Sebastian Joe's - KARE 11 Golden Sunrise

KARE 11 Golden Sunrise - Lemon Ice Cream with Shortbread Cookies and Lemon Pieces

I returned to Minneapolis' Sebastian Joe's Ice Cream last week.  This time I went to the Lowry Hill scoop shop on Franklin instead of the one in Linden Hills.  I was only planning on picking up a couple of pints but ended up seeing so many flavors that I ended up going home with three.  My freezer is too full.  It may be the end of the month before I end up getting to all of these.  The first flavor is called KARE 11 Golden Sunrise.  The woman at the scoop shop said it was a lemon cookie flavor.  I am not exactly sure of the exact details of the flavor because the flavor links at the website appear to be missing any of those details.  I picked it up because I really like lemon. 

The flavor is named after the morning show for the local NBC affiliate, KARE 11.  I figure there must have been a segment on the show where Sebastian Joe's was featured and the on-air personalities tried out their flavor.  I found a 2011 facebook post from Sebastian Joe's but it points to a dead link on the KARE 11 website.  That's a bummer because these types of segments are fun and would likely contain lots of details about the flavor.  Maybe someone can find it buried in an archive somewhere.

Anyhow, on to the ice cream!  Removing the lid shows the ice cream packed in super tight and almost overflowing the container.  That is awesome.  Thanks Sebastian Joe's scooper!  Their ice cream always looks super thick.  The base color is an off-white yellow color and I see a lot of light brown crushed cookies.  Occasionally, I can see some of the ridge detail on the cookie pattern.  You can see the pattern in the second photo below.  The pattern is similar to -- but not the same as -- the cookies used in Lemon Oreos.  Digging in, the base flavor is not super lemon-y, but I quickly encounter some delicious lemon mix-ins which provide most of the lemon flavor.  I took photos of them below.  They look like small rectangular pieces of lemon peel which have been soaked in a sweet lemon syrup.  They are delicious!  If I couldn't see the peel texture, I might think they were small gummi worms.  The cookie pieces are scattered throughout the ping and provide a crunchines which goes quite well with the lemon flavor.

This is an excellent lemon cookie flavor from Sebastian Joe's!  I have had a lemon cookie flavor once before (from Three Twins) and this flavor is easily better than that one.  As much as I like lemon-flavored desserts, it is challenge to put the flavor in an ice cream because the acidity does not mix well with dairy.  These chewy gummi-like peel mix-ins are a very innovative and successful way of delivering lemon flavor.  Lemon lovers should definitely check this out -- even if you watch a different channel in the morning.