Dill and mustard seed salmon, chicken pot pie, Cheater’s Posole, and almond macaroons.
Not exactly barbecue central, Minnesota still boasts a solid number of local, high-quality barbecue sauces. Good news, because nothing ruins a night of grilling faster than the crummy, glorified ketchup of most mass-marketed sauces (a notable exception being Sweet Baby Ray’s). A trip to Linden Hills Co-op and Lunds turned up the following five sauces, all locally produced.
Demon Pig ($6 for 13 oz.) – Made in Breezy Point, MN, the mild version won second place in the National Barbecue Association’s 2009 competition in the “Tomato Mild” category. This sauce, much sweeter and with a strong vinegar taste, wasn’t peppery and was chock full of tiny onion and green pepper chunks. This sauce would be great on poultry or pork and, with Wee Willy’s, was the best among the five.
Ken Davis ($2.19 for 17 oz.) – A stalwart from a former Minneapolis jazzman and restauranteur, St. Louis Park-based Ken Davis doesn’t try too hard but does the trick. It smells like a charcoal fire and has no extremes — mild taste and spice. This sauce would be great in small quantities with ribs or slathered on a chicken sandwich. It’s a very solid, everyday sauce you won’t get tired of, and at $2.19 a jar, a real value. In this company, though, it’s overshadowed. But for one-third the price, what the heck. Keep a jar in the pantry.
Down Under Blackberry Chipotle (Price varied, $3.99-$5.39 for 16 oz.) – From South Minneapolis, this dark, thick sauce hits you hard with a deep yet not too spicy heat. Perfect for beef, but pork or poultry probably wouldn’t work. This sauce is ketchup-based with no vinegar and would be better with less pepper and / or chili powder. In fairness, it’s not really straight-up barbecue sauce but more of a niche meat sauce, so don’t buy this expecting anything resembling traditional barbecue sauce. Yet for a special twist, say with little smokies or for dipping, this sauce is definitely worth a try. It won first place at the 2009 Big Island BBQ competition in Albert Lea.
Triple Crown ($4.29 for 14 oz.) – A three-time winner at the Minnesota State Fair, Triple Crown from Frederic, WI, smells like beef jerky and is slightly sweet and smoky. It won’t overpower the meat, yet contains anchovy, which could be the ingredient behind the unique tang / meat flavor. This sauce is intensely rich and will add a subtle sophistication to anything. A very solid sauce.
Wee Willy’s ($4.29 for 18 oz.) – From Afton, this sauce screams “tang.” A legitimate aftertaste sticks to the back of your throat. This thinner, salty sauce had the best balance of flavors: vinegar, sugar, smoke. Bite after bite, the flavors seemed to expand. Put this sauce on a chicken breast and you’ll forget how dry the meat is. With Demon Pig, the Jack Daniel’s World Championship-winning Wee Willy’s will be a permanent and versatile addition to the fridge. On pork roast, it’s stellar.
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Last month, the Heavy Table proclaimed the best vanilla ice cream around. But not everyone leaves the ice cream parlor with a scoop of plain vanilla. How about chocolate? It can range from bitter to sweet, mild to rich, and pure to complex.
We found all of those qualities and more when we conducted a blind taste test on chocolate ice cream. We assembled the same five panelists, two administrators, and seven ice cream brands from the vanilla test. And, as with the last test, we cleansed our palates with lemon water and tasted in silence.
We sampled the most basic chocolate flavor from six local establishments and one grocery store brand that’s locally made too. The four criteria were identical to the vanilla test — intensity of flavor, balance of sweetness, mouthfeel, and aftertaste — rated on a scale from 0 (inedible) to 4 (perfection) for a possible score of 16.
Did the vanilla winner reign supreme here too, or did a different parlor come out on top? Here they are, from worst to best.
Crema Cafe
Bittersweet Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 1.0 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.0 |
| Mouthfeel | 1.5 |
| Aftertaste | 1.1 |
| Total | 4.6 |
Interestingly, the bottom three from the vanilla taste test were also the bottom three here, albeit in a different order. For this ice cream, everyone found the flavor off-putting. One panelist called the flavor “unpleasant and too strong”; another noted it was bitter “but not in a good way,” and two others cited a lack of any chocolate flavor, saying “it tastes like it has been mixed with other flavors.” Two noticed an icy mouthfeel and an unpleasant aftertaste, while one found the aftertaste nicely sweet.
Pumphouse Creamery
Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 1.4 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.5 |
| Mouthfeel | 1.4 |
| Aftertaste | 1.7 |
| Total | 6.0 |
This ice cream was quite different from the others (for example, it was the only one to contain bits of chocolate) and was, according to one panelist, “the hardest to rate, the hardest to get a handle on.” Many complained that it lacked intensity and was neither sweet nor chocolatey enough. Three panelists observed its “chewiness.” Some praised the aftertaste, calling it “pretty good” with a “nice chocolate oomph.”
Kemps Ice Cream
Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 1.8 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.4 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.4 |
| Aftertaste | 1.7 |
| Total | 7.3 |
Panelists applauded the “good” and “very creamy” mouthfeel, though one thought it could be even creamier. But everyone disliked the intense sweetness, which “overpowered the chocolate flavor” and led into an intense aftertaste with hints of nutmeg and “more of the bad sweetness.”
Grand Ole Creamery
Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 1.5 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.2 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.2 |
| Aftertaste | 1.7 |
| Total | 7.6 |
This ice cream was in the middle of the pack, and it was also middle-of-the-road in many ways. For one, the flavor was mild, and it was “very hard to taste any of the chocolate flavor,” explained one panelist. “If I close my eyes, this could be vanilla.” Another mentioned, “I’m not tasting much of anything very strongly: not too sweet, not cocoa-ey, mild aftertaste. I’d like this to be bolder in some way.” Two panelists also noted a crystalline mouthfeel. On the positive side, panelists liked the ice cream’s “light sweetness” that was reminiscent of a malt.
Edina Creamery
Continue reading Chocolate Ice Cream: A Local Taste Test »
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A funny thing happens when you tell dairy eaters you’re allergic* to milk. They nod their heads politely and return to swizzling their cocktails and then, after about a two-minute pause, they say, in a horror-filled stage whisper:
“That means you can’t eat ice cream!?!”
Yes, it’s a sad truth. And while many of us may never have acquired the taste for the stuff, we might hypothetically have a deep, leftover envy of other kids’ ice cream cones — a longing, if not for frozen cow milk, for something frozen, creamy, and decadent.
Sorbets can be truly exquisite — sometimes even revelatory in their ability to capture the best parts of a fruit’s flavor — but they will never be ice cream.
Oh, quit your whining, you say: Today, even the most conventional grocery store carries at least one non-dairy frozen dessert and the local co-op has a large selection, variously made from rice, coconut, or soy milk.
Lucky us! Maybe.
In keeping with “Vanilla Ice Cream: A Local Taste Test,” the Heavy Table decided to apply the same technique — blind tasting, five panelists, water between servings — to non-dairy ice cream. We had hoped to include all local brands, but there is only one: Izzy’s ($6 a pint). (Talk about an under-served market! I have seen statistics saying that one in five people are allergic to milk to some degree.)
Izzy’s happened to be serving chocolate, so we looked for seven store-bought non-dairy chocolates; the offering is a little uneven, so we had to fudge it — an almond here, a sliver of dark chocolate there.
The panelists were a mix of dairy and non-dairy, the idea being that ice cream should simply taste good, not as an alternative but as a food in its own right. We rated the non-dairy ice creams on four criteria — intensity of flavor, balance of sweetness, mouthfeel, and aftertaste — on a scale from 0 (inedible) to 4 (perfection) for a possible score of 16.
Purely Decadent Made with Coconut
Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 2.3 |
| Balance of sweetness | 3.1 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.2 |
| Aftertaste | 1.6 |
| Total | 9.2 |
This ice cream had an almost perfect balance of sweetness, and most of us found its initial coconut and bittersweet chocolate flavor pleasing. However, it toppled in the aftertaste category, where many people remarked that it had chemical or burnt nut flavor. In mouthfeel, one judge wrote in that it reminded her of Baskin-Robbins — and not in a good way.
Tofutti
Chocolate Supreme
| Intensity of flavor | 1.6 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.2 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.2 |
| Aftertaste | 2.5 |
| Total | 8.5 |
Tofutti was one of, if not the first soy ice creams, so it is probably the most recognizable and easy to find.** Yet, tasting results were solidly middle-of-the-road, with most people agreeing that it was one of the creamier options but that it simply wasn’t very tasty. One judge wrote that it reminded them of “cocoa powder — Hershey’s, not the Godiva you put in brownies for people you like.”
Rice Dream
Cocoa Marble Fudge
| Intensity of flavor | 0.5 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.2 |
| Mouthfeel | 1.1 |
| Aftertaste | 0.3 |
| Total | 3.1 |
Yipes! The numbers say it all, but just in case, here are a few of the exclamatory remarks: “I don’t like any of it; it’s just gross!” “It tastes like Play Doh, salty – not even cocoa!” “I don’t want anymore, and I f***ing love ice cream!”
Larry & Luna’s Coconut Bliss
Chocolate Hazelnut Fudge
| Intensity of flavor | 2.6 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.8 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.3 |
| Aftertaste | 1.6 |
| Total | 9.3 |
The tasters were a bit divided on this one. One judge gave it an almost perfect score across the board, noting that it had a rich chocolate flavor and that the hazelnuts were pleasantly crunchy. Others knocked it down for an oddly metallic aftertaste.
It’s Soy Delicious
Chocolate Almond
| Intensity of flavor | 0.7 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2 |
| Mouthfeel | 0.5 |
| Aftertaste | 0.1 |
| Total | 3.3 |
On a high note, the fact that it is fruit-juice sweetened might have contributed to this ice cream’s good balance of sweetness. On a low, comments ranged from “watery,” to “the worst!,” to “into the spit bucket!”
Good Karma Organic Rice Divine
Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge
| Intensity of flavor | 3 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.25 |
| Mouthfeel | 3 |
| Aftertaste | 3 |
| Total | 10.25 |
Okay, so this one ought not to have been included in the lot because it’s technically not chocolate and, in fact, one judge refused to rate it because peanut butter hides just about everything. However, given the way things were going, the rest of us thought it should be included because it was so darn tasty. Most notable: its ultra-smooth and creamy mouthfeel, a rarity among rice-based frozen desserts.
Izzy’s
Chocolate
| Intensity of flavor | 0.9 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.1 |
| Mouthfeel | 3.5 |
| Aftertaste | 1 |
| Total | 6.5 |
This one caused the loudest outcry when the blinds were removed. Although it has a gorgeous, creamy mouthfeel, the judges found it almost entirely without flavor. Comments ranged from, “Is this chocolate?” to “tastes like day-old coffee,” and “a real nose wrinkler.”
Purely Decadent
Chocolate Obsession
| Intensity of flavor | 3.5 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.1 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.7 |
| Aftertaste | 3.3 |
| Total | 11.6 |
This ice cream rated nearly perfect on flavor, with judges noting its overall fudginess and the nice addition of shaved dark chocolate. It did get dinged for being too sweet, but even the most die-hard dairy eater among us wrote, “This is good chocolate! I would buy this.”
Overall, these results are not wildly successful. If what you want is something sweet and cold to eat, something to keep you from feeling left out at the ice cream social, you’re all set. If, on the other hand, you want something pilgrimage-worthy, something so delicious you feel compelled to eat the whole pint and apologize later, your options are depressingly limited.
We do hold out hope in Izzy’s, where some of us have been known to Hoover a peanut butter soy ice cream cone in record time and great delight — a childhood fantasy finally realized.
*By allergic, we mean swollen eyes, itchy welts, and flu symptoms — not the relatively harmless yet annoying symptoms, such as windiness, associated with lactose intolerance.
**Although not appropriate for this review, mini Tofutti Cuties are universally beloved and this author’s favorite non-dairy treat.
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Forget, for a moment, the calories, fat, and sugar. Sometimes all that matters is indulging your senses. And on warm summer evenings, Minnesotans flock to their local ice cream parlors for a taste bud-thrilling scoop of the old standby cookies and cream, the trendy salted caramel, or the daring durian. But for many ice cream lovers, the best way to gauge a parlor’s skill is to sample its purest flavor: vanilla.
In search of the best vanilla, the Heavy Table conducted a blind taste test on seven vanilla ice creams. Tasting the ice cream were five very willing panelists, assisted by two administrators who ensured a complete blind tasting. To further enforce impartiality, we conducted the test in silence and sipped lemon water between tastings.
We sampled the most basic vanilla flavor from six local establishments, plus one from the grocery store for good measure. We rated them on four criteria — intensity of flavor, balance of sweetness, mouthfeel, and aftertaste – on a scale from 0 (inedible) to 4 (perfection) for a possible score of 16.
Here’s how they stacked up, from worst to best.
Vanilla
| Intensity of flavor | 1.1 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.5 |
| Mouthfeel | 1.3 |
| Aftertaste | 0.7 |
| Total | 4.6 |
Completely different in taste from the other vanillas, this ice cream was too odd for most panelists’ palates, and many thought it yielded an especially off-putting flavor and strange aftertaste. One panelist commented that the ice cream tasted like butter and was “inedible. I love ice cream but I don’t want to eat this at all.” On the plus side, the ice cream received some adequate marks on the balance of sweetness and mouthfeel.
Crema Cafe
Vanilla Bean
| Intensity of flavor | 2.1 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.5 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.5 |
| Aftertaste | 1.7 |
| Total | 8.8 |
While one panelist commented that this vanilla’s flavor was “super good,” the others noted mostly negatives. Two observed an unpleasant icy mouthfeel and a chemical-like aftertaste. They said it lacked creaminess and “coated the mouth in a strange way.” Two other panelists mentioned an absence of sweetness: “It’s not sweet at all, actually. I’m surprised. Could be a bit sweeter.”
Vanilla
| Intensity of flavor | 2.1 |
| Balance of sweetness | 1.9 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.5 |
| Aftertaste | 2.4 |
| Total | 8.9 |
Scores were mixed for the store brand vanilla – three rated it low, labeling it “too sweet, a bit artificial, and too mild” and “not too creamy with a muddled flavor that gets washed out.” Meanwhile, two panelists praised the “good balance of vanilla and sugar” and called it a good, though typical, choice.
Vanilla
| Intensity of flavor | 2.2 |
| Balance of sweetness | 2.4 |
| Mouthfeel | 2.1 |
| Aftertaste | 2.5 |
| Total | 9.2 |
This vanilla also brought mixed reactions. Some panelists complained of an icy, slightly crystalline mouthfeel, while others encountered no iciness and found the texture acceptable, even pleasant. One panelist praised the balance of sweetness as “not too sweet, not too bland.” Everyone noticed the too-bold, honey-like flavor that one panelist said “stands out too much.” The panelists agreed that the aftertaste was better than the initial flavor, with the vanilla coming through after the sweetness subsided.
Sebastian Joe’s
Continue reading Vanilla Ice Cream: A Local Taste Test »
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