The all-about-ice cream edition | Morning Newsletter

This Sunday, let’s talk all things local ice cream in five minutes or less, as a treat. We’re still feeling the summer heat, and ice cream is just the refreshment we all need as we get our last licks of summer.

In Today’s Newsletter:

🍦 Soft-serve picks: There’s still time to treat yourself to some zany novelty flavors in our ultimate soft-serve guide.

🍦 Trusty water ice watering holes: We’ve got a refresher on our go-to best water ice list.

🍦 Innovation of women of color: Thank women of color for elevating Philly’s ice cream game to be more accessible and sweeter.

If you see this 🔒 in today’s newsletter, that means we’re highlighting our exclusive journalism. You need to be a subscriber to read these stories.

— Ashley Hoffman (@_AshleyHoffman, morningnewsletter@inquirer.com)

Our best water ice list recommends consummate classics like John’s, Pop’s Homemade Italian Ice, Siddiq’s, and D’Emilio’s Old World Ice Treats for the sorbetto — so named by Chris’ grandmom.

Our reporter Jen Ladd has more than 25 local spots in our region serving it softly with their ice cream songs.

Among the ice creams she highlighted:

🥭 Càphê Roasters dishes out condensed milk- and tropical pandan-flavored soft serve in addition to coffee.

🍓 Seek out the strawberry shortcake or peanut-sesame dukkah scooped over a chocolate magic shell at Laser Wolf and Dizengoff.

🍪 Find chocolate chip cookie soft-serve sandwiches at this Powelton Village storefront at Coco’s Cookies & Creamery

If you’re down the Shore, we have a list dedicated solely to the Shore scoops, Here are three highlights:

🍬 At Avalon Freeze, you can get your ice cream coated with “all the toppings” or whirled into a freezer with candy.

🥧 At Aneu, there are novelty flavors like blueberry pie, strawberry pistachio streusel, and caramelized banana pudding.

🧇 At Hassles, you get your Richman’s ice cream (which they’ve served since 1985) topped on homemade Belgian waffles.

“The development of the ice cream market in Philadelphia occurred as a direct result of the contributions of these women and people of color, who succeeded despite societal constraints. Recognition of their contributions is the cherry on top of an already intricate history.” — Selena Bemak of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania wrote for The Inquirer.

🍨 1819: Note the simple but beloved recipes of Eleanor Parkinson. Before she opened her scoop shop next to her husband’s tavern this year, ice cream was just for the wealthy locals.

🍨 1837: Entrepreneur Augustus Jackson is known for adding salt to pump up the flavor and staying power of his ice cream. At his confectionery, he sold single servings for a quick fix to the masses.

🍨 1843: Abolitionist Nancy Johnson was a true innovator. She invented and patented a hand-cranked ice cream churn, which in fact, she patented several times. Her “Artificial Freezer” helped to streamline production and cut down ingredient costs.

🍨 1908: Mary Engle Pennington demonstrably improved cleanliness for Philly’s ice cream. And 1908 was the year that the City of Philadelphia tapped the bacteriological chemist to oversee Philadelphia’s dairy industry, working face-to-face with the farmers and ice cream distributors.

Keep reading for more on these significant contributions.

Which flavor is definitely not a flavor from Jen Ladd’s comprehensive ultimate soft-serve guide we linked to above?

A) 🍫 chocolate-tahini

B) 🍠 ube

C) 🥑 avocado

D) 🥣 Fruit Loops

Where Rita’s Water Ice first started:

LABSMENE

We’ll select a reader at random to shout out here. Send us your own original anagram to unscramble if you’d like. Email us if you know the answer.

🎶 For today’s Sunday track, we’re listening to “rock, rock, my baby, rock ... you scream, I scream. Everybody wants ice cream, rock, rock my baby, rock.” 🎶

Today, I’ll be making more s’mores cones on the grill loaded with all the candies, and my homemade bourbon whiskey ice cream in cones dipped in chocolate sauce and dusted with graham cracker crumbs. Enjoy the last of August. Your regular morning newsletter host, Taylor Allen, will be back with you tomorrow.