When it comes to ice cream innovation, Ohio takes the cake.
From the waffle cone to the banana split, pioneering Ohioans have shaped the way the treat is consumed for over a century.
That’s because, as recently as 2002, more than 3,000 dairies were sprinkled across the state.
“When you've got extra milk, you make cheese, you make yogurt, and then eventually you make ice cream, thankfully,” said Renee Casteel Cook, author of "Ohio Ice Cream: A Scoop of History."
Last year, Ohio ranked third in the nation for hard ice cream production. And the state’s ice cream trail now boasts 150 stops, from small town shops like the Bluffton Dari Freeze to national names like Graeter’s.
A scoop of Graeter’s ice cream
“If you take a deep breath in you can smell the cocoa powder in the air,” said Andy Connolly, the director of production planning for Graeter’s Ice Cream.
Standing on the floor of a production room, he points out the processes that turn 300 gallon totes of milk into 16 ounce pints of black raspberry chip and butter pecan.
“The noise in the background is our cocoa powder being blended with milk and sugar to make our chocolate base for tonight," he said.
From there, it’s poured into two-gallon French pots where it slowly churns over a chilled salt solution until it freezes into the melt-in-your-mouth texture of soft serve.
Then come the fixings: workers add Oreo cookies, pecan pieces or the melted chocolate that hardens and breaks into Graeter’s signature chocolate chips.
“We have about 25 team members in this kind of small room working shoulder to shoulder with each other to churn out about 6,000 gallons of ice cream a day,” he said.
That’s a lot more than Louis Charles Graeter made when he first started selling scoops from a cart in Cincinnati more than 150 years ago. Still, Graeter’s has stuck with its French pot method — freezing two gallons of ice cream at a time.
Ohio ice cream innovations
While Graeter’s is rooted in tradition, Casteel Cook said much of Ohio ice cream is known for its innovation.
“So the story of the ice cream cone goes all the way back to the World's Fair,” she said. “The Menches brothers from the Akron area – a lot of people know them because they invented the hamburger as well – they were at the world’s fair with their big tent and they were actually making waffles.”
One of the brothers wanted a young woman he was courting to try ice cream. She didn’t want to drip on her dress, so as the story goes, he wrapped her ice cream in a crisp waffle to help her stay clean.
Then, there’s the banana split, debatably invented at Ernest Hazard’s restaurant in Wilmington.
“The owner was looking to develop something that would bring the college students from Wilmington College into the business,” Casteel Cook said. “And he actually challenged all of his staff to come up with something, but he didn’t like any of their creations.”
So he made his own. He split a banana down the middle, topped it with scoops of his flavors and dubbed it the banana split.
A Youngstown candy maker is credited with inventing the first ice cream truck. Ohio State researchers helped create chocolate-coated drumsticks. And a Mansfield dairy developed the Klondike bar.
What’s next for Ohio’s ice cream scene?
Casteel Cook says new twists on the classic dessert keep coming, like unexpected flavors from Columbus-based Jeni’s.
“I remember when she did everything bagel ice cream,” Casteel Cook said. “[That was] very polarizing. Most people either absolutely loved it or absolutely hated it.”
Graeter’s is innovating too. Earlier this year it released its Skyline Chili Spice ice cream.
“Off the top of your head, you might think, ‘Pasta, meat sauce, cheese, how's that going to work in ice cream?’” said Bob Graeter, a fourth generation ice cream maker. “It actually turned out really well.”
So whether you’re in the mood for a scoop of something new, or if you’d prefer to stick with a classic, Ohio has you covered.
