Ask UNL Dairy Plant Manager Jonathan Hnosko how he comes up with some of the Dairy Store’s quirkier flavors, and you might get a strange answer.
“We are mad scientists with open windows in our laboratory,” he says with a grin.
With flavors such as White Chocolate Lavender, Peachberry Cobbler, Fuzzy Navel Sherbet and Maple Bacon, some of the ice creams the Dairy Plant churns out each year seem like they were concocted under the supervision of Doc “Emmett” Brown of Hollywood fame. But Hnosko and his student staff rely on extensive research, customer feedback, good old creativity and even a little detective work to keep taste buds happy.
“When we come up with new recipes, we usually adapt them from established recipes and ingredients that we’ve used,” Hnosko said. “From there, we get feedback one of two ways; either customer feedback — what they would like to see — or employees and their ideas on how to use new combinations.”
IT’S ALL IN THE SWIRL
One of the Dairy Store’s popular flavors turned the corner for the Dairy Plant staff in developing new frozen treats. In 2009, the staff figured out how to incorporate a variegate, or swirl flavor, into smooth ice cream.
“Brownie Fudge Swirl was our breakthrough. It was our trial run,” Hnosko said. “We looked at the storehouse of pipe work and equipment to see if we could pull it off without adding new equipment. It has some limitations, but so far we’ve been able to run most things through there that we want.”
THE JOY OF ALMONDS
Almond Joy will debut in the Dairy Store’s dip cabinet in July 2012. The plant had coconut flavor from its Pina Colada sherbet and a fudge variegate used in several recipes, so why not add sliced almonds?
“For me, it was my first time using the fudge variegate to put the swirl in,” said senior history major John Densberger, a Santa Lina, Calif., native working a summer job at the Dairy Plant. “It was pretty much a perfect blend of coconut and almond flavor, one didn’t overpower the other and the chocolate complimented the blend really well.”
Hnosko said the flavors were a natural combination.
“We wanted to do something else than just coconut ice cream,” he said. “Almonds and chocolate go with coconut naturally, and sliced almonds in ice cream is just unique. They have firmness to them, but because they’re sliced so thin, they crunch up really nice.
“You get the coconut flavor that comes through, plus the visual appeal of the fudge, but for me the big draw is the almonds that are incorporated into it.”
DETECTIVE WORK
Some flavor ideas are resurrected by popular demand from customers looking for ice creams they remember from their youth. Such was the case with Orange Velvet, which was served at the Dairy Store as long ago as the 1950s.
But when Hnosko went through the Dairy Plant archives in 2009 looking for clues, he found evidence that it indeed existed but not so much as an inkling of a recipe.
“We interviewed a few people that posed interest in the flavor,” Hnosko said. “The name indicated that it had orange, and we thought it was a smooth flavor, but people indicated that it may have had pineapple in it.”
So he set to work, incorporating pineapple pieces into an orange flavored ice cream. The moment of truth came when customers compared the new version to the old.
“They said we got it pretty close to what they remember,” Hnosko said. “For a lot of these people it’s a childhood memory, or it was their uncle’s favorite or their brother’s favorite. So that was really cool to see.”
‘CREATIVITY AND ANTI-CREATIVITY’
The hardest part of making new flavors, Hnosko says, it not so much developing recipes, but perfecting them. A flavor can take just days to develop an idea but weeks to turn into a recipe that delivers the same, delicious results in every batch.
“The creativity is set loose (when generating ideas), but after that is making it right,” Hnosko said. “Part of the job is creativity and anti-creativity. It takes a lot of fine-tuning, and that’s where customer feedback is important.”
Hnosko also hinted there are more flavors to come in 2012 but was mum on the details.
“We have a wide customer base and it’s fun because they push us to make sure we don’t get too comfortable,” he said. “It allows us to keep that creativity sharp.”
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