I'm not the biggest fan of ice cream. When I have a dessert I like it to have some heft, like cake or doughnuts. The SO, however, considers it one of the 3 major food groups, the others being pizza and watermelon. Thus on the SO's birthday, we found ourselves in Cole Valley, in the rain, heading for Ice Cream Bar, a new ice cream place (obviously) that opened just last year. Even for a cold rainy night, when we got there the place was rockin'. It's also very retro 50's old school with marble counter tops, spinning stools and a cool art deco design, a nice vibe I found pleasing.
But don't be fooled, this isn't just a cool ice cream parlor. A perusal of their menu will tell you they do old school food like grilled cheese and tuna melts and flavored sodas with acid phosphates--that's right they are making it real old school mixology. They've even upgraded some of the sodas to "remedies" which include alcohol for the 21 and over sweater set. On this night though we decided to keep it simple and go with the ice cream that is made on-site, everyday, using local organic cream, milk, eggs and evaporated cane sugar. They have many flavors to choose from that change on a daily basis.
I decided to just go full bore and get the Keller's Farm Sundae.
It's cornmeal biscotti, fromage blanc ice cream, sour cherry ice cream, raspberry sauce, rosemary sauce and black cherry topping. Wow, what can I say, I loved it. Yes I don't always pick ice cream for a dessert but this was spot on. The cornmeal biscotti was wonderfully different--crunchy, salty, crumbly (I could have eaten more of just them). The cherry ice cream was not too sweet with just a bit of pucker. The fromage blanc ice cream was by far the best. It was creamy, slightly salty sweet--which is a taste I enjoy. I'd never had this before but now it will be one of my favorites. The sauces were nicely thin and light and the hint of rosemary flavor added a nice surprise flavor without overwhelming both types of cherries. They were perfectly complimentary to each other. This was a hearty, tasty dish mixing a great balance of salty and sweet--what more could you ask for? Well, I did wonder why no whipped cream, as it is a sundae after all, but it's just as well since I snorted this dish up quickly with only minimal brain freeze.
Fortunately for everyone this place is only a block from an N-Judah stop, the first one out of the tunnel as it gets to Cole Valley so it's easy to pop on the MUNI and get there. I definitely look forward to going back as I saw them preparing the banana split and they were using a blow torch to caramelize the bananas--nice! I look forward to trying it and many other things on their menu come rain or shine.
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