Ice cream flavors for June include a Dill Pickle sorbet, Plus Avocado and cardamom with fermented carrot custard ice cream, a collaboration with the California Avocado Commission and Sqirl chef-owner Jessica Koslow.
Also Fish Sauce Carmel with ribbons of fish sauce caramel that are mixed in the brown sugar custard–based ice cream, which also has palm sugar. At all LA locations.
Salt & Straw, 240 N. Larchmont Blvd., Larchmont; (323) 466-0485;
1357 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice; (310) 310-8429;
and 12180½ Ventura Blvd., Studio City; (818) 358-2890, saltandstraw.com.
I tried the sourdough chocolate strawberry flavor and it really tasted like sourdough. The consistency was still good but not something I’d enjoy a whole scoop of.
The fish sauce caramel really sounded interesting but I don’t think my brain can wrap its head around this flavor combination.
Honestly, I’m all for creativity, but I feel like some of these artisan ice cream shoppes are just making odd flavors for the sake of making odd flavors.
How about just making some really good basic flavors like vanilla (with quality Mexican beans), or pistachio (using nuts from Aegina) or chocolate (made from white criollo cacao beans).
It’s not like Salt and Straw doesn’t already do that. I never try their odd flavors. That said, fish sauce caramel is not that odd, you see that in some modern vietnamese places these days, I’d like to try that one.
The Salt & Straw vanilla uses Madagascar beans, which is generally a poor choice for pure vanilla ice cream since it’s too assertive; better to make extract out if it and reserve it for baking (like chocolate chip cookies, pound cake, and what-not).
Mexican beans are more suitable because while their vanilla flavor is less intense, it is still pronounced, and offers that nice mixture of sweet and slightly spicy vanilla flavor that provides a nice counterbalance to ice cream base. But while a better choice, Mexican beans are also more pricey.
… or peach using peaches personally picked by the dessertmaker him/herself?!
Leo Bulgarini is so ‘Type A’ about his gelato ingredients, he is now asking his peach grower if he can harvest the damn fruit off the tree himself (simply 'cuz he didn’t like the way the picker treated his last batch of fruit). That, my friends, is dedication to perfection…
Tried the Fish Sauce Carmel and surprisingly it was not a strong tasting flavor in fact it was underwhelming. The surprise winner for me was the sourdough, nice flavor and you can really taste the sourdough!
From what I understand about S&S (and I’ve only actually been once, to the NW 23rd St. Portland location, but I’ve heard an interview with Tyler Malek the founder), they’re very much into collaboration with other local businesses and offbeat combinations - it’s a pretty big part of their business model. But I’m with you - for me it doesn’t get much better than just an amazing, vanilla ice cream or something like that - simple but perfect.
agreed. I had no desire to try any of these flavors when I was there a week ago:
I’d much rather have a theme like nuts or summer berries or breakfast cereal or … And speaking of being there a week ago, I’m a little confused about these being the featured flavors for June when they were already available on May 27th. Maybe it’s a fiscal month.
Has anybody tried the Jeni’s Ndali Vanilla? They just started carrying pints again at Whole Foods for $9.99. Not familiar with Ndali but from their website they tout small batch and fair trade from Central America.
I thought it was decent, although I would take BLVD vanilla custard over it from the Whole Foods offerings. Bear in mind, I really prefer French vanilla over vanilla.
Went and tried samples of the June flavors last night. Was pleasantly surprised! That said, I don’t want any of them as full scoop… A lesson learned by First Lady Mochi as she sacrificed the majority of her avocado scoop to the gods without half of it even being gone.
Dill Pickle Sorbet - Very sweet but refreshing.
Fish Sauce Caramel - Funky and savory and pretty dang good. Maybe my favorite taster. Really liked the crunch of the palm sugar.
Avocado & Cardamom with Carrot Custard - Fine. Smooth and interesting but as mentioned above, perhaps not one for a full scoop.
Sourdough with Chocolate & Strawberries - As others have mentioned, the sourdough flavor is definitely sourdough! Almost felt like I was tasting the mother dough…
Cacao Nibs & Red Miso - A bizarre ice cream, but I enjoyed the small spoonful that I tasted.
All of those flavors sound like the perfect mignardises, served in a whiskey shot glass accompanied with a demitasse of espresso or Kahlúa, for a do-it-yourself affogato.