Centre County has many ice cream spots. Get the scoop on a hidden gem that’s worth the trip

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When you think of ice cream in Centre County, most minds likely turn to the Penn State Berkey Creamery or maybe even Meyer Dairy. Those spots are undoubtedly great, but there’s a hidden gem known only to locals that’s been serving up delicious sweet treats since 2008.

Sweet Dreams Ice Cream shop, owned by Snow Shoe natives Tina and Gary Hicks, has been been a staple in the Mountaintop area since I was just 9 years old. It’s a spot that I’ve made a necessity for friends and family alike every summer since it opened, even after moving from the area.

Located at 446 E. Sycamore Road, just off the Snow Shoe exit of Interstate 80, Sweet Dreams has just about everything that an ice cream enthusiast could imagine. There are cones and dishes of Hershey’s hard ice cream or creamy soft serve ice cream, thick milkshakes, sundaes with goods baked by Tina Hick’s own hands and even their own take on the Dairy Queen’s classic “Blizzard” — the “Dream Freeze.”

“The Dream Freeze is one of our most popular items,” Tina Hicks recently told the Centre Daily Times. “Although something else that gets a lot of hits is our sundaes. We do sundaes with brownies and other bakes goods and I make them all by hand — I bake them earlier in the week in preparation for our open hours and then bring them into the shop for our sundaes when we’re open.”

The shop even offers gluten and dairy-free options, as well as sugar-free cones.

While the shop has grown in popularity in Snow Shoe and the surrounding areas, it took time to get the business off the ground.

“We didn’t do any advertising and we didn’t have much of a social media presence either,” Tina Hicks said. “But as the months and years passed, each summer we’d get more and more people, until eventually Sweet Dreams became what it is now, and the majority of it has been done just through word of mouth.”

Sweet Dreams took a hit during the COVID-19 pandemic, but made adjustments that have stuck.

“It took a bit of creative engineering, but during the pandemic we turned our shop into a ‘come inside and order,’ place, to a ‘come order at the window and eat outside place,’” Tina Hicks said. “It was honestly the best thing that could’ve happened to us because we were not only able to serve a lot more people that way, but we were also able to have a bit more wiggle room for myself and the other employees in the shop.”

Sweet Dreams primarily employs students, giving them an opportunity to garner crucial work experience before graduating and moving onto life after high school. Gary Hicks said that despite their young age, the workers at Sweet Dreams are always “hardworking,” and “good with what they do.”

Personally, my favorite part about Sweet Dreams is the smiling faces that greet you every time you walk up to the window.

Growing up, Sweet Dreams would always be a go-to after a long day of playing out in the sun. My mom would routinely take me and my sister there, and as the years have passed, Tina and Gary have never failed to greet customers with a smile.

During the summer, it felt like the many residents in the Mountaintop area would treat Sweet Dreams as the local watering hole, coming to cool themselves off with an ice cream cone or milkshake. The line to the window was usually long, but the friends you’d see and talk with there would always make the wait go by quickly.

According to Tina Hicks, the two main goals of the ice cream shop have always been to bring quality ice cream to a town that hasn’t always had it, and to put a smile on the face of anyone who decided to make the trip to Sweet Dreams.

“I come from a long line of ice cream-eaters in my family and when we started the shop, I thought that it was due time to bring some quality ice cream to this place,” she said. “No matter who you are, we want to make sure you leave here with a smile on your face and a good sweat treat in your belly.”

Sweet Dreams Ice Cream held its opening day April 13 and will be open through fall. The shop is open from 5-9 p.m. on Thursdays and Fridays and from 1-9 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays.