Milk Bar - Pie

Pie - Deep Vanilla Ice Cream with Gooey Butter Filling and Toasted Oat Crust

Today's flavor is another from the New York-based Milk Bar brand and is called simply Pie.  I've had trouble finding this flavor locally.  Whole Foods and Target are stocking this brand now, but the ones in Saint Paul do not seem to carry this flavor.  I finally found it at the Whole Foods near Lake & Excelsior in Minneapolis.  When I took the pint to the checkout, the cashier's eyes got really big and he told me "that flavor is amazing", so that's a good sign.  What is in the flavor?  The flavor is based on the Milk Bar Pie sold in Milk Bar's brick and mortar locations in New York.  They use a toasted oat crust and a thick buttery custard for the filling.  They actually provide a recipe here.  Here they fold the filling and crust into a deep vanilla base.  Let's check it out.

Removing the lid and peeling back the seal, the vanilla base has an off-white yellow color to it and some of the oat crust mix-ins are visible right away.  Digging in, the base has a bit of custardy feel to it.  I soon encounter some of the 'gooey' pie filling mix-ins as well, but I think some of the pie filling has also mixed into the base.  I like it.  The pie filling pieces are quite delicious.  The fact that this is baked might make is partially caramelized because it tastes like a cross between a butter custard and a dulce-de-leche or caramel.  It's just really delicious.  The oat crust pieces help to give the pint some texture.

This is an extremely delicious pint from Milk Bar.  It seems like such a simple idea -- caramel custard pie -- but the implementation is just top notch.  The flavor, the sweetness, a bit of saltiness, the compatibility with the base.  It is all very good.  It makes me wonder what the pie tastes like by itself.  Maybe I will check out a slice the next time I am in New York.  Anyhow, the cashier in Minneapolis was right and this is now my new favorite flavor from the Milk Bar brand.  Hopefully, they the Saint Paul store can get with the program and start stocking it soon.

Milk Bar - Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookie Crush

Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookie Crush - Peanut Butter Chocolate Ice Cream with Peanut Butter Cookie Crumbs and Fudge Chocolate Cookie Batter

Today I return to the New York-based Milk Bar brand for their Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookie Crush flavor.  I bought this flavor at Whole Foods on Selby, but I have also seen it sold at local Target stores as well.  Milk is a fun new brand. I was alerted to its existence in the comment section of an earlier review.  Thanks again to that reader!  Today's flavor features a peanut butter and chocolate base with one swirl of peanut butter cookie crumbs and another swirl of fudge chocolate cookie batter.  Chocolate & peanut butter is a common and popular flavor combination and this looks like a fun and unique way of combining the two.  Let's check it out.

Removing the lid and peeling back the seal, I see the light brown color of the peanut butter and chocolate base and I see hints of the two swirls (a lighter orange one of peanut butter and some darker brown for the fudge).  Digging in, the peanut butter and chocolate base is mainly peanut butter flavored.  I checked the ingredient list and there is chocolate in there but it is not very obvious (especially with a swirl also providing chocolate).  That's just an observations.  Some blended are predominantly chocolate, this one is predominately peanut butter.  The swirls are both very well done.  The peanut butter cookie crumb base provides additional peanut butter as well as a gritty texture while the fudge cookie batter provides a lot of chocolate flavor in more of a goopy texture.  The fudge cookie batter swirl is excellent.  It reminded me of brownie batter which is an ingredient which should be used more often.  The strong chocolate flavor of this swirl explains why less chocolate is needed in the base.

This is an excellent chocolate and peanut butter flavor from Milk Bar.  I run into chocolate-peanut-butter flavors all the time, but this is one of the more creative ones that I have tried in recent memory.  It is a relatively smooth pint -- no chunks -- but the flavors are excellent and well balanced.  If you are into chocolate-and-peanut-butter flavors, then check this out and see if you like it.

Milk Bar - Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow

Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow - Cookie Dough flavored Ice Cream with Cornflake Crunch, Chocolate Flavored Chunks, and Melted Marshmallow

 

Today I return to the New-York-based Milk Bar brand for their Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow flavor.  I bought this at the Whole Foods on Selby in Saint Paul, but I have recently seen this brand stocked at the Target in the Midway.  I am glad to see this brand spreading to more stores.  Like my previous pint from Milk Bar, today's flavor is another one that incorporated breakfast cereal in the mix.  Let's check it out.

Removing the like and peeling back the seal with the nice message from Milk Bar founder Christina Tosi, I see several of the key ingredients right away.  The cookie dough base has an off-white color, there are quite a few chocolate chunks visible and I see hints of marshmallow and maybe hints of cornflakes.  Digging in, the cookie dough flavored base is decent.  There's no actual cookie dough, but it is cookie-dough flavored which I suppose means brown sugar, butter and eggs.  It works as a good vehicle for the mix-ins.  The chocolate chunks are a lot like chocolate chips but harder and rectangular change.  They provide a lot of chocolate flavor when you bite into them.  The marshmallow swirls are fun and not overdone.  There was not as much cornflake crunch as I was expecting but a little bit of cornflake goes a long way.  This is quite good.

This is a fun ice cream from Milk Bar.  It is not as heavily cereal based on their Cereal Milk flavor.  I would call it a hybrid flavor where a relatively small amount of cornflakes is used to spice up a chocolate-chip and marshmallow pint.  Enjoy.

 

 

Milk Bar - Cereal Milk

Cereal Milk - Cereal Milk Ice Cream with Cornflake Crunch

 

Last week, I reviewed my first pint of Milk Bar ice cream (review here).  While I was researching for that review, I realized that this brand specializes in using breakfast cereal in ice cream and I had reviewed one of the few flavors that did not contain breakfast cereal!  So, I am remedying that mistake today by trying their Cereal Milk flavor.  I bought it at Whole Foods on Selby in Saint Paul, but I have also seen Milk Bar stocked at the Target in the Midway.  Cereal Milk is Milk Bar's signature flavor and features a cereal milk ice cream with a cornflake crunch.  Checking the cereal tag on this blog, I find that I have had several cereal-based ice creams.  Several from Milkjam -- Cereal Killers, Monster Mash, Death By Chocula and Waka Flocka Flakes -- and flavors by both Bebe Zito (Breakfast Club) and Ample Hills (Breakfast Trash).  But the flavor that day's flavor most closely resembles would be Coolhaus' Cereal Dreams.  Both Milk Bar and Coolhaus feature cereal milk bases and swirls of crunchy cereal  Let's see how Milk Bar compares.

Removing the lid and peeling back the protective foil (which includes a greeting from Milk Bar founder Christina Tose), I see both the bright white color of the cereal milk base and the orangeish color of the cornflake swirl.  I can taste the cereal flavor right away in the first spoonful.  The base really does taste like the milk at the bottom of the bowl.  It is a little sweet but not overly so.  All the cream in ice cream does an excellent job of balancing out sugar for me.  For the cornflake swirl, the cornflakes are ground up into a powder that has a gritty texture to it (the Coolhaus pint above does the same thing).  I imagine this is done to keep the cornflakes from getting soggy -- and they don't -- they remain gritty which is similar to crunchy.  Sometimes the density of the cornflake swirl is a little inconsistent -- there will be a lot, then just a little, then a lot again -- but it's usually pretty easy to get both the swirl and the base on each spoonful.

This is an excellent cereal-based ice cream from Milk Bar.  This pint should have been my first Milk Bar review.  It's just simple cornflakes -- none of the colorful sugary ice creams of the Milkjam, Bebe Zito and Ample Hills flavors -- but cornflakes are still plenty sweet.  The balance between the cereal mix-ins and the cereal milk base is well done.  I did like Coolhaus's Cereal Dreams but this is my new favorite simple cereal ice cream flavor.  Check it out.

 

 

 

Milk Bar - Birthday Cake

Birthday Cake - Birthday Cake Flavored Ice Cream with Birthday Crumbs and Birthday Frosting

 

A reader named Reid in a recent review has directed me to a new brand available at Whole Foods called Milk Bar.  I went down to the Whole Foods on Selby in Saint Paul and picked up a couple of pints.  From what I could see in the freezer case, this brand appears to be selling well.  I hope they restock soon.  

Milk Bar was founded by Christina Tosi (homepage, wiki) and started off as a pastry shop on in New York City's East Village as the dessert pastry shop accompanying the nearby Momofuku restaurant in 2008.  It's been quite successful as a pastry shop, has been featured on all sorts of food-oriented television shows and now have over a dozen locations in six cities.  This spring, they've agreed to release a handful of pre-packaged ice cream flavors for Whole Foods (see articles here and here). 

It looks Milk Bar's signature flavor is "Cereal Milk".  I guess I should have started with that one, but I didn't do my write-up research before picked the flavor.  I chose Birthday Cake.  As has been mentioned in several recent review, birthday-cake-themed flavors are really big in the past couple of years. I have recently had flavors from Grand Ole Creamery, Jeni's, the Cheesecake Factory and Talenti to go with older flavors from Coolhaus, Graeter's and McConnell's as well as retired limited releases from Ample Hills and Ben & Jerry's.  Lot's of flavors!  Each time I right a review, the list gets longer.  Let's add Milk Bar to the list.

Opening the lid, the protective seal has a small hand written note:  "XO. TOSI".  It threw me off for a bit because I did not initially know who "Tosi" was.  Plus, the writing looks so informal.  It looks like some random person with a ballpoint pen just removed lids and wrote secret notes to customers on the seal.  But now that I've read the article linked above, I know that Christina Tosi is the founder of the Milk Bar pastry shops and this message is from her to her customers.  Fun.  Removing the foil, the birthday cake ice cream has a yellowish color.  So not a white cake.  Some egg yolks are in the mix. Some sprinkles are visible on top as well as a bit of frosting.  Digging in, the cake flavored base is quite good.  It is sweet, but not overly so.  The cake pieces below are soft and chewy.  There is occasionally a little flakes of pastry frosting in the mix.  These are like the bits of frosting that fall off a frosted donut or pastry. They hold their consistency on their spoon, but they melt in your mouth when you eat it.

I liked this birthday-cake-themed flavor from Milk Bar very much.  It feels like I am eating birthday cake, but it is still ice cream and it is not too sweet.  I am still going to say that McConnell's Sprinkle Cake is still the gold standard, but that flavor is hard to find outside the west coast.  This is one of the better options here in the Twin Cities.  I liked it better than Cheesecake Factory and Grand Ole Creamery (although those were still good).  I am looking forward to trying out Milk Bar's Cereal Milk flavor soon.