Dining Advice, Tips, Recommendations, and News
PrintA Case for Ice Cream in Winter
There is an ice cream shop en route to the elementary school I used to attend called the Bubbling Brook. We used to stop there on many an afternoon, the entire carpool spilling out of the minivan to line up for what "The Bub" did best: rainbow sherbet (heavy on the raspberry), or a chocolate-vanilla twist with chocolate dip, which inevitably cracked and dripped down faces and shirts and onto leather-upholstered backseats. But the Bub was a seasonal place, and I can still taste the bitterness of the disappointment—just as clearly as I can the sweetness of that sherbert—of the day when we drove by only to find that it had closed for the winter, the windows through which the ice cream passed firmly shuttered against the long, cold months ahead.
I'm more of a mocha-chip girl these days, but I still feel a little twinge of sadness around this time of year at the sight of so many shops shutting down until spring. When it comes to ice cream, why must we be fair-weather friends? Surely I'm not the only one who would splurge on a cone on a snowy day or stop in for a pint to eat later, under the covers with a mug of hot chocolate. And think of all the missed seasonal flavor opportunities: cranberry-gingersnap or kumquat-eggnog swirl.
That's why Alexis Miesen and Jennie Dundas are my new heroes. They dared to open their organic, locally produced ice cream shop, Blue Marble, this month. And while they may not have a soft-serve machine to dispense those twists of my youth, they do serve fair-trade coffee and yummy treats from Baked. I stopped in for a cup of butter-pecan earlier this week. Silky and rich, with a decadent, nutty crunch, it was the perfect complement to the crisp fall afternoon. I didn't quite finish it, though, and left the rest in my boyfriend's freezer. When I came back the next day it was gone. Oh, the agony!
I'm considering this post an expression of my gratitude to Blue Marble, and also a plea to the Bubbling Brook on behalf of the students at my alma matter to stay open year-round. If you'd like to add your own shout outs, please do so. At Serious Eats, we're always on the lookout for noteworthy ice cream shops—no matter what the weather. And if you've got any brilliant ideas for cold-season flavors (what would go perfectly scooped over a slice of fruitcake?) tack those on as well.
About the author: Lucy Baker is a graduate student in the writing program at Sarah Lawrence College. Before returning to school to pursue an MFA, she was an assistant cookbook editor at HarperCollins. She lives in Brooklyn and is currently obsessed with all things fennel.
Add a comment:
Previewing your comment:
HTML Hints
Some HTML is OK: <a href="URL">link</a>, <strong>strong</strong>, <em>em</em>
Comment Guidelines
Post whatever you want, just keep it seriously about eats, seriously. We reserve the right to delete off-topic or inflammatory comments. Learn more at our Comment Policy page.
If you see something not so nice, please, report an inappropriate comment.
21 Comments:
I can't think of any ice cream shops that closed for the winter where I am from, it gets cold, just not that cold.
On a side note, when my mom lived in Portland, OR she used to on her lunch break get an ice cream cone and walk around downtown in the middle of winter, she loved the cold ice cream on the cold day.
Sarahrm at 5:15PM on 10/30/07
I don't know. I'm Canadian, and it does get cold in winter. I stop wanting ice cream. The idea of eating ice cream with hot chocolate sounds painful. The contrast in temperatures would hurt, I think.
lisbear18 at 5:46PM on 10/30/07
Here in Indiana, a local soft-serve shop called Zesto opens in the Spring & closes late Fall. We always know when the "offical" seasons change by driving by Zesto! Huge family hang-out. The actual soft ice cream really isn't anything to shout out about but being there with family & friends after the kids play baseball or soccer make it special :)
JEP at 5:58PM on 10/30/07
They should make a Brandy Butter ice cream.. like the kind you put on Christmas pudding. Do they have that in US?
LadyJane at 6:45PM on 10/30/07
Back in the late '80s, Calvin Trillin wrote a profile of Ben & Jerry for "The New Yorker." In it, he described their theory (the name of which escapes me at present) that eating ice cream in cold weather lowers your body temperature in a relative way so that the cold outside is not as extreme as it would be otherwise.
I always thought this was the kind of scientific genius that merits the Nobel Prize. Anything that can justify year-round ice cream is jake with me.
klg19 at 7:17PM on 10/30/07
On a (very Fall) Sunday afternoon, I nearly walked right by Grom without noticing it. Reason being, there was no line whatsoever. I popped in for a medium cup of Pistachio and Lemon - not the best match, but still my two favorite flavors, and kept walking down Broadway thanking my lucky stars for cold weather.
djacobs at 7:31PM on 10/30/07
Ice cream in cold weather gives you the sort of thrill you might otherwise get from trespassing late at night or sneaking out your window-- you're daring the cold by being colder!
I've had pumpkin ice cream before that was delicious, and I could see white chocolate ice cream (or sweet cream) with cranberries and chocolate chips being divine.
Christina at 8:09PM on 10/30/07
Milwaukeeans go for Kopp's or Leon's custard any time of year. And it gets pretty damn cold there. Whenever I visit family at Christmastime, we end up making a Kopp's run or three.
Adam Kuban at 8:39PM on 10/30/07
Word, Adam. The first time I visited Milwaukee - from North Carolina, where I'd lost my New England cold tolerance - was the week of Christmas. Kopp's was an important part of my acclimation, along with walks along Lake Michigan, a brewery tour, and cross-country skiing (well, that actually gets you pretty toasty).
emily20008 at 9:11PM on 10/30/07
i wandered into a jamba juice on a cold day last week and got jumped by the staff, who were bored senseless. never have i had such excellent service!
cybercita at 9:55PM on 10/30/07
When I lived in Alaska, we ate ice cream all the time. I think when the days got short in the winter, people automatically went into "comfort food" mode, and what is more comforting than ice cream? I actually heard Alaskans eat more ice cream than people from any other state. Anybody know if that is true?
erinlovestoeat at 10:03PM on 10/30/07
Under ideal conditions, I don't crave cold food. It's got to be 302 in the shade before I really "crave" a salad or even ice cream.
therealchiffonade at 6:02AM on 10/31/07
wow! i found your blog a while ago, but never commented until now...because i too grew up near Bubbling Brook (Norwood) and am waxing nostalgic for it as i write, recalling all the many times my mom would "treat" me and my 3 brothers to a giant cone there if we (pick one): stopped fighting, cleaned up our rooms, stopped fighting, stayed "out of her hair" for more than 5 consecutive minutes, stopped fighting.
My mom got sick and died from pancreatic cancer 4 years ago at the age of 61. During her last fall, while she was still feeling ok, her biggest request to me was to take hre to Bubbling Brook--she'd get fried clams and a peppermint stick ice cream cone, i'd get a soft vanilla with chocolate hard shell, and we'd sit in the waning late september light on the picnic tables outside remembering all the times we'd been there before and savoring the moment we had now. I am always sad when I drive by and it as closed, but seeing it in the spring, opening with lines of little kids hopping up and down impatiently...some thing are worth waiting for.
thanks for posting about such a great place and stirring up some lovely memories for me.
namaste,
amy
kdjmom3 at 7:08AM on 10/31/07
I run an after school program and we just recently acquired an ice cream machine (nothing fancy) through donation, for our cooking club. The odds of my impatient kids waiting until spring for ice cream is unthinkable. I just about jumped out of my skin when I saw it, too, knowing that The Perfect Scoop was recently out and talked about.
Long story short, we will be making ice cream this winter. And maybe I'll turn my KFC loving kids into little gourmets.
Three cheers for ice cream in the cold!
StarryRose at 9:39AM on 10/31/07
I remember leaving a Baskin & Robins one Sunday evening around 7:30 or so, when the temperature was below zero (Fahrenheit) and the wind was blowing, carrying my Jamocha Almond Fudge and Pralines and Cream cone and happily realizing that it wasn't melting all over the cone. Preserves the proper texture!
lemons at 10:19AM on 10/31/07
There is no need to make the case for ice cream. The ice cream experience is not about hot or cold, it is about happiness and deliciousness. You can have those any time of the year.
feep at 10:34AM on 10/31/07
Driving down Rt. 1 in Wells, Maine this weekend we noticed that the world was a darker, sadder place for the next few months: Big Daddy's Ice Cream was closed for the season.
Deb07 at 10:43AM on 10/31/07
One of my favourite Christmas treats is Candy Cane Crackle Ice Cream. A Canadian manufacturer-President's Choice-makes it. I was thrilled to see it in the freezer at the store the other day-I know it's not even Halloween yet, but oh my, is that stuff good!
psychsarah at 12:51PM on 10/31/07
President's Choice makes some interesting stuff. For a while, we had it here in St. Louis at a now-defunct supermarket chain. When we went to Stratford and Niagara-On-The-Lake, I had a great time in the markets looking at what they are doing now.
lemons at 10:20PM on 10/31/07
I used to work for a printing company that produces the cartons that Edys/Dryers and Haagen Daz are packed into. I had an interesting discussion with the Salesman on one of the accounts regarding the upswing in production that we always had in the autumn. He said that they sell substantially more ice cream in the Winter than they do in the summer.
Maybe it is because the stores close up?
vox8ight at 3:31PM on 11/02/07
That's what I've read too, that more ice cream is sold (in the US) in winter by far than in summer. Funny...
june2 at 1:16AM on 12/05/07