Sausage ice cream anyone?
A new shop on Kent Avenue called OddFellows Ice Cream Co. is offering a variety of flavors such as the soothing Tahitian Vanilla and the savory Chorizo Caramel.
“Some of our flavor profiles are a leap of faith and we want people to try new things,” said Sam Mason, the head chef at OddFellows. “So we’ll put it out there and hopefully people like it. If so, great. If not, there’s a long list of other flavors to try.”
Flavors include a popular Cornbread, followed by the Maple Bacon Pecan and the Buttermilk Blueberry Honey. The shop also sells sorbets, with the Lychee Cilantro Sorbet proving to be a hit. Surprises are not limited to customers as Mohan says people enjoy the Burnt Caramel far more than even he expected.
The sweet shop is owners’ Mohan and Holiday Kumar’s first venture in the food industry, but Mason is no stranger to food operations — or culinary creativity. An ex-pastry chef at Wd-50, Mason presently co-owns Empire Mayo and Lady Jay’s Dive Bar in Brooklyn.
“If I get an idea, I keep playing with that ingredient and find a way to make it work with ice cream,” said Mason.
The establishment’s quirky name has a few meanings, both referring to old fraternal organizations dedicated to helping the community and to the strangeness of the shop’s flavors, said Holiday.
“We wanted to do our part to help our neighbors, and decided to partner with the Food Bank for New York City to donate 5 cents of every serving to feed the hungry,” she said.
“We liked the way ‘OddFellows’ sounded. To me, it evoked images of carnivals and circus freaks, which I thought would be a fun aesthetic to incorporate.”
The decor is also fun and wacky. Red and white striped wallpaper and colorful ephemera augment the shop’s jolly vibe. The toy monkey grinning down at customers from one of the shelves is OddFellows’ unofficial mascot.
“I named him Clyde,” said Holiday.
“Mohan had a couple of harrowing experiences with monkeys. When he visited India as a child, they snatched ice cream right out of his hand on more than one occasion.”
OddFellows Ice Cream Co. [175 Kent Ave. between N. Third and N. Fourth streets in Williamsburg, (347) 599–0556, www.oddfellowsnyc.com].
