Van Leeuwen Ice Cream

Scoops, sundaes and a parallel vegan line

The Nashville counter runs the full Van Leeuwen format: scoops in housemade waffle cones and bowls, sundaes, milkshakes, ice cream sandwiches, bars and pints to take home. The brand started in New York in 2008 and has kept the same thinking since, which is why the flavours read like desserts rather than flavour names.

Vanilla Bean and Chocolate anchor the case. Around them sit Banana Pudding Cheesecake with Strawberry Rhubarb, Honeycomb Cookies & Cream, Brown Sugar Cookie Dough, Brownie Earl Grey Tea, Praline Butter Cake, Bigface Coffee Affogato, Marionberry Cheesecake, Black Cherry Chip, Sicilian Pistachio, Mango Sticky Rice and Matcha. The vegan line runs in parallel rather than as an afterthought: Banana Bread Pudding with Fudge Swirls, Strawberry Shortcake, Cookies & Cream, Strawberry Matcha Latte, Mint Chip, Peanut Butter Brownie Honeycomb, Dark Chocolate Fudge Brownie and Mango Sorbet.

A casual counter with a long topping list

This is counter service, and the real decision is format before flavour: cone, bowl, sundae, milkshake, sandwich, bar or pint. Bundles exist for taking a set home, which makes the shop as much a freezer stop as a walk-in one.

Toppings do more work here than at most scoop shops. Hot fudge, salted caramel sauce, pistachio cream, chocolate hazelnut sauce, peanut butter sauce, whipped cream, feuilletine, honey almond slivers, dark chocolate curls, cookies and cream crumble, rainbow sprinkles and gummy bears are all on the board, and a vegan chocolate sauce keeps the dairy-free order from ending up plainer than the rest. They work best against the direct flavours, Vanilla Bean and Chocolate, or pushed further into Brown Sugar Cookie Dough or Dark Chocolate Fudge Brownie.

Start with Vanilla Bean, then go dessert-forward

Start with Vanilla Bean for the cleanest read on the base; Wirecutter picked it as the best vanilla ice cream. Chocolate is the other straightforward comparison. Both are worth a scoop before moving into the composed flavours, because they show the texture the rest is built on.

After that, go dessert-forward. Banana Pudding Cheesecake with Strawberry Rhubarb is the clearest example, while Brownie Earl Grey Tea, Praline Butter Cake, Bigface Coffee Affogato, Mango Sticky Rice and Sicilian Pistachio show the range. On the vegan side, Banana Bread Pudding with Fudge Swirls and Strawberry Matcha Latte make the point that dairy-free here does not mean sorbet by default, though Mango Sorbet is there if that is what you want.