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“I make ice cream for two reasons: I want to introduce these wonderful things we have in Asia and in Thailand to people, and I also miss these flavors. So, I make them because I miss them too.”

Meet Sutheera Denprapa, the ice cream designer and co-owner of Sky Ice, a small, artisan, all-natural ice cream shop based in Park Slope, Brooklyn. When Sutheera was a young girl, she hoped her parents would one day own an ice cream shop. That was her day dream, her little kid wish. It also tells you just how much she loves the stuff. As her husband, Jonathan explained, “few people are as passionate as Sutheera on ice cream”. I believe it. Get her talking about new flavors she’s inventing, and she could go on and on.

I came across Sky Ice on a food message board one day last fall, someone was flipping out over an ice cream flavor they’d just tried, and it immediately piqued my interest: Sky Ice Black Sesame Seaweed. As soon as the words rolled off my tongue, I was half way out the door ready to taste it. It seemed so daring – such a curious, savory idea for a flavor. And I had to know it. I had to understand it. So off to Park Slope I went, to this little, corner ice cream shop that smelled, oddly, like Thai food.

Sky Ice, you see, doubles as a Thai restaurant, explaining the scent confusion and the unique flavor selection: lychee rose, mangosteen, Thai iced tea, Thai coffee, toasted coconut, cherry blossoms and green curry, to name a few. They even carried a hard to find durian flavor – the fruit my Filipino mom says, “smells like hell and tastes like heaven”. Right away, you understood that someone making the ice cream had roots, a more tropical taste vision. A new take on flavors based on a childhood somewhere far away. This wasn’t going to be a normal ice cream experience. This was something different. And it was Sutheera’s plan all along.

So enjoy her story! Some new flavors that’ll blow you away: wasabi peanut butter, dark chocolate campfire and their white miso with sliced almonds, you won’t want to miss. Definitely my new favorite ice cream shop. I hope you make it out there!

Thanks for watching food. curated.! Happy eating!