Gresescent
You need a bouquet of ice cream. We could just end this article there because A) Who doesn’t love ice cream? Demons that’s who and B) Why wouldn’t you want 10 little scoops in a waffle cone? It’s like one scoop of tiny and tasty samples. Plus it’s Instagram gold.
Welcome to Gresescent — yes the spelling scrambles your brain with questions like how the hell do you pronounce that? But who really cares how to pronounce something when it tastes so good.
Before you ever walk into Gresescent a message is written on the glass in all caps so you know it’s super important: “YOU DESERVE ICE CREAM.” And you really do. Spring’s all sprung, we live in sunny L.A. and with all of life’s troubles you really do deserve sweet, sweet relief. Consider it cheap therapy. “Our vision and our mission is to preserve the magic of ice cream,” partner Justin Chung says.
And the magic started when one of the three owners was a kid. His name is Sam and he always noticed how gourmet places liked to attach uppity adjectives to food as a way to elevate the fancy factor. So he started using Gresescent freely. Years later he and his two partners started Gresescent – developing spot-on ice cream flavors and peddling the scoops at farmers’ markets and the rest is just a melted memory.
The all white interior of the shop allows the ice cream to live in a cool and crisp home with a simple sampling station to help you figure out a favorite flavor. Here the flavors aim to hit you with the expected essence your brain is prepared to taste — like if you order strawberry — it’ll taste like an actual strawberry and not a chemical version of the fresh fruit. And that flavor in particular took some time to nail down. At first they tried frozen strawberries — but the texture was all wrong so they went back to the drawing board and came up with this solution, “We make strawberry jam - all from scratch and we get the strawberries from the farmer’s market where we’re from,” says Justin.
But Justin’s all-time favorite flavor is the sea salt chocolate ganache made from 66% Valrhona dutch chocolate, a high-end chocolate flavor you’ll taste right away. Then there’s the Spiced Maple Pecan and damn is this the dreamiest, creamiest, crunchiest blend of all. Please at least sample it. There’s also the Rosemary Toffee an herbaceous spa for your mouth, super refreshing and honestly oddly addicting given that it’s not your typical “too sweet to eat too much” flavor. So don’t be shy, come in sample it up and get the ice cream flavor you deserve.
Written by Linda Hosmer
Photographed by Kort Havens
