To go on Perry’s production floor you have to wear long pants and close-toed shoes. You also have to wear personal protective equipment such as eye goggles, hair nets, lab coats and ear plugs. We started off in our 40-degree room or the dry warehouse where our ingredients are stored until they are taken out to the production floor. We take care when stacking different types of raw ingredients, to prevent any cross-contamination.

Each morning we receive fresh milk and cream from local farms, in our receiving dock. Samples of the daily dairy are taken into the lab to be tested for quality. Once the milk has been approved by the lab it is held in storage tanks before it goes to the kettles. Each kettle holds 600 gallons of ice cream mix and is basically used the same way as our great-great-grandfather Morton cooked it on his kitchen stove.

After achieving the creamy taste only slow-cooking can provide, the base mix is pumped into holding tanks where it is held until needed in one of our delicious flavors. It does not sit for long, we typically turn the fresh milk and cream into ice cream within 48 hours.

Next, it is pumped into flavor vats where different flavors are added to the base mix. It is then pumped through a continuous freezer where it is slightly frozen and all the “good stuff” is added. From there it is either filled into containers or novelty items such as fudgie bars and gets sent to the freezer. Each year Perry’s produces over 12 million gallons of ice cream.