Sebastian Joe's - Raspberry Chocolate Chip

Raspberry Chocolate Chip - Raspberry Ice Cream with Chocolate Chips

 

I picked up today's flavor at the Sebastian Joe's scoop shop in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis.  This is Raspberry Chocolate Chip and it is one of their "signature flavors".  It has been around since 1985 and they almost always have it available in the scooping bin.  Raspberry chocolate chip is a very popular flavor across many brands.  Milkjam has a Pink Lady flavor which uses raspberry sherbet.  Both Graeter's and Talenti have a Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip.  It will be fun to see how this flavor from Sebastian Joe's compares.

Popping open the pint, I see a hot pink color of the raspberry base.  I see quite a few of the chocolate chips as well.  I also see a couple of places where they jammed the scooper into the ice cream in order to pack it in.  This does not have an effect on anything, but it made me smile to see it.  Sebastian Joe's ice cream is thick and it takes some effort to pack it into these pint cartons.  Digging in, this is a very sweet raspberry flavor.  Often with raspberry bases and swirls, there is a balance between sweet and tart, but this flavor definitely falls on the sweet side.  It is not overly sweet, though.  The chcoolate chips are of a decent size and go well with the raspberry.

This is a solid implementation of raspberry chocolate chip from Sebastian Joe's.  It is a sweet raspberry so it has a different flavor than the Black Raspberry implementations from Graeter's and Talenti.  The Pink Lady flavor from Milkjam is probably the closest.  Checking my archives, I did find a Sebastian Joe's flavor called Bailey's Raspberry Truffle which is probably the "adult" version of this flavor.  There, the raspberry is spiked with Bailey's Cream and the chocolate chips are larger and chunkier.  I liked that flavor very much and I'll admit that I liked it a bit better than todays flavor.  That said, today's flavor might be more kid-friendly.