Physiochemical and Sensory Properties of Ice-Cream Sweetened with Date Syrup

Date palm fruit is consumed as fresh fruit or processed to produce date paste and date syrup. Date syrup (DS) a natural sweetener contains mainly glucose and fructose and used with different food products. The effect of substituting sucrose with different level of DS (0, 25, 50 and 100%) on the physiochemical and sensory properties of ice cream were investigated. The overrun increased with increasing DS level while the total soluble solids and viscosity were not affected significantly. Sensory properties of DS-ice cream were similar to regular ice cream except for color, aroma and flavor. DS-ice cream developed brown color. Increasing DS level decreased the Lightness and increased yellowness values significantly. While date aroma and date flavor increased significantly with increasing DS level, milky flavor decreased significantly. Ice cream sweetened with 100% DS had the lowest pH and the highest values for acidity and texture. Date syrup can be used successfully to produce high quality ice cream with unique brown color and distinctive date’s aroma and flavor.