WALKIES Award–Best Ice Cream: Graeter’s of Cincinnati

As seen on the first official Photowalks “Walkies” awards, we give the Best Ice Cream nod to Graeter’s Ice Cream on Cincinnati.

As I explain on the show, we’ve been to 120 different locations for Photowalks, from Amarillo, Texas to Zion National Park, and had an ice cream cone in each one of them. In some places, most notably Sicily, Italy and St. George, Utah, the cones were fantastic. But in Cincinnati, at the local chain Graeter’s, they were sensational, the best ever.

Why? Because they stuff the ice cream with extra chips that make a surprise wallop in your mouth when you bite into it.

• Graeter’s is the only major ice cream maker in the U.S. still using the old-fashioned French Pot method, a hand-crafted process dating back to the 1800s.
• Small 2½-gallon batches are spun slowly, which makes the ice cream dense, creamy, and free of excess air.
• Most commercial ice cream has 50% air whipped in — Graeter’s has far less, so you taste pure flavor.

And instead of mixing in chips or flakes, Graeter’s pours melted chocolate into the ice cream at the end of the churn.

• As it freezes, it breaks into huge, irregular chunks — sometimes you get a little sliver, sometimes a giant piece the size of a candy bar.
• This signature makes flavors like Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip world-famous. (I really liked the double chocolate chip.)

Thank you Graeter’s! I can’t wait to come back and have another cone!