How to Prepare Soft Serve Ice Cream
Soft-serve ice cream is made through a specialized process that involves carefully preparing and freezing a unique cream mix to achieve its characteristic smooth and creamy texture.
- Soft Serve Mix Recipe: Since any store owner can make a cream from scratch, Aussieblends has prepared various Dairy Soft Serve Mixes & Vegan Soft Serve mixes to cover your business menu requirements. These ingredients are combined to create a consistent and flavorful base.
- Mixing and Homogenization: AussieBlends Soft Serve Mix is a powder mix. To prepare the cream, add clean, purified cold water (4°C to 5°C) according to the product mixing instructions in a clean plastic bucket, add one bag of AussieBlends Soft Serve Mix, whisk for 30 to 40 seconds and hold the mix in the refrigerator. After 10 minutes, whisk again to homogenize the cream. Keep the cream refrigerated all the time in the refrigerator or the soft-serve machine refrigerated hopper
- Flavoring (Optional): AussieBlends offers a wide range of concentrated flavors such as chocolate, fruits, or other extracts that can be added to the previously mixed cream to prepare various flavors of soft serve.
- Freezing and Aeration (overrun): Pour the chilled mix into the hopper of the soft-serve ice cream machine. The machine's components include a freezing chamber and a beater. Air is incorporated into the cream when the beater churn and pumped the cream simultaneously. This aeration gives the soft-serve a light and fluffy texture (overrun).
- Rapid Freezing: When dispensing the soft-serve it's exposed to temperatures well below freezing. The rapid freezing prevents large ice crystals from forming, resulting in a smoother texture.
- Immediate Enjoyment: Soft-serve ice cream is best enjoyed right after being dispensed. Combining the creamy interior and the perfect crispy, tasty waffle ice cream cone creates a delightful contrast in texture and temperature.
- Toppings and Garnishes: Enhance the soft-serve with various toppings, such as syrups, sprinkles, nuts, fruit, or candies, based on individual preferences.
- Cleaning and Maintenance: - After serving, the soft serve machine needs to be properly cleaned and maintained to ensure food safety and consistent performance. The key elements of the soft serve ice cream-making process are the controlled freezing, incorporation of air, and continuous dispensing that result in this beloved frozen treat's signature smooth, light, and creamy texture.
- Profitability: Soft serve is one of the most profitable, offer in the fast-food market; also, complies to all of the following criteria:
- Low Cost Per Serve, High Mark-Up (As an example of how profitable soft serve cones are, a Cone size 75 ml. with Overrun 60% has a 248% profitability)
- Fast Serving Time (Less than 10 seconds)
- Operationally Easy to Handle (Powder soft serve is easy and fast to mix with cold water and flavor)
- Versatile Menu with a wide price-range. Soft Serve is usually sold as Cones (20-30%), Sundaes (10-20%) or used as a base for making Milkshakes (60 - 70%). However, this depends on the market and type of store.
- Can be used as an up-sell. (”Get dessert for only a small amount of money extra!”, or “Would you like dessert with that?”)
- Can be sold as a treat, dessert, food item or beverage!
- It is a very ‘Marketable’ and Affordable Product
- Customers are already familiar with the product - and there is no resistance to trying it
- The pay-back on the equipment investment is fast
Soft Serve Machine
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Soft serve machines typically come with two hoppers and a twist in the middle to dispense two individual flavors and the option to twist them together. Soft Serve machines are divided by dispensing system and cooling system.
There are two types of cream dispensing: a gravity feed and a pump feed. Gravity machines usually reach an overrun between 20% and 50%, while pump machines can easily reach up to 60% overrun. There are two types of cooling systems: the air-cooled system requires space on both sides of the machine. In contrast, water-cooled machines require water installation inside the store. |
Soft Serve Overrun
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Soft Serve Ice Cream Mix and Soft Serve Flavors
The McDonalds Model
The of selling Soft Serve profitably. The McDonald's Franchise has been hugely successful by employing both the above secrets for years. Instead of trying to re-invent the wheel, why not learn from them:
- How can you add value to something that costs very little and sell it with vast mark-ups in various exciting ways?
- They advertise the cheap cone on billboards, banners, and large posters OUTSIDE their stores, but usually not inside.
- Inside the store, they show you a menu with sundaes, floats, or other deliciously decorated cones, which in most cases changes your mind and the amount of money you spend.
- These other menu offerings usually don't cost McDonald's much more to produce, but they charge four times as much.
- You can offer much more exciting menu options, change faster, offer flavored soft serve and be more delicious and exciting than they are.
- The McDonalds soft serve is price-based. You're in a position to offer a better quality soft serve in more flavors and colors in more ways than they can. Use these advantages to your benefit.
- How can you use soft serve to draw customers into your business to buy other more profitable frozen treats, food, and beverage items?
- McDonald's advertise their low price cup cone - drawing in the crowds. However, customers buy soft serve and other things as well, which create 'Intangible benefits' because you can't put a dollar figure on it.
- Their low price cone also has another benefit - the public perceives the FRANCHISE as good value for money, which delivers lasting benefits for the franchise.