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Ah, the simple pleasures of summer. There’s hardly a more appropriate way to spend a lazy summer day than indulging in a time honored trip to the Ice Cream Shop. If those ice cream shops happen to be tucked into the shady, gracious, tree-lined streets of St. Paul, you have an even more perfect way to spend the day. Recently I took my voracious appetite for the simple pleasures of ice cream for a test drive by extending the fun and hitting a number of my favorite places in a makeshift St. Paul Ice Cream Crawl. It was such a tasty adventure I would make it a weekly tradition, if it didn’t mean I’d need to purchase a new wardrobe heavy on the elastic waistband!

Izzy's Ice Cream shop

My favorite spot to hit when embarking on a St. Paul ice cream crawl: Izzy’s. Besides being the official home to the famous Izzy scoop, Marshall Avenue’s modern little nook is nestled between some of the city’s most charming shops, including a specialty store devoted entirely to train enthusiasts – Choo Choo Bob’s Train Store – and a confection shop practically cavity-inducing from window gaze alone, Sweets Bakeshop. Stop into Izzy’s and you’ll be greeted by a friendly staff of eager youngsters, just as happy to serve you a scoop as you are to eat one. Izzy’s rule is easy: pick a flavor and get a free tiny scoop of your choice flavor on top. This is your Izzy scoop.

The Izzy, in all its glory.

Choose wisely. Because while it may seem like a relatively trivial decision, it’s not. Certain tastes align; certain flavors repel. It’s this magical alchemy that elevates Izzy’s above the usual ice cream suspects. Green Apple may sound like a delicious pick, but throw an Izzy scoop of Norwegian Chai on top, and everything changes. Consider it a palate expanding flavor experiment. If you’ll still craving the Green Apple, why not pair it with the Salted Caramel? Be careful though, before you know it you’ll have eaten yourself into an afternoon nap!

For my first flavors of the day, I chose a scoop of Cinnamon with a Norwegian Chai Izzy and my over-indulgent brother/ice cream adventure pal picked a double scoop of Mexican Chocolate Fiesta and Salted Caramel with a Butter Pecan Izzy. The Cinnamon is amazing, delightfully sweet with a kick of spicy zest. The muted Chai flavor would have been great on its own, but just couldn’t compete with the Cinnamon kick. I stole a taste of the Mexican Chocolate Fiesta, which indeed was like a party in my mouth. It had the flavors of a perfect mole sauce – minus the onion/garlic-y taste, of course – with just the right blend of dark cocoa and spice. The Salted Caramel proved to be too salty for a scoop-size portion – perhaps it’s a flavor best kept as an Izzy. The prices are quite reasonable for the exceptional quality. A single scoop goes for $4.75 and a double will only set you back $5.60.

Another vital step in ice cream crawl is the cleansing of the palate, especially since I had my heart set on something fruity for my next scoop and my mouth was still swimming in spice. A great cup of coffee or a cup of cold water should do the trick. Onward!

Grand Ole Creamery

Placing one amazing ice cream parlor so dangerously close to another practically begs for gluttony. Not being ones to pass up a good deadly sin, we acquiesced. Voted one of the “Top Twelve Ice Cream Stops in the Nation” by Saveur Magazine, the Grand Ole Creamery is truly a gem of St. Paul and in atmosphere the antithesis of Izzy’s. In place of a mod-ish, clean design, the Grand Ole Creamery relies more on the nostalgia with malt shop aesthetics. The menu is hand-written. The ice cream is homemade and the shop is full of 1950′s relics. It conjures up thoughts of a simpler time – sans smart phones and On Demand cable – a time when hanging at the ice cream shop was the “cool” thing to do on a hot summer’s day. The array of suspiciously happy-seeming families completed the scene. All the stresses of modern life seem to melt away when a scoop of creamy goodness is in your future…

The Grand Ole Creamery offers what’s known as a “split scoop” for $5.75. Perfect for the indecisive, the split scoop allows you to have all the delicious frills of a double scoop without the extravagant portion size or the calories. So on this stop,

Taste of heaven - a split scoop of Rum Cherry and Black Walnut.

I can pretend to over-indulge as well. I picked a split scoop of Rum Cherry and Black Walnut and my ice cream eating friend chose Cheesecake and Cotton Candy. There are no words to describe the Rum Cherry/Black Walnut combo. It was perfection in a dish. And the Cotton Candy actually melted in my mouth the way real cotton candy does. Beautiful stuff.

The location of Grand Ole Creamery on the East end of the Victoria / Grand shopping district is an invitation for a pleasant stroll through the delightful shops of this bustling and genteel hub. Not to mention a good way to burn off a tiny bit of the calories you’ve just consumed.

With all this ice cream you may be ready for something equally summery but a bit lighter. We headed a bit further east and across the Wabasha Ave. bridge into the District del Sol neighborhood to tiny La Chiquita for a taste of ice cream done Mexican style (helados), or one of the delightful fruit popsicles called paletas. We thought these refreshing treats would be the perfect end to our adventure. Alas, we had forgotten the limited hours (3pm to 8pm) and arrived too early to satisfy our craving for frozen Mexican goodness. Don’t make our mistake. Time your crawl right so you can enjoy the charms of this unique del Sol spot. We took advantage of our location and finished off the day with a lunch at the excellent Grand Dame of Mexican restaurants Boca Chica, which sits directly across the street from La Chiquita. The lightly spicy Mexican staples were a tasty, if incongruous, end to our ice cream jaunt.

Try an Ice Cream Crawl for yourself, or visit just one of these ice cream spots before another summer passes you by. You’re sure to find the perfect flavor combinations to compliment a sunny St. Paul day.

Grand Ole Creamery offers some of the best ice cream in the country according to the National City Search Best Places for Ice Cream in the Nation.  It was also voted Best Ice Cream in the Twin Cities by Mpls/ St. Paul Magazine.

Stop inside Grand Ole Creamery for a scoop of Black Hills Gold, Sweet Cream, Triple Berry Flake,  or any of their thirty-one ( and counting ) flavors of ice cream!  My favorite – Chocolate Malt Banana.  Their flavors range daily, so if you don’t see the specific flavor you’ve craved all day, they are sure to have a least one to please your aching taste buds!  Taste as many samples as you want, until you find the right one.

When you arrive, don’t be surprised if the line is out the door – and literally down the street!  People are willing to wait 30 minutes in line,  just to get a hand-rolled waffle cone and their favorite flavor of homemade ice cream.  Once you enter the doors, you immediately breath in the smell of freshly made waffle cones.  You can choose an original waffle cone or you can get it adorned with flavors such as Cinnabun or Birthday Cake.  A small cup or cone will cost you around $4.00, and if you want a large waffle cone (complete with a whopper on the bottom), it will put you back about $5.25.

Along with the scoops of ice cream, there are also sundaes and malts on the menu as well.  Celebrating a birthday party?  There are ice cream cakes too!  And a new item on their menu — ice cream pizza.  Cakes range from $21-40 and pies will cost you $16.

If ice cream is your thing, another great option is Izzy’s! Izzy’s has 32 flavors of  homemade artisan ice cream that rotates daily.  If you don’t want to be dissapointed by your favorite flavor not being there, no fear – Flavor Up is here!  Flavor Up allows you to see every 3 minutes, what flavors are available to you.  Who knew an ice cream shop could be so high tech!

Cupcake lover? Izzy’s makes ice cream cupcakes for $4.20 or $3 when you buy 4 or more – what a deal!  Izzy’s also offers different flavors of ice cream made with soy for the lactose intolerant ice cream fanatics.

Visit one or visit both – you won’t be disappointed!

Grand Ole Creamery                    Izzy’s Ice Cream Cafe

750 Grand Avenue                               2034 Marshall Ave

Saint Paul, MN 55105                          Saint Paul, MN 55104

(651) 293-1655                                      (651) 603-1458

As someone who has lived in a lot of different states and cities, I’m continually impressed by the sheer number of active and outdoor options in St. Paul. Whenever I’m stuck for something to do or somewhere to go, I pull out a list of local parks or the city’s bike-hike trail map and always find a new place to go, or am reminded of an old favorite.

Today was one of those days. My 1-year-old just didn’t want to nap, so rather than fight it or do the same old thing in our backyard, I packed up my baby, my baby carrier and set off for a good, long walk.

I drove down Summit Avenue until it dead-ended at a parking lot on Mississippi River Road. From here, choose your direction. You can walk, run, bike, or rollerblade on the flat, smoothly-paved trail that runs both north and south along the bluff.

I prefer heading south toward the Ford plant. The right side of the trail is packed full of trees, and if you stop to peer through the densely-packed leaves, you’ll see the steep drop leading down to the Mississippi River. (Come back in late fall and you’ll have an expansive river view.) Benches perched along the trail make great spots to take a water break with your SIGG. High-end dream homes with perfectly manicured and landscaped lawns line the left side of the trail, on the other side of the street. Sure, there’s some traffic on the road next to the trail, but one of the things I like about urban trails and parks is the juxtaposition of gorgeous nature scenery and the “alive” feeling of people going about their business.

Today we walked 1.8 miles to the Ford Dam Scenic Overlook, which comes up shortly after passing under Ford Parkway. By the time you turn around and walk back, you’ve completed a nearly 4-mile walk! If you keep heading south/southeast, the trail meets all the way up with Hidden Falls Regional Park, and beyond that, with Crosby Farm.

After working up a sweat, I couldn’t pass up my craving for Izzy’s ice cream on the way home. What I love best about Izzy’s (aside from the ice cream obviously) is that it caters to one of my worst traits: my indecisiveness—especially when it comes to choosing just one flavor out of 20-something really amazing flavors. For the un-Izzied, here’s how it works: when you order a single or double scoop, you get an Izzy on top. An Izzy is a mini scoop just right for sampling a second flavor. My all-time favorite flavor is salted caramel, but their sorbets are tantalizing, too, so an Izzy of the coconut sorbet was just right. So much for all those calories I just walked off!