There are so many great ice cream options in Park Slope in the summer. From Uncle Louie G’s and ice cream trucks to Van Leeuwen designer ice cream with vegan options. There are interesting flavors and slightly different textures as Bklyn Cream and Teo’s Ice Cream Shop. We had a really good strawberry jam scoop at Teo’s and I usually don’t like strawberry ice cream. I liked that the Teo flavors were all pretty mild.
Oddly, they still have Baskin-Robbins and Häagen-Dazs which I don’t understand… I prefer places with a local origin. Then, you can always venture to nearby neighborhoods for Blue Marble, Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory, and Ample Hills (now on Prospect Park West)…Blue Marble is the best place to visit in Prospect Heights for not only great, organic ice cream, but also great people watching and hanging out.
For really fun flavors, you have to try L’Albero Dei Gelati on 5th Av. Yesterday they had yellow pepper flavor and a common favorite is the basil gelato. L’Albero Dei Gelati, or “the gelato place” as all the locals call it, probably has the richest flavors of all, but it still isn’t my favorite.
My favorite is and always will be Culture on 5th Ave. I know it is technically frozen yogurt, but on my first date with my husband I told him to meet me for ice cream.. that was really frozen yogurt. So froyo will always be ice cream to me.
What makes Culture so special? It isn’t just the refreshing sour flavor mixed with the sweet that I love (original is the best), but the way I feel afterward. With most ice cream, I feel the sugar rushing through my veins and then the crash coming on fast and furious. I never get this with Culture. I feel good after. In fact, if I’m having any stomach issues, Culture can sometimes cure them. The live probiotic cultures in their batches really do work for me, better than store-bought yogurt or probiotic pills… and, like I said before, it is ice cream! Ice cream and medicine in one.