The Final Spring 2009 NYC Post: #3 - Ice Cream Shoppe Love.

My sister Jenny is serious about vegan ice cream.

Not only did she enjoy the Coconut Vanilla flavor at Stogo so much she ordered it twice, she almost cracked a real smile.

I had ice cream twice from NYC vegan ice cream shoppe Stogo and once from Lula's while on my vacation last month. At Stogo's, one day was cold, while the other day was sweltering, meaning the end of the world, of course. Both visits included fabulous friends from the PPK forums. Right off the bat, don't ask me to pick a favorite between the two shoppes!

Alright, I will - Lula's was cuter and more old fashioned, and sweetly vegan owned, but I liked the actual ice cream at the yuppie-gelato shop style Stogo more when it comes down to it. Whatever, go to both! Definitely go to Lula's, I still really liked my ice cream and experience there, as you'll see more below. It's adorable!

Witness the Panda and Bazu eat ice cream.

The Stogo selection - of course we tasted a few, like the salted pecan caramel - whoa.

I like how it's all fancy gelato style.

Coffee ice cream.  This! hot day! This! This!

My favorite from Stogo, and from all 3 ice cream stops (again - 2 at Stogo, 1 at Lula's)  Visit #2 was with Amanda and Gory. 

My coffee, Mike's Chocolate Brownie or Chocolate Coconut, I forget which.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookie -

how could I not? This was my first flavor, and it was good! and creamy!,

but a teeny weeny leeny yeeny bit lacking in flavor and sweetness.

Really!

  This thread is actually backyards - the first place we went to was Lula's!

The Panda with her ice cream cone!

I almost went for the cake batter soft serve, but the sample I tried was a bit on thin side, though the flavor was everything the 5 year old inside me wanted.

I opted for the classic Chocolate Peanut Butter- 

anytime a combination of these two is more peanut butter than chocolate, I'm down.

Behind the scenes of Where's the Revolution?

Lula's full name is Lula's Sweet Apothecary. Not just vegan ice cream, but vegan sweets as well, like these chocolate covered pretzels, and truffles in the background.  Evan of Bjorked Off! has a love song of a post here you should check out!

The Lula's case.

Oh hey, how about my routine obligatory trip to Long Island?  

I was there for less than 6 hours, saw my grandfather, my great Aunt Helen, my friend Alyse again, and had a bizarre meal at the 'upscale' coffeehouse turned fancy restaurant Milk & Sugar in Bay Shore.

This latte hurt my head.  Raspberry, with a freaking piece of rock candy.

We sat down, ordered our coffee, and were then presented with this bread and a dinner menu.  Ignore the butter, obviously.

My sister asked if the housemade 'Milk' veggie burger was vegan, and it actually was, so I went for it. It's not very often one gets the chance to order a housemade vegan burger in the city they were born in! Alyse had one as well, though Jenny opted for the real thing. The sealed tiny bottle of ketchup on every plate pissed me off so much.

One more family shot for the road - my brother, Rick, at Milon.

celeb sightings.

I'm sorry that I lack the skills or determination to zoom in on this photo, but on our way from Lula's to Stogo, Bazu and I nearly shit our pants with smiles when we passed Alan Cumming walking one dog and holding another on the street. That's him in the orange. And on my first day in NYC, I walked by Jorma Taccone of Lonely Planet at the Union Square farmers market. Wondering who that is?  He starts with Andy Samberg in the Jizz in My Pants video, duh.

The end!  

For more:

NYC 2009 Food Porn #1, featuring Veg Dim Sum House

NYC 2009 Food Porn #2, featuring Soy & Sake

And follow Get Sconed! on twitter, if you dare.

Next: The great Vegan Brunch post, where I'll feature everything I made as a recipe tester!