Thursday, April 06, 2006

maple's organics ice cream














bean
and i read an article in the portland forecaster about this new, all-organic ice cream/bakery place, so we went by today before her latin class to check it out. it was AMAZING. i am now officially instructing every person i know who lives in portland to go try it. it's at 796 forest ave, at the corner of hartley street (not far from baxter woods). the woman who owns it is so sweet, and the place smells incredible when you walk in, since she does a ton of baking as well as making homemade ice cream and sorbets. she'll take special orders, too, including wheat- or dairy- free treats. she buys all of her ingredients from local organic farmers, but most importantly, the ice cream is really delicious.















bean
had the maple praline pecan, which i think is kind of a house specialty; it was sublime. i sampled way more than my fair share of it. i had the mexican chocolate sorbet, which (completely coincidentally) is entirely dairy-free, made with dark chocolate, cocoa powder, cinnamon, and almond extract. it was incredibly creamy and really heavy (in a nice way) on the cinnamon.















see? all gone.

i have a mental list of the things portland needs in order to be a really great (if tiny) city, most of them involving food of various kinds (for example, good middle eastern food, including but not limited to, cheap, good falafel; excellent new york-style pizza; ethiopian food; an entirely vegetarian restaurant; and many more!). foremost on the list has been great ice cream. everyone goes to beal's, but i find it really mediocre, to be honest. when you have a hankering for a creamy-but-unnatural softserve cone, there's no place like red's. and then there's coldstone creamery, home of the $9 ice cream scoop (i'm only exaggerating the tiniest bit, plus they "sing" if you tip them).

anyway, i think this new place may qualify as the really excellent ice cream spot we've been needing. uh oh. could be dangerous.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK, it is definitely dangerous! Charlotte and I were there within minutes of reading your entry, and we weren't disappointed! In addition to the flavors you tried, we sampled apple cobbler--scrumptious! AND their cones are delicious waffle cones! The people are so nice, the place is so cute, and they were thrilled to hear that they're on a blog already. They've only been open two weeks, and everyone in Portland should go there immediately to be sure they do well!

Anonymous said...

can't wait to get up there. first place I will stop !!!!

Liz Woodbury said...

yay, mama d! i knew you and miss gliss would do me proud and support local business right away. i'm glad you liked it as much as i did.

and mom, i promise i'll take you there immediately if you come up and visit me!

Liz Woodbury said...

update: m, bean, and boo visited maple's organics yesterday, and reported: yum. mark had a mexican chocolate milkhshake, boo had a brownie sundae, and i think bean had apple crisp ice cream?