It was family reunion time and some of us were in the grocery store staring at the vast array of ice cream choices, trying to figure out which was the very best for our money.

Holy cow, only in America do we have all these confusing choices. We finally did choose a few and went on our way. But ever since, I've wondered, can I judge the quality of ice cream without opening the container? The list of ingredients is just confusing. So I went to www.answers.com for, well, my answer. Here's what I found:

"Understanding the concept of overrun will let you easily determine the relative quality of a container of ice cream in a supermarket. "Overrun" is the measurement of the volume of air that is whipped into a given volume of ice-cream mix (cream, sugar, flavoring agents, etc.). If the air is equal to one-half the mix, the overrun is 50 percent. If it is equal to the volume of the mix, the overrun is 100 percent. If it is one and a half times the volume of the mix, the overrun is 150 percent.

"Quality ice creams have lower overruns (roughly 80 percent) than those of low-quality ice creams (100 percent or more) and therefore justifiably cost more than the substandard products, which - quite literally - are a lot of cold air. [my comment: so we do get what we pay for!]

"There is another way to judge overrun before taking the first bite, but this necessitates purchasing the ice cream and taking it home. Place a small sample in a bowl at room temperature. The more quickly it melts in comparison to a high-quality ice cream, the higher its relative overrun is likely to be. A good ice cream takes its time to melt and will not as readily run down the side of a cone on a hot summer day.

"Many producers use stabilizers like gelatin to help retard the melting speed of high-overrun ice creams. If the stabilizers are used with abandon, the ice cream may melt even more slowly than quality ice cream, though that sight will not hoodwink aficionados. They will spot telltale signs, such as the tiny air bubbles that emerge on the surface as the ice cream melts and the chalkiness or gumminess of its texture. [my comment: YUK.]

"To test this information out, try this ice cream experiment. Go to your supermarket. Take two quart-sized containers of ice cream (one expensive, one inexpensive) to the customer-use scale in the produce department. The ice cream with larger air, smaller cream content will be the "lighter" of the two."

We obviously want an ice cream with more cream, not less. And I want one with the fewest mystery ingredients possible. What's wrong with wanting to eat just FOOD - real honest-to-goodness food? So now that I know what I know, this label reading won't be so overwhelming. Thus far, by the way, Edy's Grand Vanilla shows up with a 97 percent overrun, and Ben & Jerry's anything is showing up with the fewest additives and the lowest overrun percentage 24 percent). I'm giving it a try tonight.