After the atrocity that was Sublime Key Lime from Front Porch, I had become turned off to this new local brand. It took months before I built up the courage to invest in another offering from this Mooresville, North Carolina based creamery. I've sampled red velvet selections from all over, so I decided to see how their Scarlett Red Velvet would stack up against the competition. Looking over the design of the pint's exterior, Front Porch describes their red velvet rendition as, "Red Velvet Ice Cream with Cake Pieces and Cream Cheese Swirl." After tearing off the top to this selection, I was greeted with some luscious looking ice cream and some dangerously dark chunks of cake.
Most of the other manufacturers pumping out pints of red velvet use fire engine red cake pieces, but that's not the case here. These look more like little bits of brownie. My only real concern is that this selection will share the same icy-consistency as Sublime Key Lime. As soon as my spoon hits the ice cream I can tell that won't be the case. The Front Porch red velvet ice cream base has a stout swirl of cream cheese and I collect a healthy dose of both for my first bite.
Front Porch really redeems themselves with this rich red velvet cake ice cream and cream cheese swirl. This base shares the same consistency with Blue Bell's Red Velvet, lacking the denseness delivered with a super premium ice cream like Ben & Jerry's, but I don't mind. The cream cheese swirl helps bring the base to the next level by adding a soft, goeey texture. Unless they fumble on their dark chunks of cake, this could be a respectable rebound. It doesn't take many bites before I find myself with a few of the lovely, little lumps lying on my spoon.
Similar to the size of a sugar cube, these bring a bite much larger than their bark. I wasn't remotely ready for the ridiculous amount of flavor these were packing. These weren't your standard soft, chewy pieces of cake. These were super dense and shared the almost the same consistency as cookie dough, but that wasn't even the highlight of these hunks of heaven. Front Porch decided to diverge from the direction most manufacturers took, and instead concentrate more towards the notes of cocoa in red velvet cake. This interesting approach really paid dividends. This resulted in a marvelous mixture of red velvet ice cream, cream cheese swirl and bits of red velvet brownies. I'm hoping this further proved that Sublime Key Lime was a fluke. Front Porch has again peaked my interest enough that I'll continue to travel through their Southern-inspired lineup.
Where I Found It: Ingles Markets
Grade: B
