10 Great Vegan Ice Cream Shops

When temperatures are rising, your desire to don a swimsuit and run through a sprinkler (or into a pool) decidedly increases. One addition to the list? Ice cream. Hot on the heels of our July+August issue, which features vegan soft serve and ice cream recipes galore, we went coast-to-coast to round up 10 of the tastiest frozen treat shops.

1. Atomic #7 (Henderson, NV)
The certified vegan scoops from this organic ice cream shop are nothing short of out-of-this-world. Each scoop is made to-order: fill out the reusable menu with a wax pencil to make your ice cream creation. Vegans can choose between four different non-dairy milks, three sweeteners, and add-ins such as bananas Foster, cookie dough, and salted butter caramel sauce.

2. iCream (Chicago, IL)
Similar to Atomic #7, diners are able to create custom scoops of ice cream, pudding, and sorbet, all which can be made vegan. Starting with a soymilk base and creating flavors like burnt sugar, hazelnut, and chocolate (not to mention tons of mix-ins), your creation is then blasted with liquid nitrogen to create a cold, delicious delight.

3. KindKreme (Los Angeles, CA)
This gourmet raw and vegan ice cream parlor elevates ice cream flavors from classic to crazy. Who wants chocolate when you can have chocolate salted caramel or chocolate almond butter made with a mixture of almond, cashew, and coconut milk? Don’t worry, there’s plain chocolate too.

4. Sweet Ritual (Austin, TX)
It began as scoops out of a local toy store, but thanks to a lot of happy customers and a successful Kickstarter campaign, Sweet Ritual will soon be opening a storefront, serving chocolate and lavender milkshakes and coconut- and soy-based soft serve in flavors such as peanut butter, faux Butterfinger, and chai tea with vanilla.

5. Lula’s Sweet Apothecary (New York, NY)
It’s hard to make a decision at the all-vegan Lula’s. With cake batter soft serve and peanut butter and jelly ice cream, chocolate and peanut butter fudge, jars of vegan candy and chocolate, sundaes, and homemade coconut whipped cream, never mind making a decision. It will be hard to ever leave!

6. The Ice Cream House (Brooklyn, NY)
This ice cream shop has several locations in Brooklyn, serving both certified Kosher and certified vegan ice cream (on separate sides of the counter and using separate scoops, no less!). The shop’s vegan offerings include hard ice cream, soft serve, and ice cream cakes. If you’re a lover of classic flavors such as mint chocolate chip and coffee, make sure to stop by for a scoop or two.

7. Stogo (New York, NY)
Another of New York’s 100-percent vegan ice cream shops, Stogo serves 40 flavors of sorbets and ice creams made out of hemp, coconut, and soymilk. Want some cake to go with your red velvet cupcake ice cream? No problem—Stogo also offers delicious desserts from local vegan shops including Babycakes NYC and Cocoa V.

8. Scoops (Los Angeles, CA)
If you’re looking for inventive, tasty frozen treats, Scoops is the place to be. While the bacon jalapeño cheddar flavor is not vegan (lucky for us!), salty chocolate, strawberry pomegranate, and maple Oreo are. Do those sound good? Well you better hurry, because flavors change constantly.

9. Full Tilt (Seattle, WA)
With three locations in Seattle, head to any of them for some coconut-milk-based apple pie or Mayan chocolate ice cream, and grab a vegan waffle cone while you’re at it. Their flavors are also available wholesale, in case you want to fill your entire freezer with three-gallon tubs of vegan ice cream. And who doesn’t, really?

10. Sweet Action Ice Cream (Denver, CO)
Sweet Action serves up both vegan and non-vegan sweetness in cones, ice-cream sandwiches, take-home cartons, and more. Vegan strawberry balsamic, raspberry, cinnamon roll, and strawberry rhubarb crumble are just a few of the shop’s offerings. We’d have been happy with those, but then we discovered they have snickerdoodle.

Did we miss your favorite vegan ice cream spot? Let us know in the comments!

Photo courtesy of Hannah Kaminsky