Hemp soft serve and sorrell slushies: UK ice-cream sellers innovate to beat soaring costs

theguardian.com:

Rocket lollies, Screwballs, Twisters, Feasts and, of course, Mr Whippy: the menu of a typical ice-cream van has been etched into our memories since childhood and has barely changed since.

But amid soaring inflation and record fuel prices, ice-cream sellers are quickly learning they must adapt to survive – or face the rocky road to ruin.

The cost of living crisis, along with the lingering coronavirus pandemic and repercussions of Brexit, has created a disastrous environment for traditional sellers. Rather than flake out, sellers are using their ingenuity to cater for tastes that are a far cry from traditional flavours.

The new options include sustainable allergen-free hemp-based soft serve, raspberry and sorrel slushies, artisanal granita and a beer top made from purple ube ice-cream.

Traditional ice-cream, once an affordable treat, is starting to become unaffordable for many families across the UK. To stay in the trade, retailers at the top end of the market are having to cater to more esoteric tastes.

“You have to be smart, you have to be innovative, you have to be competitive. It’s cutthroat, standing still is going backwards,” said Dirk Mischendahl, whose company Northern Bloc was selling £4 slushies with a plant-based soft serve topping from its van on Friday.

In an attempt to keep going, many sellers are branching out further, hiring out their vans for photoshoots, looking at offering other products such as coffee, and even looking at setting up ice-cream street food festivals.

Mischendahl, 54, who left the marketing agency he founded around a decade ago to start his Leeds-based firm, said the current craze was fordipping churros in soft serve.

The cost of cream had risen by 53% since the start of the year, he said, fuel