While Dave and I were in Italy I received an invitation to attend the opening day of Crème Glaceé in the Franschhoek Valley. The ice creams are made by Janine van Zyl (Cold Gold Artisan Ice Cream) and the shop in Franschhoek is owned by Adri-Ann Oosthuizen. The invitation was for any time after 9am and so at 12h30 I left my office in Strand to drive the 52 km to Franschhoek. The trip there should take me 50 minutes but as I caught the school run, it took me over an hour.
The flavours will change every day and when I arrived there were 4 sorbets on offer and 9 ice creams. Unfortunately the fridge had been set on the warmest setting and so many of the ice creams were melted. Adri-Ann admitted to not quite knowing how the freezer works and so I hope my suggestion of her turning it colder helped chill the ice creams. You can choose from a mini scoop (R10) to a tasting platter (R100) but I am not sure how the scoops are served as all I had were a few tasting spoons.
I started with what Adri-Ann considers to be her favourite which was the toasted marshmallow ice cream. If I had not been told what it was I would not have been able to guess the flavour. I was intrigued by the blue cheese and honey ice cream and the blue cheese was really evident in this ice cream. Then I moved on to the koeksister ice cream which I was told is made from actual koeksisters. I expected sticky sweet but it had quite a mild flavour. After that I decided to try the licourice ice cream as I had quite a lot of this in Italy. It was good! It has a real licourice flavour which is one of my favourites. I also tasted the chocolate which was very moreish. I felt it was important to give Adri-Ann feedback on each ice cream before trying one sorbet. My choice was the strawberry sorbet and it was scrummy, tasting of freshly picked strawberries.
Adri-Ann told me that the ice creams are made from organic produce which is locally sourced and that there are no preservatives in the ice creams. I think this is fantastic as supporting local industry is what will keep our local economy strong.
My visit was short and a slight let down as by the time I got home I had spent over 2 hours in my car for a 15 minute stop and driven 110 kilometers for 6 tasting spoons of ice cream. There was no media pack of any sort with any information on the artisan ice creams. If I happen to be in Franschhoek I will pop into the shop to see if they have sorted out the issue of the ice cream melting and buy myself a scoop to enjoy while walking through the village.
Find them at Shop 4, Huguenot Square, Huguenot Road, Franschhoek.
Disclosure: I was invited to the opening. I was not required to write a blog post about my experience. All opinions in this blog post are my own. This post is in line with my blogging policy.
Thx for your honest review Tandy. I was also invited but said I couldn’t take time off work. Was glad I didn’t. That is flippen far to go for 6 spoons of ice cream :/ xx
I was slightly upset at the waste of time as I declined another invitation for the day to do this.
I love the way you humbly describe your upsets, Tandy…..
That’s too kind of you, i hope your next review will be more pleased!
Thank you for the compliment Dedy 🙂
That sounds lovely – well, apart from the fridge failure!! 🙂
Thanks Rachel, the ice cream flavours were good!
Eeek, sorry to hear that you had to drive so far for such little ice cream 🙁
It was quite a waste of time!
Bummer about the ice cream melting. Hopefully they’ll get that resolved soon!
I hope so to Monet 🙂
Hi Tandy! I’m so glad I had catering work on that day, or I too would have travelled from CT for 6 spoonfuls of icecream. Not exactly an ‘opening’ to be invited for? I’m sure if I walk into San Marco at the Waterfront today and ask to try before I buy they’ll give me the same. I do wish them success with the shop though, the icecreams sound good.
The ice creams are good!
Licorice flavor in a ice cream sounds pretty delicious! Yum!
It is one of my favourites 🙂
hopefully they get it right soon
I hope so too!
Helo Tandy
Thank you for taking the time and effort to write this review, I have sorted out the freezer in Franschhoek and you are welcome to come to my shop in Stellenbosch for a triple scoop on me anytime today or tomorrow morning, just sms me what time you will be coming and I am so sorry that it was a waste of your time=( 074 1825510
Dear Janine,
thank you for taking the time to read the review and respond. I am glad to hear that the freezer has been sorted out. Thank you so much for the invitation to come through to Stellenbosch but unfortunately I will not be able to make it today or tomorrow. I wish you a fantastic festive season.
Kind regards
Tandy
Whenever you have time just pop me an email:) vzjanine@hotmail.com
I will do that, thank you 🙂