What aspects should I look for to craft the best possible root beer float?

Question

I've been tasked with getting root beer and vanilla ice cream to craft the best possible root beer float. Amazon delivery is on the table. Money is no object. No limit on calories or ingredients.

Actually making the floats is trivial, but I'm interested in how to find good root beer and ice cream. What aspects should I look for to make sure the ice cream binds well to the root beer and produces a creamy, sweet, rich float?

• Ecnerwal: Money no object: Self-refrigerating ice cream machine, make your own vanilla ice cream.

Answer 1

I think this may come down to details about how you put it together more than which ingredients you use. Even if you have the perfect vanilla ice cream, the root beer is going to be the dominant flavor.

One thing I discovered with floats is, pour the liquid in first and let it settle, then float the ice cream on top. If you pour the liquid over the ice cream, you end up with gray foam covering the white ice cream. And you might experiment with the temperature of the ice cream to see what works best.

Edit (after reading your comment):

I'd start with premium vanilla ice cream like Ben & Jerry's or Haagen-Dazs. Avoid cheap ice cream because it has too much air whipped into it, which is why the one you used just sort of disappeared into the root beer.

Also avoid soft serve, gelato, and sherbet because their fat content isn't high enough to make a good, scoopable ice cream. You can get an idea about the fat content from the ice cream's label. Ben & Jerry's and Haagen-Dazs's has 21g of fat per 2/3 cup serving, whereas "Amazon Grocery" brand has only 9g.

I'm not a root beer drinker so I can't comment on that, other than to say it might be a bit like cooking with wine - use something you like drinking on its own.

Good luck and report back!

• Grammer: But it must have something to do with ingredients. I made some once using dollar-store root beer and the ice cream out of sandwich cookies and it failed to... bind together? It just kind of separated into ice crystals, slimy white film, and root beer. And then a few that were better or worse than others. It's a reduction to absurdity but something must be required in the ingredients.
• Russell Gilbert: @Grammer: Ah, thanks for the info on what you tried. I updated my answer with more info!
• Ecnerwal: @Grammer If you like it, the root beer from the dollar store probably works fine. More expensive root beer might or might not taste better to you. The miserable excuse for ice cream in ice cream sandwiches would be the problem there...