For delicious ice cream you have to go to Italy, right? Not at all. Brabant is an excellent breeding ground for very tasty ice cream. Ice cream parlors from Geldrop and Eersel won the most important prizes at the ice cream competitions on Monday. They made the most delicious sundae and the tastiest chocolate sorbet ice cream.
It’s hard to imagine a better time for the ice skating competitions. The mercury is rising towards 20 degrees these days and that immediately awakens everyone’s sense of ice. From a simple scoop of vanilla ice cream to a gigantic sundae: ice cream makers can show their passion now that the sun is shining brightly.
The passion also radiates from Tessa Schellekens’ face. She is an ice cream maker at IJssalon Kees in Geldrop and winner of the Golden Ice Cream Creation. On Monday she created the ‘Dream of Sorento’ live for the jury. “That’s a coup with a base of cake, topped with our homemade limoncello,” Tessa tells Ronny Balk in the Omroep Brabant radio program Afslag Zuid.
Lemons from garden in Naples
And that limoncello is already an award winner in itself. The lemons used for this come all the way from Naples, from the garden of Marco’s brother, one of the owners of the ice cream parlor in Geldrop.
“The cake comes with lemon balls, After Eight and chocolate sorbet ice cream. On top of that there is a crumble of limoncello, a chocolate, lemon mousse and lemon compote,” Tessa explains her winning creation.
Trembling fingers
It was exciting for Tessa when she had to create the ‘Dream of Sorento’ for the jury. “You have to make four identical cuts in six minutes. That is of course very exciting. My fingers were shaking and I thought: ‘ah no, it won’t work anymore’. But then I regained my composure and finally finished it neatly.”
Tessa’s coup was appreciated by the jury. “Why is yours the tastiest?”, presenter Ronny asks Tessa. “To be honest, I didn’t get much of that. I’ll have to read that again,” she laughs out loud.
Tastiest chocolate sorbet ice cream
The other prize awarded during the ice cream competitions was the Golden Spatula, for the tastiest ice cream, in this case chocolate sorbet ice cream. There was also a winner from Brabant: Dimphy van der Loo from ice cream parlor De Smaak in Eersel.
The winning ice cream flavor was not just invented, says Dimphy. “It takes a lot of time, months to refine the taste.”
Owner Gijs van De Smaak is very happy with Dimphy and the winning chocolate ice cream. “I’m just very proud. Proud that we are being appreciated for the time and energy we put into it.”
Best ice cream parlor in the Netherlands
Ice cream parlors Kees and De Smaak are now competing for the title of Best Ice Cream Parlor in the Netherlands. The five nominees include another Brabant ice cream parlour: Bastani from Eindhoven. The winner will be announced on June 10.
Presenter Ronny wonders why so many good ice cream makers come from Brabant. Gijs van De Smaak: “Good people come from Brabant!”
