Ample Hills - Baby, I Was Churned This Way!

Baby, I Was Churned This Way - Salty Hazelnut Ice Cream with Chocolate-Covered Rainbow-Colored Sunflower Seeds

Yesterday, I went to the Gotham West Market in New York City and picked up two limited batch pints from Ample Hills.  The first pint, I ate yesterday in the market and the second pint I took back to my sister's apartment.  So, today I am ready to eat that second pint which is called Baby, I Was Churned This Way! in honor of Pride Month.  I did not get a chance to see the parade but I did see a lot of the barricades that were put up before.  Of course, the flavor name is a pun on the Lady Gaga song Born This Way.  In the spirit of Pride Week, I will link to her video of that song here.  The flavor itself is quite interesting.  It has a salty hazelnut base with chocolate-covered rainbow-colored sunflower seeds.  I don't think I've ever had hazelnut by itself, I usually only see it blended with fudge (Nutella-style).  Also, I have never had sunflower seeds in ice cream before.  So, this should be interesting.

Opening the pint, the hazelnut base as a sandy color.  There are some splotches of yellow food coloring and hints of chocolate-covered mix-ins below.  In the first spoonful, the ice cream is soft and creamy and the hazelnut flavor is quite interesting.  It is pretty good.  You can certainly tell that it is made from crushed nuts.  The chocolate-covered sunflower seeds are dispersed throughout the pint.  These are quite good!  They deliver a bit of saltiness and the coating provides a bit of chocolate as well.  Mostly, they are fun to chew on.  I like them in salads for the same reason.  I am surprised that sunflower seed mix-ins are not more common.  The rainbow-coloring in this particular pint is a bit of a disappointment.  There were yellow splotches from time to time but very little of any other colors.  The coloring does not affect the flavor one bit, so this is just a cosmetic issue, but a colorful ice cream for Pride Week might be part of the appeal.  The pictures of scoops on the Ample Hills website are much more colorful.  I am sure this is something that varies from batch to batch and if you are at a scoop shop, then you can simply look inside the bin and see how colorful it is before you order a scoop.

This is an interesting pint of ice cream.  The hazelnut base and sunflower seeds provide a unique earthy nuttiness which I don't often encounter in other flavors.