Dan Pashman: I love crunch. 

Sarah Sanneh: Me too. 

Dan Pashman: When, when I go to like Dairy Queen to get a blizzard.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah. What's your order?

Dan Pashman: I I mean, it, it, it's varied over the years. Sure. But right now it's vanilla chocolate swirl ice cream.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay.

Dan Pashman: With extra, extra, extra, extra heath bar.

Sarah Sanneh: Whoa.

Dan Pashman: I basically want like 50…

Sarah Sanneh:  What is the, okay. I would get that without the chocolate ice cream. I would just want like the vanilla and the heath.

Dan Pashman: Sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes. Yes. 

Dan Pashman: Um, but like when I was growing up, I mean I remember the Dairy Queen blizzard when it was invented. It was a seminal moment in my development as an eater.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

Dan Pashman: Uh, and I would go like vanilla ice cream, extra, extra m and ms. That was just my, my go-to. 

Sarah Sanneh: Oh, that's a lot of crunch 'cause when they freeze, they really get hard.

Dan Pashman: And back then they were the full size m and ms. None of these mini bullshit.

Sarah Sanneh: We could handle it.

MUSIC

This is The Sporkful, it’s not for foodies it’s for eaters, I’m Dan Pashman. Each week on our show we obsess about food to learn more about people.

You know that I have a lot of ideas and opinions about food. And one of my favorite foods in the world, about which I have many ideas and opinions, is ice cream, and ice cream sandwiches. For years I’ve looked on with jealousy as other people have been asked by ice cream companies and stores to collaborate on unique flavors. I kept a Google Doc of ice cream and ice cream sandwich concepts just waiting for my phone to ring. 

And for years, all I heard was crickets. And not the kind of crickets you put on ice cream, which I did try but did not put into my Google Doc.

Then, a couple of months ago, I heard from the folks at Heap’s Ice Cream, in Park Slope, Brooklyn. They’d done a couple of collabs with local restaurants on really out-of-the-box ice cream sandwiches. Like, they worked with the Taiwanese-American restaurant Win Son on one that paired Heap’s mango sticky rice ice cream with a toasted soy sesame cookie. Now, they were reaching out to me to partner on a new ice cream sandwich. It was time to call my Google Doc into action.

One quick note -- You’ll have to listen to the end to find out what my sandwich is, but I want you to know that it’s going on sale this Thursday, August 14th, at 7 pm, at Heap’s in Park Slope, and I’ll be there for the launch! So if you’re nearby, I hope to see you there.

Anyway, my co-conspirator on this project would be Sarah Sanneh. Sarah’s the cofounder of Heap’s, but long before that she worked in fine dining.

Sarah Sanneh: Everywhere I've worked, I've made ice cream. I worked at this place, the Biltmore Room that sadly was not long lived in Chelsea, and we made the most incredible ice cream. It was this like macadamia brittle ice cream. And I was like, oh, everyone is going to respond to this the same way I did. And no one wanted macadamia brittle ice cream. I was totally wrong. 

Dan Pashman: What? 

Sarah Sanneh: But I know it was demented, like it was so good. It would like stay crunchy, but then all that like fat from the macadamia nuts and the, oh my gosh, it was so good.

After the Biltmore Room, Sarah landed at a seminal restaurant called Diner in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, which served cheffy takes on diner classics. The place was at the cutting edge of this trend of upscale comfort food that started in the ‘90s. And Sarah continued in that direction with her own place in the same neighborhood – Pies ‘n’ Thighs, which specializes in fried chicken, biscuits, and all kinds of incredible desserts. She still runs Pies ‘n’ Thighs today -- it’s become a Brooklyn institution. 

Then, about six months ago, Sarah became a co-founder of a new ice cream shop called Heap’s.  

Sarah Sanneh: Who doesn't wanna own an ice cream shop? Right. And also, it's such a fun medium to like keep making things. And have like new challenges and ice cream is so difficult in some ways to work with because I'm literally making all of the ice cream sandwiches, ice cream cakes, and it's not temperamental, but it is like a child because you have to understand it and then you can move it forward. But if you like rush it, if you think it's being irrational, if you're in the wrong, to me, if I'm in the wrong mindset, if I'm not like making an ice cream sandwich is going to take something close to two days, it doesn't work.

Dan Pashman: I've never made ice cream from scratch. Like what in particular makes it so challenging?

Sarah Sanneh: There's a lot to the texture. Like if the bricks, the sugar content gets too high, it gets like very soft, sometimes too soft for a cone. And so then you've. You've lost. That doesn't work. It needs to be on a cone.

For now there are other folks who develop the ice creams for Heap’s – Sarah handles everything non-ice cream, including the sandwiches.

And these ice cream sandwiches have become a mainstay at the place. They use existing Heap’s ice cream flavors, and then Sarah comes up with the cookies. As we said, ice cream on its own can be temperamental… When you add a cookie, to make a sandwich, it introduces a whole new layer of complexity. Especially when it comes to structural integrity.

If the ice cream is too soft, it’ll get forced out the back when you bite the sandwich. If the cookie is too hard, you’ll have the same problem. The cookie has to be soft, even when frozen. And that’s a challenge.

Sarah Sanneh: The softness of the cookie is not like a function of bake time. The recipe itself has to yield a cookie that has like lower gluten and when you bake it and it's done is still soft.

To achieve that softness, Sarah uses invert sugar, which is essentially sugar in liquid form. So think molasses, honey, or corn syrup instead of plain old granulated sugar. She also reduces the gluten content of the cookie by swapping in lower-gluten pastry flour for some of the all-purpose flour.

MUSIC

Once Sarah and I have covered the theoretical underpinnings of ice cream sandwiches -- it’s time to get down to brass tacks. To make our ice cream sandwich, we need to figure out two things: the ice cream, and the cookie. Sarah’s given me just one constraint: we have to use an existing Heap’s ice cream flavor as our base. 

Now, it’s time for a moment that’s been years in the making…

Dan Pashman: I am going to bring up, now, let me find it. I have a Google doc entitled Ice Cream Flavor and Sandwich Ideas. 

Sarah Sanneh: Oof. Great. 

Dan Pashman: I’m not saying all these are great ideas. Um, and, and, and they're not all for use in, uh, in our collab, but I'm just gonna throw some out here. Okay. 

Sarah Sanneh: Can't wait.

Dan Pashman: One ingredient that I've always thought should be in an ice cream, and I've never seen it, is fried plantains. 

Sarah Sanneh: What? Hang on. I have to think. 

Dan Pashman: Because I love cold fried plantains out of the fridge.

Sarah Sanneh: That this is a wild place to start. That's incredible.

Dan Pashman: Next idea. Are you familiar with the Reese's Big Cups that are like gigantic peanut butter cups. 

Sarah Sanneh: Absolutely. 

Dan Pashman: They originally launched with a few different varieties. Mm-hmm. They had a Reese's big cup with potato chips in it.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes. I remember I bought it, I got it at the gas station.

Dan Pashman: That one was bananas.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. For the, um, potato chips to stay crunchy frozen, we'll need to enrobe them. So they have to have some kind, whether it's like a white chocolate or like a buttermilk powder mix, something like that. They'll have to have a coating on them so that they don't go pfft when they get wet and freeze, you know?

Dan Pashman: Right. What if we were to put the potato chips outside around the perimeter of the sandwich.

Sarah Sanneh: They're still going to hydrate.

Dan Pashman: Right, right.

Sarah Sanneh: And so you have to prevent them from turning into mush.

Dan Pashman: Right. Like this is the same reason why I think Oreos are better when they're in ice cream than by themselves, because I don't like how brittle they are as a cookie. But when you mix them with ice cream, they soften a little bit and to me they get better.

Sarah Sanneh: Ah. Oh no. What about soft batch?

Dan Pashman: They have an Oreo soft batch? 

Sarah Sanneh: There's Cakesters. Yeah, there's so, there's, they, they, they have anticipated your needs.

I’m starting to get the feeling that Sarah and I could go on like this for hours. But back to the matter at hand. Sarah’s concerned fried plantains won’t be so great when frozen. They’re out. Potato chips, out. Unless we put them through an elaborate process, they’ll turn soggy. I pitch Sarah on a third concept:

Dan Pashman: Here's an idea. I'm really excited about Sarah. 

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. 

Dan Pashman: You already have rum raisin ice cream.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes. Yes, yes. Dan, 

Dan Pashman: I, I, I love…

Sarah Sanneh: Rum raisin is my favorite. Make it happen. 

Dan Pashman: I love Rum Raisin. 

Sarah Sanneh: Yes, me too.

Dan Pashman: I also, my mom and, and her whole family, they're from New England where Grape-Nut ice cream is a big thing.

Sarah Sanneh: Sure. Absolutely. I lived on Martha's Vineyard for two summers. Lots of Grape-Nut ice cream.

Grape-Nuts are a cereal, and they have neither grapes nor nuts. They were invented in 1897 by CW Post, the namesake of the Post cereal company. And let’s just say, they aren’t quite as popular as they used to be. They’re these tiny cluster-like things, about the size of Nerds candy, but made of wheat and barley flour. And without milk they’re hard as rocks. But in New England they put them in ice cream, which softens them a bit, and it’s really good.

Dan Pashman: I think I had this once at some ice cream shop. I can't remember where. Grape-Nut rum raisin. Mm.

Sarah Sanneh: Could the Grape-Nuts be in the cookie?

Dan Pashman: They could be, but I'm a little, I'm, I'm worried. First of all, like as much as I love rum raisin, I love ice cream with a little crunch. I want something crunchy, okay. In the ice cream.

Dan Pashman: But plain Grape-Nuts are very brittle.

Sarah Sanneh: Very brittle, right? I have bridges that would fall out.

Dan Pashman: But put the Grape-Nuts in the ice cream. They're better than Grape-Nuts solo. They, they soften a little bit, but they will, they're brittle and hard enough to retain some crunch.

Sarah Sanneh: We'll see. We'll see.  one tiny thing about frozen foods, they have to be slightly sweeter in order for your mouth to like respond to it as sweet. So if you just take something and freeze it, it tastes like it's not sweet. And so I wonder if there's some way to like make the Grape-Nuts shine outside of just texture. 

Dan Pashman: Lemme throw one more idea at you. 

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. 

Dan Pashman: I have always felt that more should be done in the dessert realm with Cracklin’ Oat Bran cereal.

Sarah Sanneh: No. No, Dan, that's not fair. That's not fair. I did it. 

Dan Pashman: You did? 

Sarah Sanneh: I did it. I did it. Dan and the people spoke and they liked it okay. 

Dan Pashman: What?

Sarah Sanneh: They liked it okay. 

Dan Pashman: The people are wrong. It, we need to find new people then. We need to find new people.

Sarah’s experiment with a Cracklin’ Oat Bran cookie was for Pies ‘n’ Thighs.

Sarah Sanneh: So we made oatmeal raisin cookies and I used Cracklin' Oat Bran. It's coconut, it's oat, it's honey, it's toasty, it's crunchy, it has so much fat and it, it's absurd. Like it has everything to make it delicious.

Dan Pashman: Yes. 

Sarah Sanneh: So we would grind it up into a flour and chop it up as like a mix-in in the cookie dough with raisins in an otherwise traditional oatmeal raisin cookie. I'm gonna make you a batch. 

Dan Pashman: Oh my God, that's so exciting. 

Sarah Sanneh: It's the best. The coconut is the thing, like it's a little unexpected. It has so much going on. It's so good. 

Dan Pashman: It's got so much flavor and all, and it always cracks me up. People think that because it has the word “oat bran” in the title that it's healthy. Like… 

Sarah Sanneh: It's not!

Dan Pashman: There's more sugar in Cracklin' Oat Bran than in like Lucky Charms.

Sarah Sanneh: It's horrific for you. Horrific. I know.

I’m extremely excited to hear that Sarah and I have this Cracklin' Oat bond. But Sarah’s cookie didn’t work out at Pies ‘n’ Thighs. They took it off the menu. She’s convinced it was not the fault of the concept, but that the cookie just got lost among their other offerings.

Sarah Sanneh: I thought that like the Cracklin' Oat Bran mafia would would like find it and be like, finally someone has taken this perfect ingredient and made a cookie out of it. I really thought that there was like a subculture of Cracklin' Oat stans like you and me. They didn't find us, but maybe this is the opportunity. I believe they're out there. I truly do. 

Dan Pashman: I have to believe it. All right, so look, I love the idea of some kind of like chewy Cracklin' oat bran cookie.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes.

Dan Pashman: Do you think that could pair with a Grape-Nut rum raisin ice cream?

Sarah Sanneh: The thing is like. We might be sitting in the corner of a huge auditorium at a table by ourselves eating these, and the rest of the world is like, what is wrong with you? No one wants that. I want that. 

Dan Pashman: Yes. 

Sarah Sanneh: So I think let's make it and see. Will the, you know, kindergartner from across the street be like, finally someone has paired rum raisin with Grape-Nuts and Cracklin' Oat Bran? Like, maybe not, but that's, but that's the fun thing about like, such a limited run and having this like, you know, creative prompt. It's like, let's do it. Let's see.

MUSIC

Dan Pashman: As we sit here today, it's July 3rd. 

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah. 

Dan Pashman: And in order to have the recipe finalized and have it photographed and ready to put it on social and all that stuff, it needs to be totally done by August 1st.

Sarah Sanneh: That's right.

Dan Pashman: Which is 29 days from today.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay.

Dan Pashman: Can we do it?

Sarah Sanneh: Absolutely. Cancel your vacations. 

MUSIC

Coming up, the testing process begins. And cracks form in our Cracklin’ Oat Bran concept. 

Sarah Sanneh: I do like that we get, we start with something that we know is like unmarketable. Like no one wants what we're making. And then we finally get it to a place where we're like, well, this is delicious, right? 

Dan Pashman: And how can we ruin it? 

Sarah Sanneh: How can we ruin it?

That’s coming up. Stick around.

+++ BREAK +++

MUSIC

Welcome back to The Sporkful, I’m Dan Pashman. Last week on the show we play our annual game show, Two Chefs and a Lie! This year I’m emceeing and our contestant is Rachelle [Rachel] Hampton, host of the podcast Normal Gossip. We introduce Rachel to three guests -- two are real chefs, one is just pretending to be a chef. She can ask each of them five questions, then has to try to pick the liar. In this edition, one of the so-called chefs shares a crazy story from her private chef work with a client:

Danielle: She doesn't do any of the nightshades with the exception of peppers. So no potatoes, no tomatoes, no eggplant, no rice. For like boiling vegetables, making stocks, only Mountain Valley Spring water.

Dan Pashman: Wait, wait, you're, you're…

Danielle: Yeah. You heard me right. 

Dan Pashman: You're, you're making chicken stock with bottled water?

Danielle: Yeah. Well, and I mean, in her very meager defense I'll say she has it delivered in their, in big glass bottles, so they are reusable. But yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty something.

Is that real? Or is that guest our liar? Listen and play along, see if you can spot the liar! That episode is up now. 

One more quick note -- Make sure you stick around to the end of this episode for a special segment brought to you by Samsung, in which I nerd out on one of the most important topics in the culinary world -- ice cubes. 

Now back to my attempt to create a new ice cream sandwich with Sarah Sanneh of Heap’s Ice Cream in Park Slope Brooklyn. And a reminder, the sandwich goes on sale this Thursday, August 14th at 7 pm at Heap’s! Anyway…

In early July, Sarah and I came up with our concept of Grape-Nut rum raisin ice cream on a Cracklin' Oat Bran cookie. In order to give her time to make enough for the launch and get it photographed for social media and all that, the sandwich has to be finished by August 1. That doesn’t give us a ton of time.

Sarah hunkers down in her ice cream sandwich lab, aka the cramped basement prep area of her restaurant. After a couple weeks, she invites me to join her there for a taste test. 

The basement has stainless steel countertops everywhere, ingredients stacked on shelves, and the dishwasher. Sarah tells me it took her a while to source the Cracklin' Oat Bran and Grape-Nuts. They might be even less popular than we thought. Once she did find the Grape-Nuts…

Sarah Sanneh: It's like, dang, it's been like many tens of years since I have eaten Grape-Nuts. I'm gonna try 'em. And so I put some in a container, I put the milk in, I let it sit for a minute, and then I ate so fearfully because now at 44 I have tooth work. Like there are things that can get dislodged and it honestly, like…

Dan Pashman: It’s perilous.

Sarah Sanneh: …it seemed to pose a threat.  Yeah. So I don't know if, if I'm gonna be like buying boxes of boxes of Grape-Nuts. Right.

Dan Pashman: But as we discussed, they will soften in the ice cream. Yes. So I think there's

Sarah Sanneh: also like, I like that when you're eating them out of the box, like with milk, there's a window. You have like, you know, 15 minutes of like a liquidy milk and a soft Grape-Nut. You gotta dive in.

Dan Pashman: Sarah, I could derail this entire conversation. I could spend the next hour talking to you about the optimal window of consumption of various cereals. How long? How long should it sit in the milk before you enter the optimal window? And then how long does the optimal window last? 

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah, exactly.

Dan Pashman: Before you get to the other side.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

Once again, Sarah and I are veering off track. We’ll save our discussion of the window of optimal consumption of various cereals for another show.

So remember, we have to pick an ice cream and a cookie. Sarah and I will test the ice cream first. She’s been experimenting with the best way to mix Grape-Nuts in. She pulls out six small test batches. She’s using vanilla so we can isolate the various Grape Nut options and focus on that. Once we decide which one we like, we can add THAT Grape-Nut treatment to rum raisin.

Sarah Sanneh: There's a control, so that's just Grape-Nuts in vanilla ice cream. There's saute: that is, I literally sauteed Grape-Nuts in butter and let's see, what else? Salt. And then I put just a little bit of white chocolate at the end. Um, and then the other four are all toasted. Sort of like varying degrees of toasted and then there are a few different variables which are like salt white, chocolate toast level, and one of them I put milk powder in. Sort of like, see if that had a sealing effect also, or what it did, right. If it made it taste like Grape-Nuts and milk. I don't know. 

Dan Pashman: You're the pro here. What order should we be testing these in?

Sarah Sanneh: I think we should start with control.

Dan Pashman: Okay. Just get ourselves a baseline, classic Grape-Nut.

Sarah Sanneh: I think so.

Dan Pashman: Okay.

Sarah Sanneh: There's a spoon for you.

Dan Pashman: Alright. I'm going in.

Sarah Sanneh: Go in. Crunchy, not soft. That's delicious.

Dan Pashman: Yeah.

Sarah Sanneh: Dirty spoons in here.

Dan Pashman: Okay.

We try Grape-Nuts sauteed in butter…

Sarah Sanneh: Hmm. Subtle. 

Then we try a version with the Grape-Nuts in clusters, which Sarah made by sauteing them in butter and adding white chocolate to hold them together.

Sarah Sanneh: You know, like as a nation we've decided clusters are the thing. So I'm like, maybe that is, is like an exciting new way to think about Grape-Nut ice cream.

Dan Pashman: I, I'm intrigued by the clusters. 

Sarah Sanneh: Yes.

Dan Pashman: Whoa. Whoa.

Sarah Sanneh: Whoa. That's really good.

Dan Pashman: Wow. Oh, oh, man. Oh man.

Sarah Sanneh: I think that that's delicious.

Dan Pashman: It's really good.

Sarah Sanneh: The test is that, like I, after dinner, would pull a pint of this out. And just like start eating off the top.

The clusters are the clear winner. But I do think we can up their flavor just a little bit…

Dan Pashman: Sometimes when I make an ice cream sundae or even just a scoop of ice cream. I sprinkle a little flaky salt on it.

Sarah Sanneh: Sure, yeah.

Dan Pashman: Can we try the clusters again, with a little bit more salt?

Sarah Sanneh: Hang on. 

Dan Pashman: Okay. 

Sarah Sanneh: Hold that thought. 

Dan Pashman: All right. All right. Sarah just ran away. 

Sarah Sanneh: Sarah ran away. 

She comes back with the clusters on their own, in a container, not in ice cream. We start playing with those, adding some more salt:

Sarah Sanneh: Toss that around. Oh yeah. Definitely better. and heightened.

Dan Pashman: Yes.

Sarah Sanneh: Let's put a note in the doc, shall we? So I'm gonna put these back in the freezer for a second so we don't lose them, and we're gonna move on to cookie.

Dan Pashman: Okay. Let's do it.

MUSIC

Now, the cookie. As we discussed in our first conversation, Sarah has whipped up the cookie she used to make for Pies ‘n’ Thighs as the baseline. It’s got Cracklin' Oat Bran ground up and mixed into the flour. Then she’s made versions with Grape-Nuts in the dough, Grape-Nuts sprinkled on top, one with chunks of Cracklin' Oat Bran, one that also has coconut. They all look like sugar cookies with different things mixed in. Before we even get to tasting…

Dan Pashman: Most interesting and surprising to me as I look at these different test samples is when I dreamt about it, it never looked anything like this.

Sarah Sanneh: Oh. What did it look like?

Dan Pashman: It was more like, imagine if you made like a graham cracker pie crust.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. 

Dan Pashman: But with Cracklin' Oat Bran.

Sarah Sanneh: Oh, interesting. 

With a graham cracker pie crust, you crush up graham crackers, mix them with some butter and sugar, and press them into a pan. I’m imagining something similar but with crushed Cracklin' Oat Bran. So it’s not a cookie with Cracklin' Oat Bran IN it -- the whole thing looks like Cracklin' Oat Bran. Sarah likes this idea – she thinks it simplifies the vision of the overall sandwich. 

So now we have a new direction – but we might as well try the cookies she’s already made. And they all have one thing in common: 

Dan Pashman: None of these are punching me in the face with Cracklin’ Oat Bran.

Sarah Sanneh: Uhuh. No.

Dan Pashman: I wanna be punched in the face with Cracklin’ Oat. 

Sarah Sanneh: We can punch you in the face. Okay.

MUSIC

Dan Pashman: We've made some progress here.

Sarah Sanneh: So much progress.

Dan Pashman: We're excited about the clusters. 

Sarah Sanneh: We love clusters. Yeah. 

Dan Pashman: We need a little more salt and maybe a few other tweaks.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

Dan Pashman: Uh, the cookie, we kind of, we have a shared, we have a mind meld image in our heads. The question is, how do we make that a reality?

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

Dan Pashman: All right. Well, I can't wait to, uh, come back for the next test.

Sarah Sanneh: I'm glad it didn't come on the first pass. Isn't it more fun? 

Dan Pashman: Yeah, for sure. If it comes, if it comes too easy, then it feels like you didn't even earn it.

Sarah Sanneh: I know.

Dan Pashman: Yeah. All right, Sarah. I'll see you in a week. 

Sarah Sanneh: I'll see you in a week.

MUSIC

A week later, Sarah and I reconvene at Pies ‘n’ Thighs. It’s just three days until our deadline. We have got to lock in and make some decisions. We have two big goals for the day: confirm that we’re good to go with the Grape-Nut clusters in rum raisin ice cream, and then decide which Cracklin' Oat Bran cookie we’ll use.

We start with the ice cream – rum raisin with Grape-Nut clusters.

Sarah Sanneh: Yum. It almost tastes like eggnoggy to me.

Dan Pashman: Is there cinnamon in here? Something tastes cinnamony to me.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah. There's cinnamon, there's nutmeg. There's like the sort of flavors of rum in the ice cream, and then… You know what it is? It's nutmeg that you're tasting.

Dan Pashman: Mm. I'm going for another taste. 

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. You have to, the raisins are huge California raisins. Very beautiful and juicy, but you gotta get a raisin to get the full rum raisin experience.

Dan Pashman: I mean, this is really good. I agree that it tastes a lot like eggnog.

Sarah Sanneh: It's eggnoggy. Yeah. 

Dan Pashman: And I, I love eggnog.

Sarah Sanneh: I do too.

Dan Pashman: Not positive that that's right for a summertime ice cream sandwich. But…

Sarah Sanneh: That ship may have sailed.

Dan Pashman: But, but, but let's go on, because I…

Sarah Sanneh: Well, the other option is a straight vanilla. Does it need a fruit? Does it need a swirl? Does it need a jam? 

Dan Pashman: I didn't know that was even an option.

Sarah Sanneh: Sure. We can do whatever. Sour cherry?

Dan Pashman: Oh.

Sarah Sanneh: Always my favorite. 

Dan Pashman: Would that work with rum raisin, you think?

Sarah Sanneh: Let's try. Let's try. We have it.

Dan Pashman: Oh, you have, you have, geez. Yeah, it's great to develop recipes in a restaurant.

Sarah Sanneh: Right. Okay. 

Dan Pashman: We're going to the, we're in the walk-in now. We're in the walk-in fridge. Is it the fridge or the freezer?

Sarah Sanneh: This is a fridge.

Dan Pashman: We're in the fridge. Oh, here we are.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay.

Dan Pashman: Oh, sour cherry jelly. I see it right there?

Sarah Sanneh: We have sour cherry jelly. Let's try. Let's see what's good.

Dan Pashman: Coming outta the walk-in.

Sarah Sanneh: At this point, do you feel how I feel, which is like, we were unchaperoned. We were left to make poor decisions and now we have to live with them. 

Sarah composes a bite for each of us, with the Grape-Nut rum raisin ice cream and sour cherry jelly on top.

Sarah Sanneh: Wow. I think it's amazing. But it's definitely a different direction. 

Dan Pashman: Mm!

Sarah Sanneh: See what I mean, like fireworks. Range.

Dan Pashman: That's got a lot going on. 

Sarah Sanneh: It's got a lot going on.

The sour cherry jelly makes the ice cream taste less like eggnog, but now I’m concerned that we’re losing the rum flavor. We decide to try the Grape Nut clusters with sour cherry swirl in VANILLA ice cream. 

Sarah Sanneh:  I love it. 

Dan Pashman: That is so good. 

Sarah Sanneh: It's very dynamic and delicious.

Dan Pashman: it's almost like, because we took away, it was a little too busy.

Sarah Sanneh: You have to edit. 

Dan Pashman: We, yeah. You gotta kill your darlings. 

It helps that Heap’s vanilla is REALLY good. This might be our ice cream flavor. 

MUSIC

We move on to the other component of the ice cream sandwich: the Cracklin’ Oat Bran cookie. 

Sarah has made two versions. Both are ground up Cracklin' Oat Bran, sugar, salt, coconut, and butter, pressed into a sheet pan. The difference is that one is baked, and the other is not.

We try both versions of the cookie with the Grape-Nut ice cream.

Dan Pashman: Alright, I'm going in. 

Sarah Sanneh: So this is, you're trying the baked. I think…

Dan Pashman: You're making kind of a yucky face.

Sarah Sanneh: I am making yucky face. The Cracklin’ is not coming through for me.

Dan Pashman: I think that if we can make the Cracklin' Oat Bran work…

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

Dan Pashman: It's really fun. I just feel like…

Sarah Sanneh: I just don't like it.

Dan Pashman: I don't want us to lose the Cracklin' Oat Bran 'cause I feel like you and I were so excited about that at the outset. We both have this, this deep belief that Cracklin' Oat Bran should be in desserts. Let's try the other one.

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. Okay, so this one, unbaked. Hmm. I can't taste it. I can't taste the Cracklin’ Oat Bran.

Dan Pashman: I'm gonna try to just bite off the Cracklin' Oat Bran bottom. Okay. Um…

Sarah Sanneh: What do you think?

Dan Pashman: Yeah, I mean, I agree with you that I don't taste a whole lot of Cracklin' Oat Bran. 

Sarah Sanneh: No.

Dan Pashman: What's happening, Sarah? Why, why? 

Sarah Sanneh: I don't know.

Dan Pashman: Why would an uncooked, Cracklin' Oat Bran a a crust made almost entirely a Cracklin' Oat Bran not taste like Cracklin' Oat Bran?

Sarah Sanneh: Well, we talked about this at the beginning, that like flavors are really dulled by freezing. And so like, if you're making a, you know, a mix in or a crust or something, like you really have to pump up the sweet, the salt. Like it, it has to be pretty supercharged. 

This is something I’ve known for a long time about temperature in foods in general, this is why you should take cheese out of the fridge 1 to 2 hours before serving, so it comes to room temp and has more flavor. Ice cream has more flavor and aroma when it’s a bit melted vs frozen solid.

It seems the magical taste of Cracklin' Oat Bran is especially susceptible to the effects of freezing.

Sarah Sanneh: I don't think we're gonna get closer to what we want. I think we'll make a delicious cookie, but I don't think we'll end up taking a bite and feeling more essence of Cracklin’ Oat Bran.

Dan Pashman: I am reluctantly a little bit, sadly, coming around to the same point of view, which is like. Sometimes things sound good in theory, and then you make them and they're not as good as you hoped they would be.

Sarah Sanneh: But I think we're on the path to something good. 

Dan Pashman: Yeah, right. The Grape-Nut clusters is what we stumbled into.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes, and, and a fruit swirl. 

Dan Pashman: The things that were most delicious to us are the Grape-Nut clusters. Yes. 

Sarah Sanneh: On their own.

Dan Pashman: And then the in, in some kind of ice cream with the fruit swirl.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes.  I like vanilla fruit swirl. Grape-Nut clusters. That sounds like a delicious ice cream to me. 

Dan Pashman: Okay.

Sarah Sanneh: That was, that felt like fireworks. 

Dan Pashman: Yes. That is. So, of all the different bites last week and this week that we've taken, that was the…

Sarah Sanneh: That's the most exciting, right? Yes. Agree.

Dan Pashman: So let's focus on that. 

Sarah Sanneh: Okay. 

Dan Pashman: Let's focus on that. Yeah. I'm coming around to your point of view because like of all the things we've eaten, that was the best.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah.

So rum raisin is definitely out. The eggnog vibes were nice, but it didn’t feel like summertime, and the rum flavor was kinda getting in the way of everything else. The ice cream will be vanilla with Grape Nut clusters and a sour cherry swirl. But for the cookie, we’ve hit a dead end. For a moment, Sarah and I feel a bit stumped.

We start spitballing.

Dan Pashman: Could it be something peanut buttery? 

Sarah Sanneh: Could it be pie dough?

Dan Pashman: Nuts.

Sarah Sanneh: Rosemary shortbread.

Dan Pashman: Is there any space in these cookies for chocolate chips?

Sarah Sanneh: What if it was like an oatmeal crust?

Dan Pashman: What about like a coconut macadamia cookie?

Sarah Sanneh: God. No, it's too much. It's too much. There's not, there's not enough room on the sign. Like there's no way to be like, okay, so I don't know. I feel like I need more time. I need to think about the cookie.

Sarah says she’ll try out some oatmeal cookie options for one more test in a couple days. 

Sarah Sanneh: I think after this we should close the innovation kitchen and start figuring out like the manufacturing and the packaging, 

Dan Pashman: Right. 

Sarah Sanneh: Like all the other things that happen before we sell them.

Dan Pashman: No more new ideas allowed after this.

Sarah Sanneh: No, we're done with new ideas.

Dan Pashman: We're only eliminating ideas now.

Sarah Sanneh: We're editing.

MUSIC

Over the next 48 hours, Sarah spends some time brainstorming on her own, putting her pastry chef skills to use. When I left our last testing session we agreed we would not allow any more new ideas. When I come back in, the day before our deadline…

Sarah Sanneh: So we have seven cookie options here. We have two fully assembled cookies, and then we have four ice cream options. Someone out there can do the math for, like if you, if you multiply all those different options.

Dan Pashman: I'll check with, I have some friends who went to MIT.

There are so many options here that our final sandwich HAS TO BE among them.

Sarah’s made a few oat cookie options. But she’s also made a whole other category of cookies, which aren’t even really cookies. This is a complete surprise to me: it’s pie crust. Sarah had mentioned pie crust offhand during our previous tests but I didn’t know she was going to take that and run with it. Then again, I guess for someone who owns a place called Pies ‘n’ Thighs, it makes sense.

Dan Pashman: I'm excited. So I love an oat cookie, but I'm also intrigued because I've never had an ice cream, I’ve never seen an ice cream sandwich in any kind of like a pie dough cookie.

Sarah Sanneh: Well, we'll see. Maybe there's a reason.

Sarah has our ice cream filling for us to put on each option. The first version of the pie crust cookie was weighted down when it was baked, so it’s flat, with flaky layers pressed together to make it a bit dense.

Dan Pashman: Mm.

Sarah Sanneh: That’s pretty good. That’s pretty fun.

Dan Pashman: I am so impressed with, 'cause you know, we talked at the beginning about structural integrity. 

Sarah Sanneh: This is so good. 

Dan Pashman: I was worried that this pie crust ones would be like too hard. 

Sarah Sanneh: No. Really works. 

Dan Pashman: But they're, they're like an amazing middle ground of being a little bit crispy and crusty. But it still gives to the bite in a way that does not push ice cream out the back.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah, and it's like recognizably pie dough, you know? Uh, I love that. We're trying so many things. I had no intention of eating full samples of each, and I just ate that. That's a good sign.

Next we try one of the ones that was not weighted, so it’s a bit taller, and bit puffier looking.

Dan Pashman: it doesn't look exactly like a biscuit, but it looks a little bit biscuit-esque.

Sarah Sanneh: Totally. Yes, it has. Maybe I love flaky layers. It really has flaky layers. Okay. Sandwich for you. It has a lot more, um, lift.

Dan Pashman: Right. It, it's probably… 

Sarah Sanneh: I was able to, 

Dan Pashman: it's probably uh, twice, twice as high.

Sarah Sanneh: Slightly less caramelized, but it has, the flaky layers have flaked. They weren't like forced together, right. Mm. That's very fun.

Dan Pashman: Yeah.

Sarah Sanneh: It um, it sort of like gives to the tooth a tiny bit easier.

Dan Pashman: Yes. 

Sarah Sanneh: Is that what the pros say?

Dan Pashman: Yeah, sure. The one that has more lift on it has more dynamic contrast because it's little bit…

Sarah Sanneh: I agree, I love it. 

Dan Pashman: It's crispy on the outside, but there's, it's a bit chewy in the center.

Sarah Sanneh: Yeah. 

Dan Pashman: Uh, as opposed to the, the flattened one was kind of like just crispy.

Sarah Sanneh: Yes, I agree. I really enjoy that. And I think it's a fun thing that we invented this like pie dough pocket filled with ice cream.

Dan Pashman: I mean you invented it Sarah, I'm giving you the credit for this. 

Sarah Sanneh: We are on the road together here. I'm very happy with that.

We try the various oatmeal cookies, just to cover all our bases. They’re good, but they aren’t as special as the pie crust. Sarah and I agree we’ve never had an ice cream sandwich on pie crust.

So, decision made: We’re sandwiching the ice cream between two layers of flaky pie crust, the unweighted ones, which are a bit lighter and chewier!

MUSIC

But wait there’s one more thing for us to decide. Should we dust the pie dough with cinnamon sugar, or plain sugar? Sarah’s made both. After we take one more bite of each version, she’s sure:

Sarah Sanneh: Okay so just sugar on the pie dough. That's it. A hundred percent. Agreement from all nations. 

In the background shouting “oue” is Sarah’s niece Lily. She’s from France – and oue is the slang for oui or yes. I have to agree.

Dan Pashman: This is so good.

Sarah Sanneh: That might get my highest rating, which is demented. Like that is very good.

Lily goes in for another bite, too.

Lily: Mm, very oue. 

Sarah Sanneh: Very oue. That is Lily's highest rating.

Lily: It’s the most oue, yeah. Very most oue. It’s very like, top three best things you've ever made. 

Sarah Sanneh: Wow.

Dan Pashman: Whoa, whoa. Like…

Lily: The coolest. 

Dan Pashman: High five. Uh, excuse me, I was here too, Lily.

Lily: Yeah. Whoa, whoa. Perfection. Truly perfection.

Dan Pashman: And with that, an ice cream sandwich is born. We decide to name it the Cherry Crisp a la Mode Sandwich. Vanilla ice cream with Grape-Nut clusters and a sour cherry swirl, between layers of pie crust!

MUSIC

Dan Pashman: It's such a great commentary on the creative process because where we ended up is so different from…

Sarah Sanneh: So different.

Dan Pashman: …from where we started so…

Sarah Sanneh: So different. It’s so dynamic. There's a lot happening in here. Yes.

Dan Pashman: The only thing that's in here that we originally set out with is Grape-Nuts.

Sarah Sanneh: That's true. And this is so yummy. It's also sort of a marriage of Pies ‘n’ Thighs and Heap’s. And The Sporkful. We've got everybody in there. 

Dan Pashman: It's all coming together. 

Sarah Sanneh: Totally. I think it's great. I'm excited.

Dan Pashman: This sandwich has a lot of dynamic contrast. Yes, it does. Because you got the crunchiness of the Grape-Nutclusters. You have the syrupiness of the jelly and then you have this…

Sarah Sanneh: and the sour jam with the ice cream is phenomenal. I also am like, who knew that this jam would freeze into something? That's fantastic. It even new like horizons for the sour cherry jam here.

Dan Pashman: That's right. And and as you know, you were saying that like some things lose a lot of flavor when you chill them. This…

Sarah Sanneh: Not that it really stands up.

Dan Pashman: What are the chances that this becomes a permanent menu item in Heap’s?

Sarah Sanneh: Zero. Not possible. Not possible. Did I say it fast enough? None. None. Zero. Is it a pain in the ass? Is that the question? Yes. Sorry. Is it a ha is it a huge hassle to make all the different components? 100%. That part we have failed at. If someone was like, okay, how do I turn this into, like, something that could, you know, actually come to market and have a reasonable return? No, this is not it. This, this has failed.

MUSIC

Dan Pashman: Um, alright, I'm gonna take one more bite for the road.

Sarah Sanneh: Please. No. What do we do with the, the Cracklin' Oat Bran boxes? You wanna take some with you? I'm serious. We have a lot of boxes.

Dan Pashman: Sure. I'll take one for the road.

MUSIC

Dan Pashman: Alright, as I said, our Cherry Crisp a la Mode Sandwich goes on sale this Thursday, August 14th, at 7 pm at Heap’s in Park Slope, and Sarah and I will be there! She’s making 250 sandwiches, and since my family and I will be eating 8 of them, that leaves 242 for the rest of you. If they sell out quickly Sarah will make more, but this IS a limited time only situation. Unless they sell out so fast that Sarah HAS to add them to the menu full time. Ok that probably still won’t happen but a guy with a google doc can dream. So I hope to see you there!

My thanks to Sarah Sanneh of Heap’s Ice Cream and Pies ‘n’ Thighs, for making my ice cream sandwich creation dreams come true.