The Eskimo Ice Cream Bar
How an ice cream bar rose to popularity in the postwar Soviet Union
Today, ice cream is ubiquitous in America. The ice cream aisle of your local supermarket is overflowing with options. The same is true of the number of flavors you can find in your favorite corner ice cream shop. But ice cream’s ubiquity depends on a confluence of forces that today we take for granted: Milk, sugar, and an ability to keep ice cream frozen.
Which is what makes the rise of ice cream in the postwar Soviet Union all the more noteworthy. In a time and place known for food rations and supply shortages, ice cream was not only beloved but also often plentiful.
One of the most popular frozen treats in the USSR was the Eskimo bar, a bar of vanilla ice cream dipped in chocolate and stuck onto a popsicle stick.
The Eskimo was made entirely by a machine, aptly named the Eskimo-Generator. Invented in 1959, the Eskimo-Generator could build bars faster than human workers; it was — in the words of scholar Jenny Leigh Smith — “a swirling stainless machine tub with numerous levels and small paddles protruding from the sides.” As the Soviet Union’s first fully automated ice cream treat, the Eskimo epitomized Soviet obsessions with mechanization and efficient manufacturing.
By chasing fully automated food production, the Soviets prioritized some ice cream treats above others. While ice cream cakes and ice cream cones were popular amongst the public, 1960s dairy planners didn’t like these products because they were half-automated; a team of workers needed to fills the cones and cakes with ice cream before re-freezing. Eskimo production was entirely automatic, so production of the bars was ramped up in the 1960s.
For the Eskimo bar to become a staple of late Soviet cuisine, the treat needed not only on automated manufacturing but also on access to key ingredients — namely milk and sugar, which were in short supply during the early years of the Soviet Union.
Unlike Britain and the US, the Soviet Union didn’t hold any tropical sugar-producing colonies. Rather, they relied on trade to get the sweetener, importing most of its sugar — at quite a cost — from Southeast Asia and Cuba. Later, in the 1960s (when Eskimo production took off), the USSR was able to decrease their dependence on trade by growing sugar beets. Because the beets were less sweet and more expensive to refine than sugarcane, it wasn’t until the 1960s that the Soviets finally developed technology that could extract enough beet sugar at a low enough cost to make growing them worthwhile.
Milk, on the other hand, was prevalent in the USSR. The problem was transporting it. Cows produced milk in the countryside, but because of Soviet central planning, milk processing was often located in urban areas, so milk needed to be transported to the cities. However, it was often hard to redistribute milk out of urban areas because, up through the 1970s, refrigerated trucks were rare. Thus, fresh milk was limited to urban centers, but other, more shelf-stable dairy products like sour cream and butter were distributed beyond city limits.
Obviously, this lack of refrigeration technology had a direct effect on ice cream, which needed to stay cool between production and consumption. While most technological developments in the USSR were imitations of Western inventions, refrigeration technologies were homegrown. To develop refrigerated transport, the Soviets relied on dry ice. The nation had increased dry ice production during World War II, so it was readily available for new uses after the war. In turn, the Soviets used dry ice (rather than freon, which was prevalent in Western refrigeration techniques) as a coolant in both trucks and small pushcarts. Eskimo bars and other ice cream treats would be shipped in large trucks and then distributed around cities and towns in pushcarts.
With ingredients and distribution in place, ice cream’s popularity soared in the 1960s Soviet Union. Part of what drove this popularity was ice cream’s marketing. It was advertised as a health food. A 1961 government publication proclaimed:
“Ice cream is one of the most healthy and delicious food products. … It is higher in calories than milk, non-fat tvorog (farmer’s cheese), eggs, meat, and many other products.”
Advertisements celebrated ice cream for its high fat and calorie content. In turn, the same characteristics that made ice cream unhealthy in a nation of overconsumption like the US made it desirable in a nation of scarcity like the USSR.
Thanks to automation, refrigeration, and supply chain improvements, the Eskimo bar became a symbol of life in the Soviet Union. In a country defined by its food shortages and rations, the Eskimo became a treat. An accessible opportunity to indulge. A way for consumers to enjoy something cold, creamy, and special.
Notes.
This narrative makes it sound like Eskimo bars were the only ice cream in the Soviet Union. Not the case. There was quite an array of options, with some of the most popular served at GUM Department Stores. The Eskimo bar is just one example — one that captures a specific story of Soviet values and Soviet supply chains.
This post is abridged and adapted from Jenny Leigh Smith’s “Empire of Ice Cream: How Life Became Sweeter in the Postwar Soviet Union” (a chapter in the book Food Chains, ed. Warren Belasco and Roger Horowitz, 2009).
All of the photos — and more on Soviet ice cream — can be found here.
A recipe for Eskimo bars is here. I haven’t made it, so I’m not sure how it will taste… but it looks easy and fun!
