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Photo: Courtesy of Gaelle Gilles
Ice cream, the traditional cold dessert that everyone can’t get enough of, particularly during the summer months. Manhattan is known for its refined eateries, ranging from restaurants, chocolate shops and delicate delights.
But its ice cream? Perhaps not as much.
Ice & Vice is hoping to change the icy dessert’s status in New Yorkers’ stomachs.
Located in the lower East Side at 221 East Broadway, Ice & Vice is co-owned by Paul Kim and Kendrick Lo. Ice & Vice has many various flavors that range from 9 a.m. (Vietnamese coffee with donut truffle) and Basic B (Mexican vanilla and black salt).
Despite its recent opening, at one point Ice & Vice had to temporarily close because it had sold all of its ice cream!
“We try to think out of the box with ice cream flavors, but people get turned off or scared by the crazy flavors,” said co-owner, Paul Kim.
Ice & Vice’s flavors are, indeed, unusual, but that does not detract from its delicious flavor.
Take for example Movie Night. It is a combination of buttered popcorn, toasted raisin and dark chocolate flakes. A nod to childhood memories.
House-favorite Milk Money is toasted milk embedded with sea salt chocolate.
“The trend is that people are trying to push the boundaries with ice cream flavors, but people are used to very safe flavors,” Kim said. “That is why we are trying to educate people and slowly get them used to these [extraordinary] flavors.”
Although some people are hesitant with trying these exotic flavors, many people who do experiment don’t only love Ice & Vice for creative flavors, but also for its quality.
Kim explained the special care taken its each flavor’s construction.
“With 9 AM, we don’t just throw in the coffee flavor with the donuts. We actually make a [donut] truffle with cream cheese butter and sugar mixture,” Kim said. “It is an extra step that is a bit labor-intensive and cost a bit more, but we want to perfect it to show people that we aren’t scared to challenge ourselves.”
(Photo: Courtesy of Gaelle Giles) Paul Kim, one of the owners of Ice & Vice
Not only are the ice cream flavors exotic, smooth and creamy, they range in density.
“We’re trying to make our brand into a super-premium brand, so that means it has a high butterfat content . . . we also don’t like putting air into our ice cream. For example, ice cream at a grocery store has 100 percent air, but we try to keep it low to 20 percent air, so the ice cream is creamy and dense,” Kim said.
Additionally, the shop uses milk from Pennsylvania-based creamery Trickling Springs Creamery. Trickling Springs produces hormone-free milk from grain-fed cows.
Aside from Ice & Vice’s high-quality offerings, the store is constantly looks to vary its menu’s offerings.
“We love switching up the menu, but we have our six staples: Milk Money, Shade, Tea Dance, Movie Night, American Beauty, and Three Little Pigs,” Kim said.
On a monthly basis, two flavors are rotated out of the menu to be replaced.
Ice & Vice will soon introduce soda floats, ice cream sandwiches and coffee with a scoop of ice cream. These additional options will be a collaboration between other vendors with whom Kim and Lo have previously vended at fairs.
The name “Ice & Vice” is a simple, catchy label, it embodies a dark masculinity that is represented in the store’s rustic atmosphere.
Kim and Lo choose New York City as their location to sell ice cream because they had “missed the experimental flavors found in San Francisco and Los Angeles [and] hopefully experimental ice cream won’t be a trend but accepted [in New York City].”
– by Gaelle Gilles and Nisha Stickles