Carmela ($5): Paired with another cookie, Carmela's ice cream would overpower with its bright flavors and creamy, velvety texture. Matched with another ice cream, the cookies would dominate; each variety perfectly balancing sweet and savory and crisp and chewy. But in a case of confectionery kismet, these cookies and ice cream are married into what is hands-down the best ice cream sandwich in greater Los Angeles. These slim, tidy treats are pre-made and kept in the freezer case, giving them an extended durability, so there's no race against the clock to devour them before they descend into a puddle of mush. Each of the quartet of flavors is divine (the strawberry ice cream that's sandwiched between brown sugar cookies is the best we've had in years), but the dark chocolate cookie with salted caramel ice cream (top) is the reigning queen of ice cream sandwiches. Buttery smooth ice cream, resplendent with deep caramel and packed onto two near-perfect wafer-thin cookies.
2495 E Washington Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91104 (map);626-797-1405; carmelaicecream.com
[Photograph: Rebecca Fishman]
Coolhaus ($5): The now bi-coastal Coolhaus takes the old Diddy Reese mix-and-match model and applies it to fancy flavor combinations of cookies (like brioche, lemon rosemary, and maple waffle white chocolate) and 'scream (we're crazy for carrot cake batter, dirty mint chip, and balsamic fig and mascarpone.) Though you can buy the pre-made sandwiches at purveyors around the city, these benefit from being freshly constructed, allowing the rich, melty cream to slowly infiltrate the cookie's porous nooks, creating an gooey cookie sundae sandwich.
Moving target; 310-424-5559; eatcoolhaus.com
Beachy Cream ($4.50): I stumbled on these 'wiches while enjoying a post-hike lunch at Malibu Seafood, but these sleeper sandwiches were so seriously good that they did the near impossible, driving all memories of fried seafood from my mind. Favorite flavors? The Key Lime Cowabunga (top) layers impressively tart ice cream between two nobbly coconut oatmeal cookies, creating a pie à la mode experience in a portable package. The Surf City Classic is simplicity at its finest—salt-kissed chewy brownie cookies with a dollop of light, silky vanilla. The perfect creamy respite after a day in the sun (and now available at the brand new Market at Santa Monica Place.)
395 Santa Monica Place Suite 341, Santa Monica, CA 90401 (map); 310-656-4999; beachycream.com
Sweet Rose Creamery ($4.50): Though Zoe Nathan and Josh Loeb's small batch, organic ice cream shop offers an assortment of fancy flavors, the ice cream sandwiches, available in three pre-made varieties, are relatively simple, and we love them for it (and for their old-fashioned rectangular shape.) Perhaps the best of the trio is the Ginger Lover. Light, sweet ice cream with a powerful gingery kick is sandwiched between two subtly spiced gingerbread cookies, which boast a satisfying snap.
225 26th Street, Suite 51, Santa Monica, CA 90402 (map); 310-260-2663; sweetrosecreamery.com
Mashti Malone's ($2.75): The robust, aromatic flavors of Mashti Malone's scoops would overpower almost any cookie, so instead of trying to out-muscle flavors like rosewater saffron or the perfumey lavender, the ice cream institution sticks to crisp wafers for its sandwich base. Crackly thin, they act as perfect neutral platforms, providing a little textural oomph, while allowing the bright, fragrant creams to sing.
1525 N. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90028 (map);323-874-0144; mashtimalone.com
[Photograph: Rebecca Fishman]
L.A. Creamery ($3.95): Another choose-your-own-adventure ice cream sandwich experience. Cookie flavors tend toward the simple (think double chocolate, snicker doodle, chocolate chip); while the ice creams run the gamut from old fashioned coffee or green tea to the more ambitious options like the exceptionally velvety, subtle Tennessee Whiskey and the apple pie (pictured here with a cinnamon-bedecked snickerdoodle), which is fragrant with the aroma of sweet apple and abundant with bits of chewy pie crust. The cookie to ice cream ratio skews toward cookie, and the ice cream is fast melting, so these sandwiches are best eaten open-faced with a spoon, saving the second cookie to catch the ice cream soup that collects at the bottom of the cup. A cheat? Perhaps, but worth it to make sure that you sop up every bit of the remarkably flavorful ice cream.
777 Americana Way Glendale, CA 91210 (map); 818-552-2663; lacreamery.com
A-Frame ($6): The newest member of Roy Choi's growing empire of smart, soul-satisfying comfort food, A-Frame calls itself a "modern picnic," and what's better for dessert at a picnic, modern or otherwise, than a terrific ice cream sandwich? These fancy-pants versions do the job admirably. On the left, (and only for the adventurous) black pepper Szechuan ice cream on a salted chocolate cookie. It's complexly savory, with a hint of floral fire from the peppercorn. On the right, subtly spiced cinnamon ice cream gets cover from what may be the best cookie of our round up, an oatmeal cherry specimen, crisp on the edges, while chewy and craggy in the middle with the occasional burst of cherry tartness.
12565 Washington Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90066 (map); 310-398-7700; aframela.com
Milk ($4.50): Though they take one of the most delicate cookies as their muse, these macaron-inspired ice cream sandwiches are anything but dainty. Milk's massive 'wiches are also colossal in flavor, available in varieties like red velvet, Thai ice tea, and salted caramel, and often coated with thick icing glazes for good measure. Some, like the red velvet, might be too sweet for some palates, but the grasshopper is everything you've ever wanted old-fashioned mint chocolate chip ice cream to be. And though it's the humblest looking of the bunch, the coffee toffee (there in the bottom right) takes smooth, earthy java ice cream, teeming with crunchy toffee bits, and sandwiches it between two perfectly smooth, thin, just barely chewy macaron cookies.
7290 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90036 (map); 323-939-6455; themilkshop.com
