Sweet Science - Rocky Road

Rocky Road - Chocolate Ice Cream with Marshmallows and Dark-Chocolate-Coated Toasted Almonds

Today we return to the Saint-Paul-based Sweet Science Ice Cream for their implementation of Rocky Road.  I bought this pint as part of a choose-your-own four-pack curbside pickup order outside of the Keg & Case Market in Saint Paul, but since then the market has re-opened and you can go inside and grab individual pints from the scoop shop.  Rocky Road is one of the oldest "complex" ice cream flavors, dating back to before World War II.  I wrote about the history of it in an earlier review.  It is chocolate ice cream with marshmallow and almond mix-ins.  I have had Rocky Road implementations from several brands, Häagen-Dazs, McConnell's, Jeni's, Baskin Robbins and Lapperts.   Here, it looks like they're coating the almonds with dark chocolate.  Let's see how that works out.

Removing the lid, I see the chocolate base, a few of the marshmallow mix-ins on one side and hints at a couple of the chocolate-covered almonds.  Digging in, the chocolate base is good -- I have had their milk chocolate base before.  I try the marshmallows and they are pretty good.  They are about the same size as the mini-marshmallows that you can buy at the grocery store, but these are step above those in quality.  Looking at the side of the container, it says they get their marshmallows from North Mallow -- looks like they got the vanilla flavored ones.  The other mix-ins are the dark-chocolate-coated almonds.  These are amazing.  They remind me of the almonds in one of the most famous Häagen-Dazs flavors -- Vanilla Swiss Almond.  It's a simple change and even in a base which is already chocolate, it super-charges the impact of the almonds.

This is an excellent implementation of a Rocky Road ice cream from Sweet Science.  Good chocolate and good marshmallows, but it the chocolate-coating on the almonds which lifts this into one of the better Rocky Road implementations that I have had.  Fans of this classic flavor should check it out if they are at Keg & Case and see it available.