Ice Cream Replaced With Warm Date Pudding?

[seat38a]

Can confirm it wasn't available this week on multiple Long Distance trains. One of the diner staff mentioned he thought it was the over all complaints of the new blue bunny ice cream that made them drop it for now.

Good riddance to getting rid of the blue bunny ice cream. I bought that garbage at Walmart one time and it is the only ice cream I've thrown away. So what happened to Chao and Haggen Daz? Did palms not get greased enough in Washington?

So, Amtrak's solution to customers not liking their replacing Haggen Daz ice cream, with Blue Bunny ice cream, was to dump both and offer in their place, some crap called warm date pudding?

I honestly thought the Haagen-Dazs ice cream cups were fine but I didn't truly miss them until after trying the Blue Bunny cool whip ball nonsense.

Haagen-Dazs Vanilla: Cream, Skim Milk, Cane Sugar, Egg Yolks, Vanilla Extract.

Blue Bunny Vanilla: Milk, Skim Milk, Cream, Sugar, Corn Syrup, Vanilla Extract, Artificial Flavor, Carob Bean Gum, Guar Gum, Carrageenan, Mono & Diglycerides, Cellulose Gel, Cellulose Gum, Annatto.

It is not ice cream, when one can leave it outside for 2 hours and it still stays a perfectly shaped ball. Still looks the same except for the cold.

 

[willem]

On a train to or from the Gathering, a dining car attendant told me that Amtrak had discontinued ice cream "because it didn't refreeze well." (It sounds like the Blue Bunny product might refreeze well, though.)

 

[Palmetto]

On a train to or from the Gathering, a dining car attendant told me that Amtrak had discontinued ice cream "because it didn't refreeze well." (It sounds like the Blue Bunny product might refreeze well, though.)

All of which begs the question: why would someone want to refreeze ice cream in an Amtrak dining car?

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

On a train to or from the Gathering, a dining car attendant told me that Amtrak had discontinued ice cream "because it didn't refreeze well." (It sounds like the Blue Bunny product might refreeze well, though.)

All of which begs the question: why would someone want to refreeze ice cream in an Amtrak dining car?

Because the Blue Bunny "ice cream" would be left out on the summer-time platform, waiting to be loaded onto the 4 hour late train? Once finally loaded, it had to be refroze before serving.

 

[tommylicious]

Truly pathetic! Well done, Amtrak!

The Blue Bunny was served on 30 last week. That's the kind not in a cup and not hand dipped either, right?

Correct. It comes in a scoop size in a bag and the dining car staff puts it in a bowl.

Sometimes they just leave it in the Blue Bunny Bag as-is.

Bon appétit...

Well it is almost winter. Let's see what they offer next summer.

What does winter have anything to do with serving ice cream?

Some people don't like to eat cold food when it's cold. I'm not one of them but I don't like eating soup when it's hot.

Oddly enough Amtrak can actually be super hot in the winter when they leave the heaters on the Sahara setting. It may seem counterintuitive but if you eat a hot and spicy soup in a hot environment it can help you feel cooler when you're done. That being said I've never seen soup of any sort on Amtrak's LD network. My own personal quirk is that I do not like to combine hot drinks with hot food or cold drinks with cold food.

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

I was on the Crescent the other day (only for dinner). The choices were the date pudding, yogurt cheesecake, lava cake with caramel filling, and the diet pudding (I didn't see ice cream, but maybe I just wasn't looking carefully).

Having immediately eliminated three of the four from consideration, I tried the lava cake. It was essentially a tiny chocolate cupcake with a bit of runny caramel in it somewhere. I had two bites and that was enough.

Amtrak may have actually done me a favor--I've been trying to cut down on desserts, and I may not have any in the dining car from now on!

To be fair, the company that makes the diet pudding (which is awful) makes absolutely wonderful regular pudding. I buy it once in a while, but not often, because I go through the carton in a couple of days. But they are good at "real" dessert, not diet stuff. It would be like asking the Twinkies people to make diet fruit and nut bars.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

The choices were the date pudding, yogurt cheesecake, lava cake with caramel filling, and diet pudding.

That sounds like something out of the Southern Pacific zero satisfaction playbook. Seriously Amtrak, are you even trying anymore?

 

[haolerider]

With all the major issues facing Amtrak, discussions regarding the lack of ice cream and the quality of desserts should be way down the list of priorities! I doubt if the new CEO has that on his top ten list!

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

However if they are unable to keep ice cream frozen that is a issue of food safety. While you and me can tell when a ice cream bar has been refrozen, it not a health hazard per say. A steak fresh or frozen that is not maintained at a correct temperature will become a health hazard.

The tip of the iceberg.

The safe transportation of food is from plant to plate.

 

[crescent-zephyr]

There is the "Chocolate Lava Cake" and "Date Pudding"

 

[OlympianHiawatha]

That Date Pudding looks suspicious; I think I saw something like that in the back yard last week when I was mulching leaves :blink: :angry2:

 

[dlagrua]

The best deserts that we have had on Amtrak were the Tiramisu ( a kind of vanilla flavored cream, over lady fingers topped with powdered coffee) and the orange and raspberry sorbets that were served. Both were really excellent but both have been discontinued. IMO, the ice cream was always marginal at best. As for date pudding; they can keep that stuff. Not worth the calories.

 

[jebr]

I actually really like the date dessert. It's one of the better desserts I've had and it broke me out of my typical cheesecake dessert multiple times.

 

[Dovecote]

FWIW - On my recent trip, the server recommended to my wife she have the Warm Date pudding for dessert. The server said it was his favorite. My wife enjoyed the dessert. The server made a better presentation than of the picture recently posted. It was dusted with powdered sugar and the sauce nicely drizzled. It was served with strawberries as well.

 

[Bob Dylan]

I agree with OH,that Date pudding looks like something out of a cow pasture!

The Best deserts I've ever had during my 40+ Years of riding Amtrak were the Chocolate Bundt Cake a la mode on the Empire Builder and the Bourbon Pecan Pie served on the CONO and the Crescent!

 

[Ryan]

I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder, that date pudding looks pretty tasty.

I guess that different people have different tastes, who would have thought?

 

[AmtrakBlue]

I guess that different people have different tastes, who would have thought?

Which could be why Amtrak does update the menu often. You can't please all of the people all of the time, so might as well try to please some people some of the time and please other people at another time.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

These desserts don't necessarily sound completely unappetizing in and of themselves. If I'm at the right kind of restaurant I might try and enjoy any of them. But here's the thing. Amtrak isn't a specialty restaurant that knows how to make and sell unique culinary experiences. Amtrak is a lowest common denominator warehouse food vendor. As such they're only shooting themselves in the foot by trying to be cute and quirky with their dessert selections. Amtrak was doing a much better job pleasing (or at least not disappointing) folks in prior years. I'm actually a fan of lava cake myself, but Amtrak's version looks and tastes like something from a random convenience store. Then again I suppose if you normally eat convenience store desserts perhaps you'll be really impressed with the new selections.

 

[tommylicious]

The warm date pudding sounds decent to me.

 

[PVD]

I don't see a problem with a couple of specialty or seasonal items as long as some mainstream selections are also available. Where they fall down very often is in not having items available because of their stocking/inventory practices.

 

[Palmetto]

Given the state of affairs in Amtrak's culinary pursuits, I think we're lucky to have a choice of desserts.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

The warm date pudding sounds decent to me.

You can have mine.

I'll leave it behind the 6th pillar on the WAS platform. No need to rush. I have a feeling it will last longer than a Twinkie.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

If the new focus is all about being quirky and cheap I wonder where Amtrak can go from here.

 

[Tennessee Traveler]

Just rode the Capitol Limited both directions this past week and vanilla bean ice cream was on the menu and served. On the California Zephyr it was the deserts others are describing above. I liked the chocolate lava cake but mainly stuck with the sugar free vanilla pudding. I like it if no ice cream available.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

If the new focus is all about being quirky and cheap I wonder where Amtrak can go from here.

Those sound good... especially if served à la mode (Haagen-Dazs, of course) !