How to tell the difference between "ice" and "ice cream" when the word "Eis" is used?

Question

"Ice" and "ice cream" both translate to "Eis" in German. Is the only way to differentiate between them by context?

For instance, if you want to translate the sentences

"Does this store sell ice?"

and

"Does this store sell ice cream?"

would the resulting German translations turn out totally the same and indistinguishable from one another?

I'm curious about both ways, when writing German, how to make the meaning clear, and when reading German, how to distinguish between the possible cases.

Answer 1

Die normale Form, von ice cream zu sprechen, ist in der Tat einfach nur Eis. Es gibt kein Problem damit, weil Situationen, in denen man die beiden Dinge verwechseln könnte, fast gar nicht existieren.

Eis (gefrorenes Wasser) ist praktisch kein Handelsgut, oder sagen wir präziser: war es seit der Verbreitung des elektrischen Kühlschranks nicht mehr und ist es erst jetzt wieder geworden mit dem Aufkommen der (ich vermute: aus den USA eingewanderten) Sitte, Wassereis in kleinen Stücken abgepackt im Supermarkt anzubieten. (Wozu auch immer... gegen Kopfweh vielleicht?) So etwas gab es vor ein paar Jahren einfach nicht. Wer Eiswürfel wollte, hat sie sich im Gefrierfach selbst gemacht. Aber offenbar besteht ja nun doch ein Markt dafür.

Kurz also: Die Unterscheidung von Eis und Eis war in den vergangenen 50 Jahren alltagspraktisch irrelevant. Das könnte sich nun ändern. Wo Ambiguität droht, greift man zu erläuternden Zusätzen:

Kunde: Haben Sie Eis?

Verkäufer: Meinen Sie Speiseeis oder Eiswürfel? Speiseeis wär' da drüben, Eiswürfel sind hier in der Truhe.

Oder der moderne Konsument (einer aus der Generation Eiswürfel) fragt gleich:

Wo haben Sie denn Eiswürfel?

Ansonsten sind Zweifelsfälle selten. Wenn ein Kind kräht:

Ich will ein Eis!

dann ist es kaum eine Frage, was für ein Eis es meint. Wenn der Kellner auf die Frage "Was empfehlen Sie zum Nachtisch?" sagt

Ich empfehle unser Eis.

dann ist es auch klar. Wenn der Barkeeper fragt:

Wollen Sie den Whiskey mit Eis?

dann denkt sicher niemand an Vanille-Eis.

Answer 2

Even though there is the German word "Eiscreme" (often used as a label on ice cream packages) it is not very common to use it in conversations unless the context is ambiguous or misleading.

So, "Does this store sell ice cream?" will result in:

Verkauft dieses Geschäft Eis?

On the other hand, in Germany ice is usually qualified by additional words or more specific expressions (nowadays even using English terms). So, "Does this store sell ice?" will result in something like:

Verkauft dieses Geschäft Eiswürfel?
Verkauft dieses Geschäft Crushed Ice?

Answer 3

Is the only way to differentiate between them by context?

Here's one case where you can distinguish by grammar:

In German, you can count ice-cream [portions], but not the frozen water on lakes, roads, puddles in winter nor the ice on the back wall of your freezer:

"Ein Eis" is always ice-cream - it's the colloquial abbreviation of one portion of ice-cream.

Of course, you can also count ice cubes but the colloquial short form for "zwei Eiswürfel" would rather be "zwei Würfel" rather than "zwei Eis".

Answer 4

In most contexts in German, the "default" condition is that Eis" means "ice-cream," even though that's not the American usage. So in German, if you want to specify "ice" without the "cream," you would say "Eiswürfel" (literally crushed ice or "ice cubes"). If you wanted to specify ice cream, because of the context (e.g as raised by a commenter), an alternative is "Speiseis," literally "eating ice." The latter is not usually necessary, however.

Answer 5

Normally you say Eis to both of it. But if you are in a special situation where it is not clear because of the context (what is the case in most situations) you can distinguish it with Speiseeis or Eiswürfel. While Speiseeis is very expressive, Eiswürfel is more often also used in normal situations.

Answer 6

Does this store sell ice? ➔ Gibt es in diesem Laden Eiswürfel?

Does this store sell ice cream? ➔ Gibt es in diesem Laden Eis?

Ice that is sold in a store will most likely be ice cubes (Eiswürfel). If you wanted to ask about, for example, the ice that has formed in their freezers, indeed you would have to explain that, there is no unambiguous word for that.

Answer 7

In the German language, the word "Eis" is colloquially used for both "ice cream" and "frozen water". When someone uses that word, figuring out what exactly she refers to requires context. Both meanings being spelled and pronounced identically, "Eis" is a homonym^[1].

If you're standing at a lake in winter, context suggests that you're referring to frozen water: "Eis wäre jetzt schön" would be understood as a wish for the lake to be frozen (roughly "it would be nice if there was ice on the lake").

If you're standing at a swimming pool in summer, context suggests you're referring to ice-cream: "Eis wäre jetzt schön" would be understood to mean "some ice-cream would be nice right now".

There are scenarios where there is no implicit context, as described in other answers. In a supermarket that sells both ice-cream and ice cubes, for example, asking "wo haben Sie Eis?" would prompt the question "which kind, cubes or ice-cream?" or, if the clerk is distracted, likely cause the obvious misunderstanding.

If context is unavailable, a more specific term than "Eis" must be used to prevent ambiguity:

• "Ein Eis" (specifically phrased with the count) would always be understood as meaning ice-cream (if the context clearly suggested frozen water, it would be unconventional enough to cause irritation). It is very common, for example, for parents to ask their children "Wollt ihr ein Eis?" (Note that in such a context, one would still say "Ein Eis" even though all but the most pedantic parents would mean one for each, not one for all.)
• "Eiswürfel" is commonly used to refer to frozen water, even if it's not actually cubes. The German language has no specific term for frozen water (other than cubes) that doesn't sound stilted; crushed ice, for example, is mostly sold as "crushed ice" in German supermarkets.

_{[1] technically, a polyseme, as explained in the same Wikipedia article}

Answer 8

At least in switzerland the word Glacé is used to refer to the kind of ice that has taste and that you'd actually eat, where as Eis would only refer to regular frozen water.

As others have mentioned, it's very context dependent. Usually when you refer to eating something then it's obviously not just frozen water but ice cream. And this is pretty much the best distinction, if you can glean from the context that it's meant to refer to something edible, then it's probably ice cream and not just frozen water.

In some cases of course there's no clear way of telling without further clarification:

Hat es Eis auf der Strasse?

Could mean both of course like a truck with ice cream had an accident an now there's literally ice cream on the streets so if it's summer people will probably assume you're referring to ice cream but if it's winter, people will assume you're referring to ice (although ice on the street is also called 'Glatteis' but col. 'Eis' is very common).

Hat der Laden Eis?

As others have mentioned. Buying frozen water isn't really a thing here. Literally everybody has a refrigerator with a bulit-in freezer compartment and most have both a refrigerator AND a freezer so there's very little point in buying frozen water because you can just freeze it yourself. Thus in most cases this will refer to ice cream. If you're trying to buy actual frozen water in a supermarket people will probably laugh at you because the sheer thought of buying frozen water is just too ridiculous, much more ridiculous than buying pre-sliced bread and buying pre-sliced bread is also considered ridiculous here.

Answer 9

You don't say "Eiscreme" in general, even if the eaten "Eis" is meant. Technically speaking, "Eiscreme" would refer to creamy icecream only, but there's a lot "Wassereis" or "Eis am Stiel", which is not creamy at all, it's more like a sorbet... It's kind of old-fashioned to say "Eiscreme", you rarely use that word in spoken German. So just say "Eis" and it's distinguished by context.

If icecream is meant, I would ask: "Wird hier Eis verkauft?" or "Kann mann hier Eis kaufen?" or "Gibt es hier Eis?" If ice is meant, I would explain my question to make clear what kind of "Eis" I want: "Eisstücke zum Kühlen/ Eis für Drinks/ Eiswürfel/ Crushed Ice/ ..."

Answer 10

There is generally no need to distinguish. The other answers have already explained how do differentiate them linguistically if the need arises.

But I take from the question that what you really want is to know what to ask for to buy large quantities of ice in bags, as is commonly done from convenience stores in North America.

This product is generally available at gas stations and larger supermarkets(at least where I live), and seems to be called "Partyeis". This is definitely not a common word.

If I encountered confusion upon asking for this, I would probably explain that I mean "abgepackte Eiswürfel".

Answer 11

One way of distinguishing ice cream and ice that I have not yet seen mentioned in the other answers is that ice cream is sometimes listed with its flavour to avoid the ambiguity. This occurs especially in cases where both interpretations are possible: "Orangensaft mit Eis" could be either orange juice with ice cubes or orange juice with a scoop of ice cream inside. Therefore, the latter will rather be denoted e.g. "Orangensaft mit Vanilleis" ¹. The same applies to similar (slightly rare) drinks such as "Kaffee mit Milcheis", "Kakao mit Schokoladeneis" etc.

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¹: Note that in Germany, "Vanille" (vanilla) is seen as a flavour in its own right. The word "Vanille" is not associated with "basic", "unmodified" in German.

Answer 12

They are called homonyms. You have them in every language, not least in English.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pV1IP4N9ajg