Ample Hills hot chocolate float

You already know how I feel about Ample Hills: I love it. But I just wanted to update you that I went here recently, and it was a really cold day, and I was like, "What do I do? Order to awesome peppermint pattie ice cream because it is awesome, or order a hot chocolate because it is cold outside?"

Answer: order both, combined in this hot chocolate float.



I don't understand why more places don't offer hot chocolate floats. The Chocolate Room does, and nearly every time I go there, I order a hot chocolate with a scope of fresh mint in it. This Ample Hills version is just as delightful. You can choose any flavor of ice cream for your float, so obviously I chose the peppermint pattie ice cream. It tasted like a scoop of mint ice cream absolutely smothered in about 12 ounces of hot fudge.

BOTTOM LINE: You should never have to choose between hot chocolate and cold chocolate.

Blue Marble

This evening I went to Blue Marble and got this:



It's chocolate ice cream with chocolate mint cookies inside it. I don't even know what to say. Every bite was pure bliss. The cookie-to-ice cream ratio and the mint-to-chocolate ratio were perfect. I was so focused on eating this ice cream that I nearly walked into a streetlamp.

BOTTOM LINE: Blue Marble knows what they are doing.

Devil's Food Chocolate Ice Cream at Blue Marble at the Barclay's Center

I was walking around the Barclay's Center for the first time, and I spotted a Blue Marble among the concession stands (shared with Junior's Cheesecake, a guilty pleasure of mine from which I was able to abstain for the evening).  I went back an hour later, after eating real food, to claim my prize -- devil's food chocolate ice cream.  But they were sold out!  I was despondent.  Sadly walking the Barclay's Center, feeling like a traitor to my beloved Knicks (even though i was there for college basketball rather than the Nets), without even ice cream to console me.

But after dejectedly doing a lap around the arena, I saw someone walking away from Blue Marble with chocolate ice cream!  An outrage!  I stormed up to the front.  Instantly recognizing me, they insufficiently apologetically informed me that more had been made/delivered just after I had left.  They did not know the pain they had caused.

They rang me up for my ice cream.  $8.75!  Another outrage!  But then it was served to me:

It was at least 8 scoops.  Maybe 12.  Thinking about it, $8.75 was a total bargain, on a per-scoop basis.

As for quality, well, you certainly won't find better at a sporting event.  And the quality seemed in line with their home store.  The downside is that Blue Marble is based in Brooklyn, which to me just obviously means that the ice cream is going to have too high of a cream-to-chocolate ratio for my highly unreasonable tastes.  But it's still great chocolate ice cream no matter how you look at it.

Bottom Line:  If you're at Barclay's, get three friends together and go in for one of these.  You'll have plenty of ice cream at a cheap price, and I doubt you'll find anything better at any sporting event any time soon.

Dark Chocolate and Sweet As Honey Ice Cream in a Chocolate Chip Cone at Ample Hills

My friend Kasey wants to become an ice cream maker.  To that end, she visited New York this weekend to check out a number of ice cream spots.  I met her at a place adored by Leila, Ample Hills.

Photo credit: Kasey

While Leila opted for Chocolate Milk and Cookies with Pumpkin Pie, I opted for Dark Chocolate with Sweet As Honey (sweet cream ice cream with bits of honeycomb in it).

So Leila divides ice cream into two categories.  So do I, but they are different ones.  Mine, though, betray my bias.  One category is the artisanal, Brooklyn kind, with a focus on top quality ingredients.  The other is the less pretentious kind, with an emphasis on the end product.

First, I should note that I prefer the latter kind.  The former often does get good quality chocolate.  I don't know what Ample Hills uses, but Van Leeuwen, for example, uses Michel Cluizel chocolate, which is excellent.  But this category also takes its cream very seriously, locally sourcing organic dairy farms or whatever you do when you take cream seriously.  This is not in and of itself bad, but it often lends to creamier, less chocolatey ice cream.

Second, Ample Hills is clearly in the first category of ice creams.  Everything about this place screams "Brooklyn."  I dare you to walk in and try to imagine for 5 seconds that you are in any other part of the world.  You will fail.  And you can't taste the ice cream without realizing the ingredients are quality.

Third, I think this is my favorite version of its type.  Kasey and I both agreed that it had the best texture of any ice cream we'd had in the city.  It was her favorite overall from her trip.  The taste was good, but I think their attempt at tackling so many flavors, as Leila points out, makes it difficult for them to master simple dark chocolate.  It's excellent, and it's far better than the chocolate milk and cookies or any other chocolate flavor they had, but it's still an ice cream lover's chocolate ice cream rather than a chocolate lover's chocolate ice cream.

Bottom Line:  If you are as much an ice cream lover as a chocolate lover, you probably will not find a better place than Ample Hills.

Ample Hills

Last month, I established the two primary schools of ice cream thought: the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory school, and the Ample Hills school.

I went to Ample Hills last week, so now I can show you exactly what I mean:

Here is what is in this cup: one scoop of pumpkin pie ice cream ("made with organic pumpkin and graham cracker crust"), and one scoop of chocolate milk and cookies ice cream ("chocolate milk ice cream with pieces of all-natural Back to Nature sandwich cream cookies").

Those are only two of the maybe 30 flavors that Ample Hills offers. The chocolate milk and cookies is delicious (since I love cookies), but it is not even the chocolatiest. The chocolatiest Ample Hills option is probably their dark chocolate ("rich dark chocolate ice cream, made with Valrhona cocoa powder and 72% E. Guittard chocolate"). They also have a Mexican hot chocolate-flavored ice cream that's fantastic, if you like a bit of a kick. Plus they have all sorts of amazing, complex flavors that are not strictly chocolate but that feature chocolate in some creative way.

BOTTOM LINE: Please go here, and try as many flavors as possible. I never, ever get bored of Ample Hills.