Whenever a customer goes to almost any grocery store, there is a seemingly unending selection of ice creams flavors and brands to choose from with new ones coming out every year. From Blue Bell to Ben and Jerry’s, there is no shortage of choices for ice cream brands. However, consumers have never been able to completely agree on which is best. So, to hopefully put this debate to rest, Blue Bell, Haagen Dazs, Ben and Jerry’s and generic brand will be put under the microscope to see who is the best. For this, each brand’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough flavor will be taste tested and compared against each other (normally, it would be vanilla or chocolate, but Ben and Jerry’s does not sell plain vanilla or chocolate ice cream). So, here are the results:

Ben and Jerry’s

Honestly, I do not quite understand the appeal to this one that others see. It was alright, but it did not impress me in the way it has been described to me. It was not bad, but it felt like the sugar was overloaded on it at the expense of cream. Also, it was very hard to dig into the ice cream despite that fact that it had been sitting out for about 10 minutes with the others. There was nothing that really set the brand apart from the others in a positive way. Unfortunately, Ben and Jerry’s just tasted average, so I am giving it a three out of five ice cream scoops.

Blue Bell

Just a quick note before I get into this one: I did exclude the fact that Blue Bell is a Texas ice cream brand; it was solely judged based on quality and flavor like the other three brands. Anyway, Blue Bell stood out much better as brand. The ice cream was much creamier than the others and had a certain smoothness that made the experience much more pleasing. However, the flavor was lacking in some parts because it was more like the brand’s homemade vanilla with cookie dough chunks mixed in. For some, this can actually be a plus, but for this, it detracted from capturing the full flavor. Thus, Blue Bell is receiving four ice cream scoops out of five.

Haagen Dazs

I do have to admit that this brand surprised me. Before I tasted it, I expected it to be average or sub-average, but Haagen Dazs proved me wrong. Their ice cream better captured the flavor of chocolate chip cookie dough than the other three. Instead of vanilla with cookie dough mixed in, it was more like cookies and cream with cookie dough mixed in which better contributed to the flavor. Despite this, their creaminess was slightly deficient and missed some of the smoothness that others better captured. It did not necessarily ruin the quality, but it definitely detracted from it. Therefore, I am giving Haagen Dazs four out of five ice cream scoops.

Generic Brand

Before I even opened the package, I knew this was going to be a bust. The container was not properly sealed and already had ice cream leaking out of it within minutes. Once I opened it, the ice cream was more like soft serve than actual ice cream, so it felt like I was eating a soup from the start. But, the biggest thing was the flavor. It did not even taste like vanilla; it tasted more like coffee with cookie dough chunks interspersed which is not something I want when the flavor is supposed to be chocolate chip cookie dough. I have no choice but to give generic brand a depressing one out of five ice cream scoops.

In the end, it comes down to a tie between Blue Bell and Haagen Dazs. Both brands greatly excelled in one area, but were lacking in another. However, their flaws do not ruin the overall ice cream by far. They are both quality ice creams that I wouldn’t mind having on a summer day. With these two, they are equals in this case, and the only other determinant is personal tastes.