Ice & Vice (www.iceandvice.com/), an experimental ice cream pop-up shop based in Brooklyn (and a 2014 Vendy winner) , is all about handcrafted ice cream, sorbet and frozen yogurt made in small, customized batches. Chef Paul Kim, one of the founders, is a savory chef who has worked in the food industry for a number of years. He was trained at Le Cordon Bleu. Ken Lo, on the other hand, works in finance and was never formally trained. Both attended the Ice Cream Short Course at Penn State, and are huge food lovers.
The result is edgy, out of the box flavors like toasted milk ice cream swirled with sea salt chocolate ganache, nilgiri tea ice cream swirled with lemon charcoal caramel, green apple buttermilk, white chocolate, and shiso leaf, and Vietnamese coffee ice cream with doughnut truffle (go here for more: http://iceandvice.com/flavors/).
Their inspiration for distinctive pairings comes from a number of things -- an ingredient, a life experience, or a concept. “When we get inspired by an experience or concept, we try to capture that through flavor and imagine what it would taste like. For example, we may be inspired by a trip to Costa Rica, or heartbreak. It usually draws us to an ingredient, and we build a flavor organically from there,” explained Ken.
Playing with ingredients and flavors is pretty much the modus operandi of their business. “We play with ingredients and flavors a lot,” said Ken. “We tend to get bored with our flavors, so we like to experiment. We think that helps in terms of developing a fresh perspective.
Flavors change regularly. The two say usually come up with new flavors once or twice a month and actually have a list of flavors that are on a waiting list to be created.
And there are more plans in the works: The company’s first brick and mortar, which is slated to open early this summer on New York’s Lower East Side (check social media for announcements) along with constant surprises on where the next pop-up will be.
For more chef interviews, ice cream trends and flavor innovation CLICK HERE to subscribe to the weekly in-sight newsletter!