Name: Iceflation.<\/p>\n
Appearance: An ice-cold rip-off, with a Flake on top.<\/p>\n
Ah, here we go \u2013 expensive ice-creams. It seems like only yesterday the two eight-year-olds who went viral on TikTok<\/a> were complaining about having to pay \u00a39 for two screwballs from an ice cream van. It was 2024 \u2013 and the cost of licking has only risen since then.<\/p>\n Wow, gross expression, but go on. According to a survey of 2,000 British parents commissioned by Aldi<\/a>, they are spending \u00a350 a kid on ice-cream over the six-week summer holidays this year. The average cost of a 99 is \u00a32.65, but one vendor outside the British Museum in London is reportedly <\/a>charging \u00a37 for one scoop with a flake. A survey of 33 seaside resorts by the credit card company Zable found a single-scoop cone in Porthmadog in north Wales cost \u00a33.85.<\/p>\n Any cheaper spots? It would cost you a more reasonable \u00a31.95 for one scoop at Barton-on-Sea in Hampshire.<\/p>\n I guess that\u2019s where we\u2019re heading on holiday then. What\u2019s causing this round of iceflation? Exactly what you\u2019d expect. As an Ice Cream Alliance spokesperson told the Daily Mail<\/a>: \u201cAlmost every part of serving a 99 has become more expensive.\u201d Milk and chocolate are among the five most climate-impacted foods, according to a recent report from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit thinktank<\/a>, and ice-cream vans need to keep products cool and travel around at a time of rising diesel and electricity prices.<\/p>\n A sorry state of affairs. But hasn\u2019t ice-cream always been pricey? Not everywhere: in Naples, it was a popular treat for all classes in the 18th century<\/a>. \u201cPenny licks<\/a>\u201d \u2013 reusable glasses filled with ice-cream customers licked and returned \u2013 democratised it as a street treat in Britain in Victorian times, though you might get a free cholera topping, according to an 1879 medical report<\/a>.<\/p>\n Yuck! You\u2019re putting me off ice-cream altogether. It may actually be good for you \u2013 a mysterious, seemingly beneficial \u201cice-cream effect<\/a>\u201d has been observed in diet-related research multiple times. One Harvard study in 2005 found men who ate two or more servings of ice-cream a week had a 22% lower risk of diabetes; a 2016 meta-analysis of multiple studies also found that eating as little as half a cup was associated with a 19% lower risk.<\/p>\n