Anyone who's been to an ice cream plant, knows there's nothing quite as cold as a walk-in tray freezer...except maybe a warm day Minneapolis in January.
All kidding aside, ice cream freezers and hardeners are marvels of frigidity. Spiral freezers, tray and tunnel hardeners produce arctic-like -30 degree C temperatures, complete with windchill. And the continuous freezers used to manufacture the ice cream are getting colder too. While most operate in the -6 degree C range to bring the liquid and dry ingredients to a semi-solid state similar to soft serve, one manufacturer is introducing a new model that operates at -12 to -15 degrees C which is especially advantageous for low fat and fat-free products.