Milk Bar is a New York City legend. Whether their Cereal Milk soft serve, their pie (formerly known as "crack pie"), or their cake truffles, dessert there is a sweet-toothsome experience. But I have a confession: I've always *liked* Milk Bar, but haven't *loved* Milk Bar. Their sugar-forward approach may give the chic place an adult candy store feel, but to me it was always at the expense of depth of flavor. Until now.
I happened to be walking through the Whole Foods freezer aisle, just taking stock, when I saw that Milk Bar now has grocery store pints! I jumped on the opportunity to buy one of each flavor, praying that this NYC export wasn't the bitter disappointment of Serendipity's grocery store pints. The results of my scientific inquiry? Well, I liked them enough to blog about it, which is saying a lot these days.
From favorite to still-good-but-not-as-good, here are my thoughts:
Cereal Milk: Admittedly, when I eat cereal, I do not drink the milk remnants afterward. To me, it is concentrated sugar, like drinking soda from the machine is too many parts syrup. That said, when I had the Cereal Milk soft serve in New York, I was underwhelmed. It ends up all it needed was more milkfat. Simple and an instant classic, this pint has a subtler sweetness than its namesake, all with crunchy cornflakes mixed in to add some textural diversity. A wonderful flavor.
Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow: Are you even making ice cream in post-Ben & Jerry's America if you don't have a flavor boasting to have the most crazy chunks mixed in? This long flavor name doesn't even mention that the flavor base aims to taste like cookie dough, something I'm not sure it achieves. What is does taste like is toasted bliss, vaguely s'mores-like. The mix-ins--chocolate chips, more crunchy cornflakes, and the occasional patch of a marshmallow-like substance--only add to the flavor experience, making each bite a little different from the next.
Birthday Cake: In general, I find this flavor trend cloying and something colorful intended for kids, but Milk Bar made it right. Rich and flavorful, my only complaint is that the delicious frosting mix-in (usually the downfall of Birthday Cake ice creams) was in hunks rather than a ripple. This made some bites a bit much.
Pie: A somewhat bland name for an interesting flavor. The "deep vanilla" base has a hint of burnt sugar. With the "gooey butter filling" giving the ice cream a St. Louis "Gooey Butter Cake" effect, this flavor is almost too rich for me...he says still licking the spoon. Lastly, they have some oats mixed in to approximate pie crust, but for me oats just don't work as a mix-in. Sure, they maintain their texture, but they linger too long and end up dominating. Still, a good flavor.
