What to Know
- The Summer Picnic Series at Salt & Straw
- Five artisanal flavors, all themed to picnicking, are available at local scoop shops through August 2024
- Pink Rosé & Watermelon Sorbet is another warm-weather flavor on the lickable line-up
Ranking the ultimate comfort foods is a tough task, especially if you must combine the savory and sweet categories rather than selecting a winner from both.
Would you go with mac & cheese, that piquant pasta that's a party for the palate, a dairy-forward, carb-strong fantasia of super-filling proportions?
Or is it ice cream all the whimsical way for you? The classic cool-down confection that can transport you, one gooey chomp at a time, back to your earliest ice cream-obsessed days?
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You won't need to choose when visiting your local Salt & Straw scoop shop in August, where the new Smoked Mac & Cheese Ice Cream is now being semi-surreally served.
But "semi-surreally" is surely a bridge too far, for the time has certainly arrived for two comfort food titans to enjoy a playful mash-up resulting in one toothsome treat.
The new ice cream is part of the Salt & Straw "Summer Picnic Series," which features four other fanciful, spread-out-the-checkered-picnic-blanket flavors.
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Pink Rosé & Watermelon Sorbet is on the luscious list, as is the Grilled Peach White Chocolate Custard.
Sour Cherry Pie just sounds like a quintessential August sweet while an icon of the summer season, fried chicken, is starring in its own ice cream (that would be Cinnamon & Honey Fried Chicken).
As for the not-so-quirky, highly craveable components that swirl through the Smoked Mac & Cheese Ice Cream?
Salt & Straw's site tells the yummy tale behind the offbeat eat: "This must-try scoop stars award-winning Beecher's Smoked Flagship Cheese, aged and smoked to perfection over real cherry and apple wood."
"We drizzle this scrumptious cheesecake swirl into our pasta-infused ice cream, featuring Flour + Water Foods pasta that's made with deep rough ridges to hold all the flavor you can handle. Every bite pops with tiny clusters of savory brown butter bread crumbs."
Read more about Beecher's Smoked Flagship Cheese and Flour + Water Foods of San Francisco.
Comfort foodies, don't wait: The Summer Picnic Series, like a summer picnic, will end all too soon. Find your closest and/or favorite Salt & Straw and visit before August fades away, like the perfect late-season sunset.
Updated: Aug. 8
