Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Smitten Ice Cream + local food

Monday evening several dozen Bay Area foodies joined Savor Oakland for a special sneak peek of Smitten Ice Cream that just opened Tuesday on College Avenue in Rockridge.

Smitten is small, local chain of ice cream stores that started in San Francisco. One of the things that makes Smitten unique is that they make the ice cream on demand. That's right, they start with cream and other fresh ingredients, chill it with patented technology, and minutes later produce really fresh, creamy ice cream. I only got a chance to taste two of the six flavors, but the salted caramel ice cream was awesome, and the fresh mint chip (thanks, @eastbaydish!) was astoundingly fresh. And I generally don't even like mint ice creams that much. (If I've got to limit my frozen dairy intake, I'll generally go for chocolate, coffee, or combinations thereof.)

I suspect that the Smitten Ice Cream on College will do very, very well. While there is a Dreyer's Ice Cream Shop in the College Avenue side of Dreyer's headquarters a short distance away, they're not in the same league. Smitten has a limited number of flavors (maximum of 6; 5 fixed plus 1 seasonal flavor), but the ice cream that they make is super smooth and creamy, and extremely fresh-tasting since they make it on demand. And I think kids, foodies and others will enjoy the process: you order the ice cream, then watch as the ingredients are combined, not unlike watching a chef in a restaurant kitchen. And while Dreyer's may have started in Oakland, they're owned by mega-corp Nestle's now, and definitely don't feel local by any stretch.

Besides the sneak peek of Smitten Ice Cream, Carlo of Savor Oakland had also arranged for some tastes from other local food creators. We heard from The Cookie Department which makes great, "fully functional cookies", Chunky Pig, which makes (what I'm told is) a tasty bacon caramel corn, and Sugar Knife artisan sweets, which make great booze-flavored marshmellows.

More pictures from the event:

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