I first wrote about gluten free ice cream in 2007, and that article is the most frequently-visited post on this site. It seems right to present updated information about gluten free ice cream during this week when I will be publishing my 1500th article. I’m dividing my coverage of the topic into three parts:

• the ice cream that we purchase to enjoy at home (this article)

• the ice cream that we enjoy in ice cream shops or other public places (an updated version of the original article /click here to visit

• the ice cream treats we prepare at home. (currently a work- in-progress)

As far as I know, there is none of the major ice cream manufacturers labels their product ‘gluten free’. They do caution us to avoid obvious problems like cookie-dough ice cream and to read every ingredients list carefully. Personally, I feel uncomfortable removing a product from a freezer just to read the ingredients label. Fortunately, at least five companies post their ingredients list on their website: Blue Bunny, Breyers, DREYERS, EDY’S, and Haggan-Daas post their ingredient lists on-line. I capitalized Dreyers and Edy’s to thank them for including the words ‘gluten free’ on the appropriate ingredients lists.

In reading those ingredients lists, I noticed three ingredients that need to be mentioned here:

acacia gum is considered ‘safe food’ on the list published at Celiac (dot com).

caramel color is a frequent source of concern in America’s gluten Free community. This statement published at the Gluten Free Living website summarizes my ideas on the subject: “Corn is used to make caramel color in the U.S.  The FDA does permit use of barley malt but all major caramel color producers say corn makes a better product,”

carrageenan is ‘safe’ according to the list mentioned above. This article agrees, but argues that there are other good reasons for avoiding that ingredient.