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I’ve never really liked ice cream sundaes. Aside from the sheer size of the monsters, too often the ice cream is smothered in one overly sweet sauce after another, lots of higgledy piggledy toppings and in the end tastes of nothing but sugar. We spend so much time and effort making our ice cream flavours stand-alone-fantastic that is seems disrespectful to treat them as a mere vessel for sugar excess.

So I’ve approached the development of our first-ever range of ice cream sundaes with less than appropriate enthusiasm. But I was at Clarke’s Dining a week or two ago with a group of friends, and the clever peeps at Clarke’s have started serving our peanut butter ice cream in sundae form, with slivered almonds, caramel sauce and hot brownies on top. Now, I haven’t eaten much of this creation, for the simple reason that my fellow diners inhaled the four we’d ordered to, ahem, share, in ten seconds flat. Everyone was so excited and enthusiastic about the sundaes, that my resistance, well, melted. I’m a sucker for enthusiasm, whether it’s for a rare type of beetle only found in the Tankwa Karoo, or my husband’s inexplicable adoration for lol cats. Something that can elicit enthusiasm from our awesome customers? I’m there.

So as a starting point we’ve spent some time developing the foundation sauces for any self-respecting sundae – chocolate, fudge, caramel – and a lot of time daydreaming about awesome names and delicious flavour combinations. I really enjoy pairing flavours, it’s such a fun exercise in creativity, and so my mindset has gone from grudgingly acknowledging the universal appeal of sundaes, to considering the various elements of a finely tuned, ice cream-starring, composite dessert.

Our sundaes will have three main components – ice cream (but of course), a preferably warm sauce, and a textural component, like a cookie or brownie, nut, fruit or candy (all made by us). Some might have more going on, but that’s our basic premise (don’t get me started on the larger debate, “What defines an ice cream sundae?”). We will be serving both single scoop and double scoop sundaes at the Neighbourgoods Market on Saturdays, and then based on its success we will hopefully take the concept to other markets and events. We will be starting with a simple menu of two sundaes, which will change each week. Customers can swap out the ice cream flavours with others in our scoop counter if they wish.

Here are some initial names and pairings. If you have any creative (winter appropriate) sundae names or ideas, please send them our way!

Banana Split halved & flambeed banana, hot chocolate sauce, ginger ice cream

(The Elvis Variation substitute peanut butter ice cream for the ginger ice cream)

Hot Fudge Brownie chocolate brownie cubes, hot fudge sauce, vanilla ice cream

Resistance Crumbles rhubarb compote, crumble topping, caramel ice cream

‘Smores toasted marshmallow, graham cracker crumble topping, hot chocolate sauce, coffee ice cream

Apple 3.142 baked apples, hot caramel sauce, pie crust cookie, farm cream ice cream

Clockwork Orange orange curd sauce, chocolate brownie numbers,  milk chocolate ice cream

Monkey Business spiced pecans, caramel sauce, banana ice cream

Lemon Meringue almond meringues, marshmallow sauce, lemon ice cream