Desserts: Bring your imaginations to reality

One picks up food likes and dislikes quite early in life. For most of us, comfort food is what we used to have in childhood. Somehow, I never liked ice cream. Being a daughter of an IFS officer, my protected childhood was mostly in massive British bungalows in fairly remote areas. In such areas, the only ice creams one got was the vanilla served with Gulab Jamuns or Butterscotch, which was a luxury. I never developed a fondness for the same till I married into a family that adores ice creams. My in-laws' shuttle between Chandigarh and Canada and their reference point for ice creams is totally different.

Hesitantly, I agreed to try ice creams from this new creamery that a lot of my friends swore by. Located at 14, Ballygunge Park Road, Kolkata-19, Olivia Creamery offers a wide range of artisanal small-batch ice creams. I was actually amazed to see the creativity of Olivia wherein they serve some of the iconic desserts in the form of ice creams. Hitherto, this was mostly a European or American concept.

THE ORDER

Nutella Mousse (Rs 640), Nuts over Pistachio (Sugar-free) (Rs. 640), Dark Chocolate Sea Salt (Rs 599), and Strawberry Cheesecake (Rs 599)

FIRST IMPRESSION

The ice creams come in beautiful 500 ml tubs which are then packed in dry ice packets so that the ice cream does not melt during transportation. The first look is, " Wow!"

AFTER TASTE

The first tub I opened was Nutella Mousse. The Nutella Mousse ice cream was very rich and creamy with a very smooth texture and is a delight for Nutella lovers. The richness of chocolate and hazelnut in the Nutella and the fluffiness of the mousse lends a unique character to this ice cream. What was amazing was that the tub was topped with a smooth rich hazelnut chocolate with big bits of hazelnuts giving it a feeling of eating a Ferrero Rocher. The crunchy nuts complimented the creamy consistency of the ice cream mousse.

One of the most exclusive flavours that I felt among all the ice creams available was the Dark Chocolate Sea Salt. The tub had chocolate salt sand topping which buried a yummy dark chocolate ice cream beneath. The bitterness of the dark chocolate was in complete harmony with the briny flavour and in fact the salt augmented the overall taste of the ice cream. Though I have a sweet tooth, I must admit that this ice cream, which was more on the savoury side completely stole the show for me and it was quite difficult for me to put the spoon down!

I was also quite fascinated to taste the Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream - a combination of two very popular flavours - Strawberry and cheesecake. This beautiful pink ice cream had a slight acidity from the strawberry and the delicate buttery aftertaste from the cheese. Garnished with a copious layer of the crushed cheesecake biscuit, one gets a bit of cheese and cake flavour and texture in every scoop from the tub. One actually feels like eating a chilled cheesecake and I think that was no small achievement!

In the sugar-free variety, I had the Nuts over Pistachio which had a generous amount of roughly chopped Pistachios as well as a strong distinct flavour of Pistachio in the cream. However, I personally felt that the typical strong flavour from the chopped pistachios did not go well with the spirit of the otherwise sweet ice cream. In hindsight, I feel we have got used to artificial pista

flavour in many commercial ice creams and kulfis that the real stuff tastes bland. But it was a very decent dessert for people who have sugar related issues.

WHAT I LOVED

I loved the whole experience they created around the home delivery of happiness. The Nutella Mousse and Dark Chocolate Sea Salt are to die for.

VERDICT

The Olivia Creamery brings your dessert imaginations to reality. With new flavours recently launched like Birthday Cake, Almond Florentine, French Vanilla and Raspberry Dark Chocolate, you are spoilt for choice. Try it once! This comes from a person who never liked ice creams.

(The columnist is a food connoisseur who loves experimenting with culinary delights and a career bureaucrat in the IRS Income Tax)