Häagen-Dazs - Espresso Chocolate Cookie Crumble

Espresso Chocolate Cookie Crumble - Coffee Ice Cream with a Chocolate Cookie Swirl and Chocolate Espresso Flakes

We return to Häagen-Dazs today to discuss another one of their new flavors for 2017: Espresso Chocolate Cookie Crumble.   It is a classic coffee and chocolate combination.  As mentioned in previous reviews, the key ingredients of coffee (caffeine) and chocolate (theobromine) have similar chemical structures.  Coffee has the stronger stimulant but a lot of why we like chocolate is because of its similar effects.  Because of this, coffee and chocolate are often paired together as they are here.   Häagen-Dazs has a classic flavor called Java Chip which is a simpler combination of these two.  For 2017, they are using more creative ingredients.  Here it is espresso beans and chocolate cookies.

Removing the lid shows the creamy beige color of the coffee base which a chunky dark brown swirl visible right away.  As I eat my way down into the pint, the coffee base is a bit mild.  Some coffee ice creams are geared to overpower you with strong coffee flavor, this is not the intent here.  In fact, you probably get more coffee flavor from the mix-ins.  The chocolate-covered espresso beans tasted a bit like if you grabbed a roasted coffee bean from the manual dispenser at the supermarket and started chewing on it as you continued browsing the aisles.  I sometimes do that at the supermarket.  The pieces are fairly small but it doesn't take much bean to provide a strong flavor.  The cookie pieces are mixed in with the espresso pieces.  They are both chocolate based so it is not always obvious which is which.  Its a good mix, though.  There's lots of chocolate mix-ins with the occasional coffee bean kick.

This was a pretty good flavor.  Fans of the Java Chip flavor will definitely want to see this more deluxe implementation of that flavor combination.  I am not a coffee drinker so in the past, super-potent coffee flavors are too overpowering for me.  I will often defer judgement on those types of flavors because I am not the target audience.  That said, I still enjoyed this flavor.  Perhaps because it fits my habit of chewing on beans at the supermarket.