Ample Hills - Maple Bourbon Barrel

Maple Bourbon Barrel - Maple bourbon ice cream made with Widow Jane bourbon and Crown Maple Syrup aged in Bourbon Barrels and Sprinkled with Chocolate-coated Maple-candied Pecans

I always like to try a pint of the Brooklyn-based Ample Hills whenever I visit New York.  The selection at the Whole Foods on the Upper East Side was not great, so I trekked down to one of their newest scoop shops in the Essex Market on the lower East Side.  I ate the pint down there, so you'll notice my photos have a different look to them than usual.  For this pint, I got their featured fall flavor called Maple Bourbon Barrel.  It's a bourbon and pecan implementation which has been very popular with other brands in recent years.  I have seen similar flavors from Graeter's, McConnell's and Häagen-Dazs.  Here the bourbon is from Widow Jane and the maple syrup is from Crown Maple.  It will be fun to see how this one compares.

This pint was hand-packed at the scoop shop.  So, it's a bit softer than I am used to seeing it from Ample Hills, but it is only half-melted on the surface.  It still has the same ice cream texture that I am used to once I get my spoon dipped into it.  Anyhow, the maple bourbon base as a very light neutral color to it and I can see the pint is chunky.  Digging in, I can taste both the bourbon and the maple at the same time.  It is a sweet bourbon and not a bourbon that has a biting kick to it.  That said, the bourbon is not too intense.   It blends with the maple well and provides a bit of 'aromaticity'.  The praline pecan pieces are crunchy and have a very flavorful praline coating on them.  The website link mentions a bit of chocolate in the coating as well, but I did not specifically taste that.  I didn't miss it, though.  The candied pecans were delicious.  There was also some larger chunks of the coating which was separate from the pecans.  I enjoyed this as well.  It was like having a bit of brittle mixed into the ice cream as well.

This is an excellent new flavor from Ample Hills.  It is a very well done implementation of a bourbon-infused pralines-and-cream which ticks all the boxes for me.  As I write this, this is my new favorite bourbon pecan flavor, but I confess that I might have a bit of recency bias.  Looking back at my reviews of  Graeter's, McConnell's and Häagen-Dazs I really enjoyed those as well (especially the Häagen-Dazs) but I do recommend that NYC-area folks that enjoy this type of flavor should check out this pint from Ample Hills as well.  It is very good.