Proper Pie Co. in Richmond, VA

Buttermilk raspberry.

New Zealand-style hand pies are a thing. I had no idea that they were until my brother introduced me to Proper Pie Co. several years ago. As a lover of pie both savory and sweet, of course this was a slam dunk for me. Now every time I visit Richmond we make a stop at Proper Pie, grabbing some hand pies for lunch and choosing from an even wider selection of dessert pie slices for dessert. You can't lose at Proper Pie, but here are my favorites: 

Buttermilk Raspberry - The buttermilk doesn't need anything added to it, but I love raspberry, so no harm done. For the uninitiated, a buttermilk pie is texturally somewhere between a chess pie and a custard pie: solid, but soft. It's super rich, so something tart cutting through works the magic.

Chocolate Raspberry Cream - Chocolate and raspberry are typically two separate, complementary flavors, but in this pie it is a single flavor. The union is, in a word, sublime. The cream pie is topped with a white whipped cream with sifted cocoa powder and a few raspberries giving it a straight-out-of-Great-British-Bake-Off look to it. It goes without saying that this pie would earn a handshake from me. 

Honorable mentions: Peaches & Cream and Sweet Potato Pecan...but let's be honest and say it's all good.

Furniture City Creamery in Grand Rapids, MI

Since the pandemic, I have thrice made the journey from Chicago to Grand Rapids for ArtPrize. An annual autumnal visual arts competition featuring entries from around the world, ArtPrize is an impressive spectacle to behold. It takes over central Grand Rapids with competing art displayed in galleries, hotel lobbies, restaurants, bars, vintage stores, knick-knack shops, museums, parks, and more. They print maps of all of the participating venues so people can choose which part of town to stroll around hunting for art.

ArtPrize is one of my favorite things.

Happily, these trips also allow my wife and I to visit with our friend Annelise who lives close to downtown Grand Rapids in the East Hills neighborhood. As luck would have it, this is the same neighborhood as Furniture City Creamery. (To an outsider, it may seem like an odd name for a scoop shop, but pre-Depression-era Grand Rapids was the center of the furniture industry.)

Furniture City Creamery has a solid mix of classic flavors and inventive flavors. Here are three of the most memorable ice creams I've had there:

• Treasure Bar - Sweet cream base with toasted coconut, chocolate, butterscotch, and graham cracker. Pure bliss.
• D'ough - In their take on cookie dough ice cream, the ice cream doesn't merely contain cookie dough...it tastes like cookie dough! The flavor is a collaboration with a local bakery.
• Hot Honey Cornbread - A spicy after burn accompanies this ice cream rippled with corn bread. It is good, I'm glad I tried it, and it is also not my thing. The spicy desserts I gravitate toward are usual Mexican chocolate.

At this creamery, one is bound to find something to tantalize the tastebuds. Grab a scoop while roaming East Hills during ArtPrize!

Here are some of my favorite ArtPrize entries over the years.

2021. Ted Lott, Nomadic Domiciles

2022. Deanna Taylor, Nature's Beauty

2021. Artist and title unknown. My apologies.

2024. Edgar Hernandez, Neon Oasis

Chill in Akron, OH

It is pretty rare to order five flavors of genuinely unique ice cream concoctions. My dad and I did just that at Chill in Akron, Ohio. Located right across the street from Lock 3 ("Akron's Central Park"), Chill is a no-frills spot with at least one option of where to walk and enjoy your scoop. Or grab a cone before an Akron RubberDucks game at nearby Canal Park. Really, if you DEVOte any time to Akron, be sure to hit Chill. Who knows? Maybe you'll run into the Black Keys!

Onto the ice cream...

My dad got Grandma J's Peanut Butter Rice Krispies and Lavender Queen Bee. I got Buttered Popcorn, Dr. Pepper Float (Dr. Pepper sorbet swirled with vanilla ice cream), and Call Me Any Lime (Honey and lime ice cream with a red raspberry swirl), a somewhat sickly colored flavor that was sublime. I wish Chill were closer because all five flavors we tried were delicious. In fact, each of the flavors would be worth getting again were there not so many tempting options to choose from. There were 30+ flavors, including:

• Peach, Please! (peach cheesecake)
• Hazelnut Latte
• Blackberry Crisp
• Sweet and Salty (dark chocolate with pretzels)
• The 9AM French Toast and Bacon (french toast ice cream with maple and bacon)
• Tiger Tail (orange ice cream and black licorice ice cream)
• El Nino Jalapeno (jalapeno corn bread)
• Extra Spicy Mango (mango ice cream steeped with habanero)

Chill also has two locations in nearby Medina. Check 'em out!