Photo from Mission Mars | The Viking Summer Fete
Hi! We're Mitch and Alex, and we're the founders of IcyCurls Dairy-Free Rolled Ice Cream.
We first saw rolled ice cream in Thailand during a backpacking trip around South East Asia in 2017/18 and it blew our mind! Crowds gathered as street vendors mashed up all kinds of ingredients before rolling them and serving in tubs drenched with some pretty questionable topping and sauce combinations. We, like many others, had never seen anything like this before so we quickly joined the queue.
We found ourselves lying on the tropical beaches surrounded by palm trees, white sand and turquoise water, dreaming of how we could bring a slice of this paradise back to the UK with us. We threw all kinds of ideas around- from selling sugar cane juice at markets to opening a hostel in Liverpool...but the dreams soon faded and before we could say 'Bangkok' we were back in the UK, and both back working 9-5 office jobs. Mitch even got offered the job he left behind back within 2 weeks of returning home!
Three months on from touching down, and after the buzz of seeing much-missed family and friends faded, our life took an shock turn when Mitch's healthy and active dad suffered a very unexpected heart attack and passed away, aged 54.
Faced with the realisation that life is far too short not to take more risks and do what makes you happy, we decided to take a leap of faith and set up IcyCurls. But given the recent events, there was no way we would be happy using unhealthy and artificial ingredients.
We first saw rolled ice cream in Thailand during a backpacking trip around South East Asia in 2017/18 and it blew our mind! Crowds gathered as street vendors mashed up all kinds of ingredients before rolling them and serving in tubs drenched with some pretty questionable topping and sauce combinations. We, like many others, had never seen anything like this before so we quickly joined the queue.
We found ourselves lying on the tropical beaches surrounded by palm trees, white sand and turquoise water, dreaming of how we could bring a slice of this paradise back to the UK with us. We threw all kinds of ideas around- from selling sugar cane juice at markets to opening a hostel in Liverpool...but the dreams soon faded and before we could say 'Bangkok' we were back in the UK, and both back working 9-5 office jobs. Mitch even got offered the job he left behind back within 2 weeks of returning home!
Three months on from touching down, and after the buzz of seeing much-missed family and friends faded, our life took an shock turn when Mitch's healthy and active dad suffered a very unexpected heart attack and passed away, aged 54.
Faced with the realisation that life is far too short not to take more risks and do what makes you happy, we decided to take a leap of faith and set up IcyCurls. But given the recent events, there was no way we would be happy using unhealthy and artificial ingredients.
Why Coconut Milk?
We settled on coconut milk because although the base does need some fat content to freeze into the amazing roll-able texture, the saturated fatty acids found in coconuts are medium-chain, which are more quickly metabolised by the liver than the long-chain saturated fatty acids found in dairy. Since they are more likely to be used for energy and less likely to be stored as fat, the medium-chain fatty acids are far less likely to contribute to heart disease the way the long-chain fatty acids do.
We spent countless hours experimenting with different recipes, forcing hundreds of flavour combinations and pots of IcyShards rather than IcyCurls onto our family and friends, until we found the perfect mixture and consistency and IcyCurls was born.
Our first ever event was at Gordale Garden Centre, the day after we arrived home from a holiday with barely any sleep, but the hugely positive feedback we received took us by surprise, and seeing people genuinely love the product we'd worked so hard to create was overwhelming. Since then we're very grateful to have been hired for many weddings, business events and private parties all over the country.
Our journey has only just begun, but we can't wait to see where it will take us, and we hope you'll be on board for the ride.
That's how we roll,
Mitch & Alex
We settled on coconut milk because although the base does need some fat content to freeze into the amazing roll-able texture, the saturated fatty acids found in coconuts are medium-chain, which are more quickly metabolised by the liver than the long-chain saturated fatty acids found in dairy. Since they are more likely to be used for energy and less likely to be stored as fat, the medium-chain fatty acids are far less likely to contribute to heart disease the way the long-chain fatty acids do.
We spent countless hours experimenting with different recipes, forcing hundreds of flavour combinations and pots of IcyShards rather than IcyCurls onto our family and friends, until we found the perfect mixture and consistency and IcyCurls was born.
Our first ever event was at Gordale Garden Centre, the day after we arrived home from a holiday with barely any sleep, but the hugely positive feedback we received took us by surprise, and seeing people genuinely love the product we'd worked so hard to create was overwhelming. Since then we're very grateful to have been hired for many weddings, business events and private parties all over the country.
Our journey has only just begun, but we can't wait to see where it will take us, and we hope you'll be on board for the ride.
That's how we roll,
Mitch & Alex
Click to see the IcyCurls Brochure
