Searching by town name (since google maps search is significantly worse than MetaCarta was a decade ago¹) turned up another secret Waltham ice cream shop. Lizzy's is in downtown Waltham, right on Moody Street (there's another storefront in Harvard Square, according to their web page.) Since it's in a Very Urban spot, there is neither outdoor seating nor shop-specific parking - Google Automotive even popped up a novel "parking at your destination will be difficult" warning (turned out to not be a problem², but it emphasized how different this kind of spot is from my usual suppliers in the "Western Suburbs".)

The shop itself is long and narrow, with half a dozen four-seat tables towards the back and another half dozen two-seaters near the register. (Probably not a good coffee+laptop space, but The Common Good Co. is a "coffee and coworking space" a block away if that's what you're looking for.) The adjacent store front is also theirs, and has about twice as much seating - but it's a "party event" space, which is an interesting choice (on this random September evening it was clean and well-lit but empty, suggesting it was kept ready and actually gets reserved.)

Lizzy's mainly does "real" ice cream, but has yogurt, sorbet, sherbet (w/dairy), vegan, and no sugar added (Splenda™) options; they also have an "Adult" category that I haven't seen before, apparently flavored with Actual Booze? They also offer a broad range of toppings including Andes Mints and Brownie Bites - while straddling the cultural divide by having Chocolate Jimmies but Rainbow Sprinkles.

They also have a "5 Flavor Sampler" (what West Side Creamery calls a "flight") as well as Sundaes, Frappes (including Adult Frappes), Smoothies, and a full coffee bar including Chai Latte, Affogato, and Bailey's Affogato. (They also snuck a Raspberry Lime Rickey into the cold drinks section.)

First Visit

I got a large (which was generous even by Massachusetts standards.) The top half was Charles River Crunch - a more "honestly local" flavor than you might expect, they're only 1000ft from the south bank of the river - which was a Dark Chocolate with bits of Almond Toffee. Good crunch and an honestly dark chocolate - not over the top, but "definitely dark not milk" on first taste. (That suggests their "Chocolate Orgy" is worth a try, but as documented it might be the same base but with chocolate chunks instead of toffee; one might also argue that the name alone should put it on the "adult flavors" list, but no.)

The lower half was Mocha Chocolate Lace, which caught my attention because of some obscure history: one of my early exposures to Serious Ice Cream was Dr. Mike's in Bethel CT (I hadn't planned to include them on this site but their history page says that they sourced their ice cream from "a secret dairy in Massachusetts", so maybe they do qualify.) Dr. Mike's was specifically famous for ice cream with Chocolate Lace mixed in - as described at the time, a Russian concoction based originally on drizzling caramel and chocolate into snow.³ Sure enough, this flavor is a tasty Mocha (both the coffee and the chocolate parts come through, which might be easier with ice cream than with actual hot mocha) with bits of nostalgia, err I mean bits of Chocolate Lace, mixed in for a very sweet crunch (moderated by the dark chocolate coating.)

Other Items

They have a self-serve freezer in the front for pre-made ice cream cakes (mostly online orders) and pints/quarts/gallons, like Bedford Farms does. (The website mentions pastries, which I didn't get a picture of, but there was a pastry cabinet next to the register; if they get them fresh in the morning it's sensible that they were out by late in the day, I did arrive after dinnertime.)

The extra tables in the front seem to have ended up the de-facto "kids section" - probably because it's the only area in the shop with room for a stroller - but it also has a Connect-4 game which I've only seen before (although at much larger scale) at Kimball Farm. I guess after more than thirty ice cream shops even the really weird things start to repeat...

Finally, as a photographer I have to point out the ice cream "portraits" on the walls. They also have a cow statue - as far as I've been able to research, it is not part of the world famous Cow Parade but maybe this "[sculpt] me like one of your french girls" pose wouldn't fit, CowParade doesn't really have an Adult category...

I found Goodhile's while looking at things west of Wachusett Reservoir (if you look at the experimental map page you'll see that other than Ice Cream Cottage on the South Shore the reviews here come from a fairly specific box, and I wanted something a little "outside the box". Well, this place particularly caught my eye because it was the first ice cream place where the reviews primarily talk about how good their fried chicken¹ is...

Despite that, it is a conventional ice cream shop, with two windows under an overhang, a couple of tables, and multiple signs that specifically say "ice cream" - so it's definitely on the correct side of the line between "ice cream shop" and "restaurant or store that happens to have ice cream" but in a way that clarifies where that line actually is.

First Visit

While Goodhile's doesn't have any web presence of their own, the poster listening their extraordinary 24 flavors of soft serve has a url, for the manufacturer of the Wadden 24 Flavor System - instead of needing a machine per flavor, there's one machine and a mixer stage for flavors. One of the listed flavors was Butter Pecan, so the mixer apparently handles crunchy bits too. I was there fairly late and was only able to get the basic Vanilla soft serve, but the texture an creaminess was quite good; I'll definitely try and get the German Chocolate or Butter Pecan on a future visit. ( Update: Wadden has a detail page with a video of the system that shows how you dispense soft serve, add mixins and flavor, remix it, and re-dispense into a cone. Pretty clever, and also explains how you can have the mix-machine shut down for the night and still be able to serve a base vanilla soft serve...)

They do have a short list of hard ice cream flavors - but the Blake's brand went away in 2023 although Bliss Microcreamery picked up a few of the unusual ones. They also have Shakes and Sundaes, and a "Razzle" blizzard-equivalent.²

Also of note - they share a parking lot with Stewart's Chocolates and also share the proprietor's name: Stewart John Goodhile. (They're only open 10am-6pm but I expect to check them out when I next visit...)

There are two places called Dandi-Lyons, a couple of miles apart; today we're talking about "Dandi Lyons Ice Cream Flowers" (that's what the sign says which has amused me for years - the artwork even has a flower growing into the letters) on 28 in Reading. Plenty of parking and a dozen picnic benches, 3 ordering windows on one side and a delivery window around the corner, and traditional yellow flourescent lighting. (There's also a section of the building which might have once been the flower shop but seems clean but closed.) Still open until 9pm mid-September.

First Visit

Dandi-Lyons menu is mostly classics, though it does have some highlights (and an explainer list by one of the menus); "Crunch-a-saurus" - blue Vanilla with chocolate-covered rice krispies - is one of the more unusual sounding items. I went with Chocolate Overload and Totally Turtle.

Chocolate Overload was a rich dark chocolate "with stuff in it", including brownies. The ice cream itself had a legitimately dark-chocolate flavor to it and was quite creamy. It also has an entirely normal color, when not under yellow flourescent lighting; in future visits I will have to see if my phone can be convinced to do manual color balance, the automatics are doing it no favors here.

The "Totally Turtle" photographs much more appealingly under my car's white LED interior lighting - more importantly, it has a really nice butterscotch swirl as well as crunchy pecan and other mixins. The butterscotch is also available on their ice cream sundaes - they do soft-serve sundaes, and I'm not sure if that's unusual or if I've just missed it before, but it's an interesting novelty.

They also have frappes, "flurrie", slush, and "hard yogurt." They also specifically have Chocolate and Rainbow jimmies (I haven't been tracking carefully enough to measure where the Jimmies vs. Sprinkles battle lines are drawn, perhaps next year) and Crunch Coat, as well as three different flavors of dip cone - so for a future visit I will probably either try a dip cone or the crunch coat on something. For hard ice cream, I'll probably go back for Totally Turtle, though Heath Bar Crunch and Crunch-a-saurus also look interesting.

Holy Cow Ice Cream Café is literally the first thing off of the route 114 south exit from 128, in Peabody. It's a compact but efficient space, with four serving windows, and a surprising amount of parking¹ while also having a bunch of picnic tables. If you're at the Northshore Mall, you can get here using the underpass over by Nordstroms without having to get on 114 or 128 directly. (Seriously, skip dessert at the Cheesecake Factory and come here instead.)

Holy Cow opened in 2021 and by 2022 had won awards for some of their unique ice creams, "Rityz AF" (with Ritz Cracker Toffee and cracker bits mixed in) in particular; they "took that personally" and now only have a special flavor menu - and recommend snapping a picture of the flavor wall to read while on line.²

While Holy Cow is only a couple of years old, it preserves a marker stone³ for Chandler’s Ice Cream, which was open from 1934-2003 - closed by fire - and then from 2009-2013. DownRiver Ice Cream had a branch here in this location for a few years as well (DownRiver is still open in Essex.)⁴

First Visit

The menu is very broad, though not the longest list I've seen - they've definitely chosen to go with Interesting over Everything - and yet, they've still managed to include Chocolate, Vanilla, and Strawberry. I went with "Corner Piece" - crispy brownie corner pieces in a very rich chocolate ice cream - combined with "Boston Blackout" - black cocoa layer cake in a black cocoa ice cream. Boston Blackout was overwhelmingly chocolate - imagine a really nice chocolate swirl except that's actually the entire ice cream - which is "what it said on the tin"! It's a very "no we're not kidding" chocolate - in the Bring A Tent sense. Corner Piece is on the high end of "chocolate with stuff in it" flavors; Boston Blackout gives a serious challenge to Tosci's "Dark Chocolate No. 3".

I was there with a friend who enjoyed the "Pistachio Baklava" flavor; the crunch from the baklava itself was interesting, on top of having pistachio chunks in the ice cream. (See also The Creamery for their Baklava Sundae; I heartily endorse this trend of colliding baklava with ice cream.) My friend also pointed out that many of the flavors involved butter in some form; this place is on the upper end of the scale for really rich flavors.

For future visits I think I'll start with "Mintsanity" or "Brown Butter Cornbread", with "Cinnamon Churro Dough" and "Rocky Neck Road"⁶. You could also pick through the flavors that they've specificially gotten awards for, as marked on the menu: "Ritzy AF", "Eazy Peazy" (lemon curd+lemon bar), and "Jackpot" (butterscotch+biscotti.) For that matter, their Vanilla, Chocolate, and Strawberry all indicate NAICA award status, and it's good to see them taking the classics seriously.

Alternatively, they have an "Old Fashioned" Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich that apparently dominated a boston.com survey (2022-07-21, public) with 50% of the vote - the article points out that they also have (or had, in 2022) "the Smorewich, a riff on the classic campfire dessert".

Decoration

Usually I just mention that a place has picnic tables, and maybe include pictures if they overlook a farm with cows but Holy Cow has put some real effort into the setting. Since they're tucked into a corner of a busy intersection, having Jersey Barriers around the picnic area is just basic safety - but they've decorated them extensively in cow art in their blue and black theme colors as well. Also, they've covered the concrete slab with artificial turf, which as at least an attempt at getting the "countryside ice cream shop" feel even when you know route 128 is a block away.

They've also got something halfway between a mural and a climbing wall on two sides of the building; traffic cones repainted as splattered ice cream cones are straightforward, and the sculpted ice cream cookie sandwiches are absurdly large - if they were lower down they'd probably get used as seating.

(As a photographer, I also want to point out that it was convenient that the artwork was thorougly lit up - all of the art shots are from after sunset, if anything the shadows help show the 3d aspects of the sculptures.)

Pizzi Farm in Waltham turned up as a surprisingly nearby option, for a place I'd never heard of (or accidentally driven past) before. They're sort of a "near miss" from some major routes - they're about halfway between Trapelo and Totten Pond roads, and halfway between Wyman St/128 and Lexington St. If you're on the section of 128 south of 2 and you see that hillside encrusted with large shiny office buildings? They're half a mile behind those.

Just because I hadn't been there, doesn't mean they're unknown - possibly because they were still open late even though it's September, there were twenty people on line ahead of me at 8:30pm. I don't think any place I've written about has been that busy, short of a downtown Boston J.P. Licks after a game.

They had four windows open and were serving reasonably efficiently - I still had a 15m wait, under a minute per person, but that shouldn't scare you off. I went back the next afternoon and there was only a ten person line; according to their website this place does stay open all winter.¹

First Visit

They have a lengthy menu, including Campfire S'mores and Chocolate Raspberry Truffle. I went with Chocoholic and Graham Central Station on my return visit, but got distracted by their soft serve - I don't think I've ever seen Creamsicle soft serve before!

Unfortunately, if you look closely, that machine is already switched over to fall flavors - Maple and Pumpkin (presumably a Maple-Pumpkin Twist given how those are configured.) So I went with my classic, a vanilla soft-serve chocolate dip cone.

Yes, it's pretty drippy as-served but that's pretty standard for dip cones.

Second Visit

I don't usually go right back to a place, but poking around the map I discovered Prospect Hill Park was nearby and had some interesting looking hill-climbing trails, so it seemed like a good combination - a big serving of ice cream and then some exploration. (Fall foliage in New England is unevenly distributed, so it turned out to be a photographer's dream combination of Sunset and Autumn Leaves along some otherwise sparsely used trails.)

The Graham Central Station was great, I think it's a relatively new flavor but I'm happy to see it more places. The Chocoholic had a nice dark chocolate flavor to it, but was a little less creamy than I expected, at least to my Tosci's-attuned tastes.

They also have Sundaes, Ice Cream Sodas, Frappes, Smoothies, Raspberry Lime Ricky, and Slush; they also have something blizzard-like called (appropriately, and I assume non-trademarkedly) "The Nor'easter".

I think for my next visit it's a tossup between trying the Maple soft-serve and their Hardy Pond Mudd² flavor, though the Coffee Fudge and Strawberry Cheesecake also look tempting.

Kayleigh's Ice Cream is a brand new¹ ice cream shop on 129 in North Billerica². (There is also signage for "Hello! Tea" but that isn't currently a separate thing - it's just that Kayleigh's has fancy coffee drinks and bubble tea as well as ice cream.) Service is indoors; there are some inside tables, as well as a handful of outdoor picnic tables and a decent sized parking lot.

They didn't have a flavor menu for me to take pictures of - they just had two a pair of 8-bucket ice cream fridges, with the flavors written on the acyrlic cover in some sort of neon paint-pen, which was challenging to photograph. (They also had a pastry display.)

First Visit

I got Maple Walnut and Butter Pecan; the maple flavor came through more than most versions (most maple walnut is basically chocolate walnut, which is actually fine - but at Kayleigh's, the chocolate was good and the maple stood out, which was unusual.) The Butter Pecan was decent and had a nice texture too.

Next visit I'll probably try the "Billerica Rocky Road" (which is apparently snarky commentary on the local road quality) and possibly the "Best Chocolate You Never Have!!!".

Their website also credits Bliss Bros Dairy in Attleboro, MA as their upstream dairy source.

Two weeks after Labor Day and they are still staying open until 9pm - which was convenient for me, but they didn't have any other customers at 8:30pm so I wouldn't count on that persisting.

Sterling Ice Cream is on 62 just southeast of 190. It's a fairly large building but there's only really one or two ice cream windows; the other half of the overhang is for fried food and hotdogs, and the other half of the building is "Cafe Fresh Bagel" (which seems to be what has the drive-in service, not sure if you can get ice cream on that side - the bagel places closes at 2, so it's definitely a separate thing.) At least for the summer there's a huge tent with a dozen picnic benches; there's also a vast amount of parking. It's about half a mile from the Davis Mega Maze; it's also not far from Rota Spring Farm Ice Cream.

While tagging pictures, I discovered that this was not my first visit; I was there 11 years ago and had a soft serve dip cone - which seems to no longer be on the menu.¹

I got Monster Mash (lots of candy and cookies in a vanilla base) and Butter Pecan. The Monster Mash was ok, but not nearly as creamy as you find at most ice cream places around here; it may have just been the vanilla base, I should try their "Extreme Chocolate" for comparison. They also had a "Campfire S'mores" and a "Maine Black Bear" flavor.

This is also the second place I've seen listing "Ice Cream Nachos" - the other one was Friendly's who call it "Sugar Cone Nachos". (They also have frozen yogurt, sherbert, and coconut-milk-based "vegan" ice cream.)

Just before I started this blog, a friend mentioned that we should go somewhere for National S'mores Day. "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first" so we went to Friendly's (see below) for a S'mores Sundae before I did my usual research¹ into the background of the holiday.

Background

The deteriorating state of internet search combined with ephemeral marketing content means I was unable to find a really convincing "patient zero" for S'mores Day - although I found references going back to 2007, it wasn't clear if those were actually early references or just the time horizon on search (some of my better references were only available in the Internet Archive's occasional scrapes of Twitter, which is not an impressive quality metric.)

Factoids

• It is definitely 10 August.
• It's the birthday of Henri Nestlé. (Rather less relevant is that it is also the birthday of Leo Fender and Antonio Banderas.)²
• "Tramping and Trailing with the Girl Scouts" (1927) is a widely cited early-but-not-actually-first publication of the recipe. (See page 71 and 72 of the book at the Google Books link above, under the subheading “Some Mores”.)
• Late Addition The Google Doodle for 9 September 2024 was about S'mores in general, because "On this day in 1925, article called Patrol Leaders Have Outing came out mentioning some-mores' being introduced as a new dish at Camp Andree (national Girl Scout camp)" and also adds the vague claim that "the s’more first appeared in a 1920s cookbook and was called a “graham cracker sandwich.”" It turns out the article is actually available online (page five, column B) as quoted in a S'more enthusiasm blog and review site that started in 2019. Noone is actually claiming this as an alternate "S'mores day", just a 99th anniversary of an early newspaper mention, but the google doodle gets a lot of visibility...

Timeline (2020-2024)

In 2021, Krispy Kreme partnered with Hershey to make Hershey S'mores Donuts in two variations: S’mores Classic Doughnut and S’mores Fudge Cake Doughnut. Unfortunately, https://www.krispykreme.com/promos/smores is a dead end, and it isn't clear from the Internet Archive when it went away more precisely than "before 2023", so it may have been a single year promotion.

(Dunkin Donuts also introduced both a S'mores donut and several S'mores coffee products in 2017, some of which went away but the coffee is still available in 2024 via Target.)

Timeline (2015-2019)

NASA posted about National Smores Day in 2015 archive.org, twitter saying "For #NationalSmoresDay, may we suggest Sun S’mores? How to harness sun's energy to make them: http://climatekids.nasa.gov/smores" (an article that details building a solar oven out of a foil-lined cardboard box and using it to cook s'mores - definitely an edge case to challenge my "S'mores must involve Fire" theory below.)

Another popular calendar site, Days Of The Year first posted about it in late 2017, crediting the "National Confectioners Association". Founded in 1884, they have an active twitter presence at @CandyUSA, but twitter itself has deteriorated a bit and scrolling back manually only gets to 2019 which doesn't look like a first post; oldest on web.archive.org is 2008-10-26 but nothing crawled in August until 2013 (and that didn't mention the day.) So it appears to not have been part of their social media presence even though they had one very early in the game (they had an account when twitter was still only two years old - their account is almost as old as mine is) which makes it somewhat unlikely that they actually founded it - also, noone else mentions them as an instigator.

In 2018, CNBC worked out that, based on the recipe from "Tramping and Trailing"...

• The original ingredients would have cost $0.81 in the 1920s;
• Inflation adjustment makes that equivalent $11.66 in 2018;
• Purchasing the ingredients from Target in 2018 was $12.50.

In 2016, Hershey did a brand marketing exercise about the day itself: "Hershey's sponsored the #SmoreFun hashtag on Twitter yesterday,", "Stacie Stauffer³, senior brand manager at Hershey’s Brand", "“Relive the joy of your first s’more. Have #SmoreFun this National S’mores Day by sharing your favorite treat!”"⁴ (The internet archive version of the article is more complete than the MarketingDive mirror, and actually has a datestamp and a screenshot of the referenced Hersheys posting, which itself is (unsuprisingly) dated 10 August 2016 and links to a HersheyLand Recipes Page that is still online..)

Timeline (2010-2014)

• In 2010, popartdiva says "“National S’mores Day” is on August 10th each year - this date was instituted by the Hershey Company" which is the earliest citation I have that credits Hershey.
• In 2011, meanderingwithbev note that "While the holiday is not official (which an act of Congress requires) it has been celebrated for years" as sort of an anti-citation.
• The #NationalSmoresDay hashtags goes at least as far back as 2013.
• Ben And Jerry's mentions the day in 2014, with "Happy National S’mores Day! How about S’mores on s’mores to celebrate? #peaceloveicecream"

Timeline (2000-2009)

The oldest references I have are from 2007.

• The Pittsburgh (PA) Post-Gazette wrote "Who knew? National S'mores Day is nigh" in 2007, describing Hershey's engagement (they are after all a local company) with "The Hershey Company is doing its part in celebrating 80 years of this gooey, chocolatey confection by coming up with unique twists to the original combination of milk chocolate, graham crackers and toasted marshmallows" but without shining any light on the founding of the day.
• The Baking Bites blog also provides an anti-citation - "I’m still not entirely sure who comes up with these days"

Places with S'mores Ice Cream

Having now tried a few of these options - they are certainly interesting but my traditionalist side insists that they're not S'mores if you didn't set something on fire to make them 🔥. That said, mid-August isn't a great time for outdoor fires; I happen to have an opportunity to do make S'mores in late spring during an annual community "spring cleaning" yard-scraps bonfire, which happened to overlap with the 2024 solar eclipse but Walpurgisnacht bonfires are also an option. Even as late as the 4th of July, S'mores on the leftover barbecue coals is great, but by mid August, noone wants to add fire to 90F temperatures - so S'mores Ice Cream is at least worth considering.

Nanabette's

Nanabette's has a S'mores Ice Cream (haven't tried yet as of review time.)

Friendly's

Friendly's introduced a S'mores Sundae in time for S'mores Day 2024. Chocolate ice cream, graham cracker crumbs, chocolate syrup, small-but-not-mini marshmallows on top. Unfortunately the "raw" marshmallows basically failed - they were much too sweet and weren't "gooey" so it didn't really work.

They actually have a Limited Edition S'mores ice cream in 1.5 quart containers but that wasn't used for the Sundae.

Also in 2020 they had a Sundae Kit: "S’mores without sticky fingers. Just in time for 4th of July, our All-NEW Build Your Own S’mores Sundae Kit is now available. Kit includes: One carton of vanilla ice cream, graham cracker crumbles, hot fudge, marshmallow topping, whipped cream, cones and cups."

Ben and Jerry's

(See "Timeline (2010-2014)" above for history) They used to have a "S'Mores" flavor with a chocolate base, dropped it, and now have "Gimme S'More" and "PB S'more". They also have S'mores Mix Snackable Graham Cracker Cookie Dough & Marshmallow Truffles in pouches. No idea if they actually have any of these in stores, though.

Rota Spring Farm

Rota Spring Farm has an amazing Graham Central Station (graham cracker ice cream with chocolate-covered graham cracker bits) which turns out to be a better S'mores than Friendly's version even without marshmallows. Top it with some marshmallow sauce and wave a torch over it for ten seconds (you may have to bring your own torch) and it would win the day.

Meadowlands Homemade Ice Cream

Meadowlands Homemade Ice Cream has a S'mores flavor, described as "vanilla ice cream w/marshmallows, chocolate chips, graham cracker" which looks tempting (but may only be a short term special, it was on their Specials board 2024-08-22.)

Theatre Creamery

Maynard Theatre Creamery has a "Campfire S'Mores" ice cream which I actually tried on my first visit. Didn't stand out in comparison to the Rota Spring Farm Graham Central Station (and I haven't yet tried Theatre Creamery's own Graham Central Station) but it's an option if August 10 falls on a weekend (like it did in 2024, and will in 2025, but will skip 2026 2027 and 2028; 2029 it's back on Friday.)

Big Dipper

Big Dipper also has "Campfire S'mores" on their menu; haven't yet tried it. Big Dipper is on route 28 on the north end of North Reading - east of I-93 and south of I-495.

Cherry Hill Ice Cream

Cherry Hill Ice Cream has a S'mores flavor that is "toasted marshallow flavored ice cream w/a graham cracker swirl and chocolate chunks" which is tasty and gets pretty close to "essence of s'mores" without involving actual fire.

The Ice Cream Cottage

The Ice Cream Cottage lists a S'mores flavor (which it gets from Acushnet Creamery according to their grand opening news article.) Not yet sampled.

Breakers Ice Cream in Woburn (no web presence) is on Winn Street, a couple of blocks north of Woburn Common. While it has a 4 windows and a set of well-lit benches with umbrellas along a large parking lot, it's not actually that visible from the street - it's tucked in behind Mike's Place Pizzeria and has a relatively small street sign. Since it's after Labor Day, they were notably one of the few places in the Burlington area that were actually still open¹ after 9pm (they were actually serving people right up to 9:30.)

They might have indoor seating, I couldn't tell if it was that or that Mike's Place extends around behind them (a disadvantage of late night ice cream runs, even the well lit places aren't all that conducive to wandering around, though google maps shows that the extensive parking continues around the back of the building too.)

First Visit

I went with "Death By Chocolate" (which had a proper dark chocolate flavor to it, as well as mixed in brownies and other chocolate.) Followed it with "Green Monster" which is a traditional mint with stuff in it; not all the way up to "grasshopper" level, but plenty of mint and plenty of chocolate.

Next visit I might try "Maine Black Bear" (raspberry) or Totally Turtle, though if their machines are up a chocolate dip cone is just as likely.

The menu lists soft serve and dip cones; they also have frappes and slush.

After dining at The Cask And Pig (excellent brisket, and novel appetizers like Spicy Deviled Eggs and Hanging Bacon) in Dartmouth, my friends decided that "we should go generate content for your blog" so we ended up at The Ice Cream Cottage in Fairhaven.¹ The Cottage is tucked in down some one-way streets a block in from the waterfront. Smaller than most - one order window and one pickup window under an overhang, a public lot across the street, one bench (the breakfast shop next door² also has a bunch of benches and closes at 5pm, seemed like a popular overflow spot.) Opened in 2023 on the site of the former Brady's Ice Box.

We got lucky, this was the last weekend they were open late, and after Labor Day they're only open on weekends.

First Visit

The Cottage has a medium-length list of flavors, plus soft serve (twist, but no dip cones), dairy free and sugar free flavors. (The article on their own website credits Acushnet Creamery, about 4 miles up river, for the ice cream itself.)

They also have a 4-scoop "Ice Cream Flight" (seen previously at West Side Creamery), Hawaiian Shave Ice, frappes, floats, and Ice Cream Cookie Sandwiches. (Also hot dogs.)

I had a cup of Coffee Oreo Cookie with Butter Crunch underneath. Reasonably strong coffee flavor, and the butter crunch was actually crunchable (in some versions, the crunch bits are too hard to actually bite down on, these were fine.) On a future visit I'll probably try the Hawaiian Shave Ice, especially if it's still hot out; otherwise the Espresso Brownie Fudge, Mocha Peanut Butter, and S'mores are on the short list. They also list a Very New England "Cranberry Harvest" - one hopes that hip waders are not required for serving it.