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HomeOpinionNYC's Van Leeuwen BBQ cornbread ice cream grilled by The Post

NYC’s Van Leeuwen BBQ cornbread ice cream grilled by The Post


Have we got a scoop for you.

Brooklyn’s own popular Van Leeuwen has released a new, outlandish flavor of ice cream that melds the summer favorites of cornbread and barbecue sauce into an impressive, $10.50 pint that’s not for the faint of heart.

Aptly named BBQ Gold Cornbread Crumble, it’s a homey concoction of sweet harvest corn ice cream with thick chunks of cornbread and a mighty kick of barbecue sauce “swirl” to top things off.

Slabs of the extreme, limited-edition combo — which follows fellow Van Leeuwen wildcards like Kraft mac ‘n’ cheese and Hidden Valley Ranch dressing ice cream — were offered for free at select locations throughout the Big Apple on Tuesday. It’s also available exclusively on Uber Eats or in any VL brick and mortar location.

Whether it’s worth it to try or buy, well, buckle up, pardner, because The Post has opinions as strong as the ice cream.


The Post’s Alex Mitchell (right) and Ben Cost tried a barbecue-sauce-and-cornbread-flavored ice cream.
Stefano Giovannini

Reactions were mixed.
A missteak or well done? Reviews are mixed.
Stefano Giovannini

Alex’s take: BBQ misses the bullseye

Quoting Jeff Goldblum’s character in “Jurassic Park”: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.”

This ice cream pulls no punches. It’s an attempt at the classic sweet and savory all in one gimmick, but lands a few bulls short of a rodeo.

No matter how you slice it (or in this case, swirl it), barbecue sauce harmonizes poorly as a dessert component. My whole body honestly jerked back like Kramer from “Seinfeld” during a first taste.


Van Leeuwen's barbeque sauce flavored ice cream is quite polarizing.
Van Leeuwen’s aptly named BBQ Gold Cornbread Crumble is quite polarizing.
Stefano Giovannini

The condiment has far too much zest and its taste is overbearing to the point you forget it’s meant to be accompanying ice cream.

At first, perhaps complex neurons of the human brain can rationalize barbecue sauce as some sort of exotic chocolate drizzle, but that wears off quickly as one tries to process all the other tastes.

This weapons-grade act of overdoing it is especially a shame because the cornbread chunks can fend for themselves in ice cream — sans BBQ sauce — with a palatable, textured and cookielike taste.

Even the conservative “vanilla or chocolate” crowd could enjoy just that sprinkled on their treats.

Moral of the story: This pint ain’t big enough for the both of them, and barbecue sauce is the outlaw in this showdown.


The Post's Alex Mitchell (L) and Ben Cost tried barbeque sauce and cornbread flavored ice cream.
“This ice cream pulls no punches. It’s an attempt at the classic sweet and savory all in one gimmick, but lands a few bulls short of a rodeo,” Alex writes.

Van Leeuwen created a corn bread and barbeque sauce flavor ice cream.
A pint of the extreme, limited edition combo costs $10.50.
Uber One x Van Leeuwen

Ben’s take: The perfect gift for your ex

Unlike the ice cream, this review is short and sweet.

A challenge for fast foods off the beaten palate is bringing improbable-seeming flavor combos to life — in junk food form. Most amount to a combo of artificial fixings that taste like a mix of food coloring additives.

Van Leeuwen does, well, an admirable job trying to impossibly condense the essence and even texture of BBQ sauce and corn bread, like a frozen version of the three-course dinner gum from “Willy Wonka.”

But perhaps in the case of this discordant, sweet-savory mashup, that’s not a plus.


Ben Cost (L) was not a fan of the flavor either.
“It tasted acrid and sour, like someone literally spilled BBQ sauce on cornbread and mashed it into a tub of vanilla ice cream,” Ben wrote.
Stefano Giovannini

It tasted acrid and sour, like someone literally spilled BBQ sauce on cornbread and then mashed both into a tub of vanilla ice cream.

In conclusion, BBQ sauce, cornbread and ice cream are great — on their own.

Combining them is akin to blending ammonia and bleach together to create a volatile mustard gas for your taste buds.

That’s coming from a guy who drank beer through a hot dog.



This story originally appeared on NYPost

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