Ice cream, frozen custard, sorbet: Must-try flavors, according to 12 metro Detroit shops

What can ice cream do?

It helps us celebrate on special occasions and consoles us during difficult ones.

Its memory-making power reminds us of racing to catch the ice cream truck as its tune floated through the windows and childhood afternoons spent gobbling up vanilla and chocolate twist cones.

It can sweeten a first date or improve a road trip.

Maybe, most of all, it can put the exclamation point on summer nights.

Whatever the reason — whether for nostalgia, comfort, joy or just because — there are plenty of shops in metro Detroit where you can soothe your sweet tooth with scoops of ice cream, swirls of frozen custard, vegan soft serve, sorbet and more.

This list is by no means exhaustive. There are many, many, many options.

But if you’re out and about, here are some must-try flavors, according to a dozen local shops.

A cherry ice cream studded with fruit

When asked what the must-try ice cream is at Calder Dairy and Farm, Jennifer Burley, manager at the farm store in Carleton, thought for a second. “There’s actually a lot,” she said with a chuckle, when reached in July. Calder, its website says, makes more than 30 flavors on the farm. Burley said one popular choice is black cherry, studded with big chunks of the dark red fruit. Other top flavors include butter pecan, cake batter and Bloo Moo, which has a bright blue hue. To visit, Calder has three locations: 1020 Southfield Road in Lincoln Park, 28190 Telegraph Road in Flat Rock and at the farm at 9334 Finzel Road in Carleton. On top of sweet treats, a trip to the Carleton location also offers a chance to mingle with farm animals, including some friendly goats.

A sought-after banana soft serve

The special soft serve flavor at Doug's Delight in Hazel Park changes almost weekly, but there's a particularly popular one customers keep coming back for — banana. When available, it's the base for the shop's banana cream pie "Dougie," which is like a flurry, and has been a top seller, said Mo Marzullo, who runs the shop with her husband. They also own Matt and Mo's Italian Beef, which operates out of Doug's. The shop also sells scoopable ice cream from Northville-based Guernsey Farms Dairy and has a Dougie featuring Sanders Bumpy Cake. The banana soft serve isn't always available, but it's on rotation and the shop frequently posts its available flavors on Facebook. Doug's Delight is located at 24110 John R Road in Hazel Park.

A coconut-encrusted custard

At Bob-Jo's Frozen Custard — a Downriver landmark now in its 76th year — the topping is, easily, toasted coconut, said manager Cristina Booza. Encrusting the outside of the custard soft serve, customers will pair it with any flavor, she said. But her personal favorite is vanilla, in a waffle cone and rolled in the toasty coconut bits. The shop offers other concoctions, including frozen yogurt, hard scoops of chocolate and vanilla custard and sundaes, but the soft serve custard cones are bestsellers. And if you order a large, be prepared. "We don’t skimp," Booza said. "I mean, our cones are big." Bob-Jo's is located at 4071 Fort St. in Wyandotte.

A scoop that's like pudding in a cone

The banana pudding ice cream at MJ's North End Ice Cream Parlor in Detroit is so popular, customers don't just buy it by the scoop. "We have people literally come and buy three pints ... and then another one to hide in their house just in case it goes missing,” said Amber Justice, whose family owns and runs the shop, where she is head of marketing and social media. The shop sells Hershey's Ice Cream, which describes the flavor on its website as banana ice cream with marshmallow swirls and vanilla wafer cookies. Justice said other favorites include Superman ice cream and banana splits. MJ's North End Ice Cream Parlor — which also offers sundaes, vegan options and ice cream sandwiches that customers can customize — is located at 8801 Oakland Ave. in Detroit.

A summer special: Pie and ice cream in one

On a recent trip to Ray's Ice Cream, customers were lined up out the door to the sidewalk, waiting to grab some scoops from the long-running Royal Oak shop, which offers dozens of flavors each day. For the summer, that includes the popular seasonal favorite blueberry pie, Macy Hill, a manager at the shop, said in July. She described the sweet concoction as vanilla ice cream, layered with blueberry jam and pie crust. Another favorite, she said, is the salted caramel mocha chip. Ray's Ice Cream — which offers other treats like sundaes, ice cream sandwiches, cream puffs and banana splits — is located at 4233 Coolidge in Royal Oak.

A classic that's always a favorite

Guernsey Farms Dairy makes dozens of ice cream flavors, but third generation co-owner Joe Kinville said the top sellers are always the classics: vanilla, chocolate and butter pecan. What makes good ice cream, he said, is the base mix formula. Guernsey sources raw milk from a Grand Rapids farm, uses pure cane sugar and makes everything from scratch. Kinville said they "do things a little bit different in our processing to caramelize the sugars. ... There’s just different things like that, that make something as simple as a chocolate ice cream different from every manufacturer.” Asked to describe their chocolate ice cream, he said it has a lot of butterfat, giving it a good mouth feel. Guernsey's scoop shop and restaurant are located at 21300 Novi Road in Northville.

A nod to the biggest cookie fan of all

Treat Dreams has a rotating menu of ice cream options (sometimes surprising ones like ketchup and lobster bisque), but owner Scott Moloney was clear on the flagship flavor: Kooky Monster. The blue vanilla ice cream, packed with cookie dough and Oreos, has been on the menu since the Ferndale shop opened in 2010 and was inspired, of course, by the Cookie Monster. “I really don’t think we’d even be in business today if we didn’t have Kooky Monster," Moloney said. Treat Dreams, which also offers flavors like salted butterscotch and dark chocolate chocolate chip, is now in a few locations: 22965 Woodward Ave. in Ferndale; 4160 Cass Ave. in Detroit and 621 E. Eleven Mile Road in Madison Heights. In an interview in July, Moloney said a location was soon to open in Grosse Pointe Woods.

A Girl Scout cookie-inspired sundae

At Cold Truth Soft Serve, which exclusively serves vegan ice cream, a go-to for manager Angelia Smith is a sundae based on Girl Scout Samoas. It starts with scratch-made vegan sweet cream soft serve, topped with dark chocolate drizzle, toasted coconut and caramel. "That is always such a delicious combo,” Smith said in July. The shop, which Smith said uses coconut cream and oat milk for its base, has rotating soft serve flavors and also offers treats like ice cream sandwiches and homemade gluten-free waffle cones. Cold Truth Soft Serve's address is 4240 Cass Ave., Suite 100, in Detroit, but the walk-up window is around the corner on West Canfield Street.

A lemony layered dessert

Some of the ice cream treats at The Creamery on Main in Armada are grand — both in size and appearance. Customers could just grab a scoop of ice cream (made by Michigan-based Ashby's Sterling Ice Cream). Or, they could get a parfait, customized with the flavor and toppings of their choice. "They are very fun, they’re filling," said Emily Sawitzky, who co-owns the shop with her mom. A popular one, she said, is blueberry lemon cheesecake, layered with Lemon Cheesecake Bar ice cream, blueberry sauce and cheesecake nibbles and topped with whipped cream. Other favorites include a German chocolate parfait and loaded shakes, which are piled with goodies like cupcakes and ice cream bars, Sawitzky said. The Creamery on Main is located at 23090 E. Main St. in Armada.

A honey-infused artisanal treat

In downtown Detroit, artisanal ice cream shop Milk & Froth, which started in 2018 as a food truck, sells flavors like Peanut Butter Brittle, Sea Salt Butter Cake and Roasted Strawberry, a nondairy option made from coconut cream blended with roasted strawberries and layered with strawberry compote, according to the shop's website. "What makes our ice cream special is that we make everything from scratch," said co-founder and CEO Deion Cao. He said his favorite is Honeycomb, which the website describes as a "raw-honey infused custard featuring with chunks of homemade honeycomb brittle." Milk & Froth is located on the Congress Street side of the Buhl Building downtown.

A treat inspired by Michigan's crummy roads

Michigan's potholes are so notorious, they warrant frequent news coverage, wreak havoc on tires, frustrate drivers and, apparently, inspire creamy confections. Michigan Pot Hole, a flavor created by Ashby's Sterling Ice Cream, can be found at shops across the state, including Scoop and Twist of Macomb, where owner Tanya Balcom said it's a top seller. "The name itself makes it interesting for people," she said. On its website, Ashby's describes the flavor as "thick, black-tar fudge in chocolate ice cream with chunks of chocolate asphalt." Scoop and Twist of Macomb, which also offers a number of other Ashby's flavors, is located at 21912 Twenty-three Mile Road in Macomb.

And finally ... a sweet sorbet made with Redpop

Ice Cream Detroit plans to open a brick-and-mortar location on Second Avenue in Detroit's Midtown this fall, specializing in alcohol-infused ice cream and sorbet. But nonalcoholic versions of some of owner Ysahai Honor-Marie's small-batch creations are available now at her pop-up inside of Detroit Soul in the city's Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood. At the restaurant, her Virgin Ice Cream Bar offers a handful of ice cream flavors (including vanilla bean and butter pecan), treats like milkshakes and floats and the shop's signature sorbet made with strawberries and Faygo Redpop. "Everyone loves it, everyone loves it," she said. The Ice Cream Detroit pop-up is located inside of Detroit Soul at 14300 E. Jefferson Ave.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Must-try flavors at 12 metro Detroit ice cream, frozen custard shops