Over the course of the last several weeks I had the arduous and painstaking task of sampling dozens of ice cream flavors from all of the ice cream makers in our locale. Fortunately I emerged from these trials unscathed and with a new product to hit the shelves next week.
The thing about ice cream is that most creameries purchase an "ice cream base" from a large-scale industrial operation. These bases are composed of dehydrated milk powder (coming from bad dairy farms), all sorts of preservatives, chemicals, and artificial sweeteners. They then mix this base with their own flavorings. There are not very many creameries that make their own base (it requires a hard to get USDA certification), let alone very many creameries that use local, seasonal fruit and pastured dairy. There are a couple in our area that fit the bill, but one stood out: Owowcow Creamery. After experiencing the hospitality that I was shown there, learning about their philosophy, and tasting all of the flavors, I realized that this was the ice cream that I wanted to offer. They source their milk and cream directly from Painterland Farm, a local organic dairy farm owned and run by two sisters. The cows graze on open pasture. Most of the other ingredients are local. And those that are not, like the vanilla and chocolate, are coming from good sources. The decision was pretty easy, honestly, and I'm grateful for a friend who recommended them to me.
Anyway I'll be carrying 10 flavors in pints and 2 of their ice cream pops. I'm not getting them this week. They'll arrive next week. But I was just too excited to wait till then to tell you. They'll only be available at Huntingdon Valley. Elkins Park folks: it's worth the drive. I do hope that the self sacrifices that I made to fill my belly with copious amounts of ice cream over the course of the past couple weeks prove to be worthy.