REVIEW: Turkey Hill Raspberry Shortcake (Limited Edition)

Once again I was able to snag another limited edition carton from Turkey Hill. Even though it had received a few mediocre reader reviews, I still had to give it a shot. Raspberry Shortcake is described as vanilla ice cream with shortcake pieces and a raspberry swirl.

This 150 calorie per serving premium ice cream may feature a vanilla base, but good luck getting any by itself. This entire carton is loaded with enough raspberry swirl and pieces of shortcake that you won’t have any bites of pure ice cream. The purple raspberry swirl seems like a sweet, concentrated syrup and is balanced out nicely by the vanilla ice cream.

The finishing touch of this flavor comes in the form of the soft, fluffy shortbread pieces tossed in. These aren’t exactly exploding with taste, but small notes of butter and sugar manage to come through. Even though I came into one not expecting much, Turkey Hill still manages to make one of the better ice creams featuring a fruit swirl that I’ve found.

Where I Found It: Food Lion
Grade: B

REVIEW: High Road Strawberry Shortbread (Private Reserve)

After stumbling upon Peanut Butter Brittle and discovering how heavenly High Road ice cream could be with mix-ins involved, I jumped at the opportunity to review this Private Reserve pint of Strawberry Shortbread. I've yet to find a really well-executed version of anything involving strawberries, but I have high hopes considering High Road is at the helm.

The description above makes this strawberry-based flavor actually sounds alluring. Blue Bunny's Strawberries are Forever Shortcake and Blue Bell's Summer Strawberry Pie had both fallen well below this blog's standards, but after reading words like macerate, slow reduction and jammy syrup I think High Road may have this figured out. Pulling off the lid allows the slightly-sweet smell of strawberries and cream to escape. At first glance this looks like your standard vanilla, but the remnants of strawberry seeds in the base give away it's true identity. Scooping out my first bite, I'm immediately impressed with the quality and taste of this super-sweet strawberry ice cream.

Although not disclosed in the description, I assume High Road has mixed their macerated strawberry reduction with their incredible sweet cream mix to produce the ice cream packed in this pint, much like they did in Peanut Butter Brittle. The majority of the strawberry slivers were the ideal size. These barely-there bits of berry were few and far between, and because of their small stature, lacked the ice-cube consistency of larger pieces found in other flavors. Complex enough to keep me interested, the combination of ice cream and bits of strawberry have created a capable base to show off this shortbread.

The first few fragments I scooped out secured this flavor's fate. This is exactly how a high-grade strawberry shortbread ice cream should taste. These chunks of cookie cover all the textural aspects this ice cream had previously been missing. Adding a slight grit, as well as an initial crunch, these pieces of shortbread break down into chewy morsels that add some serious sweetness. Just when I thought I had reached the peak of this pint, I unearthed this mammoth of a mix-in.

Nearly spanning across the diameter of the container, this colossal chunk was almost too big to fit in one bite. Unhinging my jaw, this singular bite of shortbread, dripping in sweet, slightly-fruity ice cream ended up being one of the the best strawberry experiences I've ever had.

Where I Found It: Whole Foods Market
Grade: B

READER REVIEW: Mo's Review of Turkey Hill's Raspberry Shortcake (Limited Edition)

There’s just something about the words “limited edition” that makes me want to snatch ice cream right off the supermarket shelf. So when I stumbled upon one of the newer offerings from Turkey Hill, I decided to give it a shot—especially since I absolutely loved their Limited Edition Coconut Cream Pie.

This flavor is actually a simple vanilla base with shortcake pieces and a raspberry swirl scattered throughout. As was to be expected, when I first popped open the lid I wasn’t hit with a ton of raspberry or cake pieces. But as I scooped down toward the center of the carton, I found the cake pieces and swirl to be plentiful.

Let’s talk about the swirl first, because this is really the feature that makes this flavor appealing. The raspberry does a good job of not tasting artificial, and the swirl adds a nice tartness to the otherwise sweet vanilla base. At the same time, the raspberry isn’t overpowering and doesn’t negate that vanilla flavoring, but rather just enhances it nicely.

The cake pieces, however, are a different story. Having loved the pie pieces in the aforementioned Coconut Cream Pie, I had somewhat high hopes for the shortcake. But unfortunately, this was one mix-in I could’ve easily done without. The cake pieces didn’t add a lot of flavor, and I found them to be rather dense and dry. In fact, I would’ve much preferred that Turkey Hill offer up a vanilla-raspberry swirl flavor for summer and call it a day. (Incidentally, I’ve tried Turkey Hill’s Strawberry Cheesecake and am pretty convinced that it’s basically the same cake pieces being used here.)

All in all, this is a pretty decent, refreshing seasonal product from Turkey Hill, and considering the reasonable price tag and caloric value, it’s worth picking up if you can find it. From what I hear, it’s somewhat difficult to come by.

Where Mo Found It: ShopRite
Mo's Grade: C

READER REVIEW: Dairy Queen Strawberry Shortcake Blizzard (May 2014 Blizzard of the Month)

Following last month’s Dairy Queen flop with the Confetti Cake Blizzard in a waffle cone, we were eager to see if their Strawberry Shortcake Blizzard could fare any better. Described as strawberry topping and shortcake pieces blended with creamy vanilla soft serve, our medium cup contained 770 calories.

Passing on the waffle cone option, we decided to save ourselves the cleanup and just go with the traditional cup. As soon as our server handed us May’s Blizzard of the Month, it certainly looked better than what we had tried a few weeks ago. As we’ve seen before, the soft-serve consistency makes adding fruit a viable option, without the threat of the mix-in becoming too frozen solid.

The strawberry topping not only adds color and flavoring to the off-white vanilla soft serve, but the left over chunks of strawberries within the syrup adds some authentic texture to the strawberry shortcake theme. The pieces of shortcake were easily the best part of the Blizzard, but unfortunately there weren’t enough of them to warrant an A rating, especially towards the bottom, and a low ranking B is the best it could muster.

Where I Found It: Dairy Queen
Grade: B

REVIEW: Front Porch County Fair Fried Apple Pie

Late last week, Front Porch announced that they would be adding four new flavors to their Southern-inspired lineup. After just a few days, I ran across all of the new recent releases and wasted no time in scooping them up. Even though Happily Pineapply Upside Down Cake, My-O-My Peanut Butter Pie and Wildberry Cheesecake all seemed sensational, I couldn’t resist the temptation of County Fair Fried Apple Pie. The majority of the apple-based ice creams to pass through the blog, such as Hubig’s Apple Pie from New Orleans Ice Cream Company and Publix Premium’s Deep Dish Apple Pie, have been among my favorites and after reading Front Porch's description of their variation; this should continue the tradition. They've even put a Southern twist on the concept by modeling their flavor after the individual-sized, fried pockets of apple pie you'd find at the fair rather than the deep-dish versions baked in an oven. They've described their take as a spiced apple ice cream with apple swirl and cinnamon sugar shortbread pieces.

After taking off the top, the first layer is an off-white color and shows off some of the cinnamon shortbread pieces underneath the surface. County Fair Fried Apple Pie contains 160 calories per serving, which gives the base a substantial consistency without feeling overly dense like a super-premium. Front Porch has infused this ice cream with strong notes of cinnamon and sugar that provides the ideal canvas for the other ingredients. The apple swirl is far smaller than the ones you’d find in a more premium product and, although it doesn’t add much in the terms of texture, adds some more spiced apple flavoring to the mix.

Much like with the apple swirl, Front Porch leaves plenty of room for improvement with their cinnamon shortbread pieces. Considering all of their flavors feature mix-ins that are small in stature, I shouldn’t have been expecting big, hunky pieces of pie crust; but it was hard not to. The shortbread squares included in this particular pint added a slightly crunchiness to some bites, which provided some much needed contrast against the creamy base. Although there may not have been much going on in terms of texture, the combination of flavors in County Fair Fried Apple Pie is still enough to warrant an above average rating.

Where I Found It: Ingles Markets
Grade: B

To push this flavor over the edge, I then added a nice slice of Apple Creme Cake to accompany the Front Porch ice cream.