Update: Van Leeuwen Columbus is Open!
Van Leeuwen Ice Cream is growing rapidly, with several recent openings and several more on the horizon. Their second UWS location will be located at 253 Columbus Avenue (between 71st and 72nd Streets). They’ve recently opened in Hudson Yards and Prospect Heights, and they’ll soon be opening shops in Greenwich Village, Murray Hill and Rockefeller Center.
We don’t know exactly when they’ll open their new UWS shop, but they’ve posted a sign in their window saying “soon”!
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The first Van Leeuwen on the Upper West Side, located at 448 Amsterdam (82nd Street), opened in late May of 2018, and is frequently packed to the brim (especially during the warmer months).
Based out of Brooklyn, Van Leeuwen is known for unique flavors made from natural ingredients (with vegan items on their menu).
Van Leeuwen’s menu includes classic and vegan ice creams, house-made sundaes, coffees, teas and pastries.
They also have rotating specials. These will vary between locations, but two especially delicious specials are their brown butter maple pecan pie and vegan double mint chocolate swirl. The first one especially.
Classic Flavors
Ice creams on their classic menu are made with milk, cream, cane sugar, and egg yolks.
For those of you ice cream purists, they do have chocolate chip cookie dough, cookies and cream and mint chip.
For those of you looking to mix things up a bit, here are some interesting flavors on their classic menu:
- Honeycomb: house-made honeycomb caramel candy.
- Candied Ginger: organic ginger juice, candied ginger pulp and chunks of candied ginger.
- Earl Grey Tea: organic Rishi Ancient Tree Tea cured and infused with bergamot citrus oil.
- Passion Fruit Layer Cake: pure passion fruit with chunks of house-made caramel and vanilla layer cake.
Honeycomb
Vegan Ice Cream
They also offer ice cream for vegans. These are made with cashew and coconut milk, extra virgin coconut oil, organic cane sugar, pure cocoa butter and organic carob bean.
For the vegans looking to keep it normal, they’ve got vegan pistachio, coffee and vegan chocolate chip cookie dough.
And again, some options for those who want something new in their lives:
- Caramelized banana nut: banana ice cream with caramelized bananas and candied walnuts.
- Matcha tea: steamed, dried and ground tea blended with matcha green tea powder.
- Honeycomb: same description as above, just vegan.
Vegan Matcha Tea
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Van Leeuwen’s Sundaes
Van Leeuwen’s menu offers six house made sundaes.
- Classic: chocolate, strawberry and vanilla ice cream with fudge, walnuts and whipped cream.
- Caramel Curried Nut: vanilla ice cream with candied curried nuts, caramel sauce and whipped cream.
- New Yorker: Espresso ice cream with fudge, whipped cream and cacao nubs.
- Banana Split: vanilla ice cream with fudge, walnuts, whipped cream and morello cherry.
- Ginger Caramel Crunch: ginger ice cream, crushed cone, caramel sauce and whipped cream.
- Continental: vanilla ice cream with fruit compote, fudge, almonds and whipped cream.
The Continental Sundae
About Van Leeuwen
Van Leeuwen opened in 2008 out of a truck in Brooklyn. Today, they have twelve locations throughout Brooklyn, Manhattan and Los Angeles … and tons of trucks! All of their ice cream is made from scratch in Greenpoint, BK. And in following the trend of the day, everything they make comes strictly from natural ingredients.
Learn more about Van Leeuwen here.
