Filed under: Places to Eat | Tags: bellingham, dessert, ice cream, Pacific Northwest, Washington
I think Mallard’s ice cream in Bellingham, WA makes my top three all time favorite ice cream joints. It even beats Jeni’s in Columbus, OH. Last time I was here I ate a very memorable cardamom ice cream. I was disappointed to not see it on the flavor list this time, but that allowed me to branch outside my indian spices and try basil. It was sweeter than I expected, but it was perfect. I will have dreams about this ice cream. The chocolate earl grey wasn’t bad either. But, oh man, the basil.
One of my strong visceral memories from childhood is this homemade black cherry ice cream I ate at my babysitter’s house. I knew that there was something more special about this ice cream than even the delicious Breyer’s mint chocolate chip my dad brought home. I’ve longed for an ice cream maker for so long. Sometimes I go here and drool over the flavors that people are concocting. Recently, I escaped Chicago to kayak, swim, campfire, and catch fireflies in Michigan-a simple summer weekend that culminated in Julia’s grandmother’s recipe for vanilla ice cream. Topped with Michigan strawberries, it was simply divine.
The tour continued with ice cream at Sweet Action, where the flavor of the month was compost. I, however, am a traditionalist, so I stuck with garam masala.
Vita-Mix’s recipe for banana ice cream involves ingredients other than bananas (milk, sugar, ice), but I had read it could create banana ice cream out of nothing other than frozen bananas. The Vita-Mix rocked the smoothie test, but failed to replicate a food processor in the peach pie test. I discovered the Vita-Mix here, and tried my own ice cream at home. It worked and was delicious! That’s 2 to 1 for the Vita-Mix.
The only problem I had was my own. I wanted to melt chocolate to drizzle over the healthy and vegan ice cream but it acted difficult, as chocolate often does. By the time I remembered to put it in a water bath (at the exact moment Anna was yelling from Mexico City to get it in a water bath) it was too late, and I was left with little chocolate balls. Not ideal, but delicious nonethelesss.
