Scoop Friday: Madeline’s Sweets & Savories – Coffee Crunch
Personally, I don’t believe in destiny, but when I spotted the signs earlier today, I started to question my own beliefs. The first Scoop Friday was off to a disastrous start. I was running late for an appointment and possessed an indecisive mind racing full of ideas for the first ice cream location that I had put off finalizing earlier in the week. As I approached a stop sign, a powerful breeze forced two nearby black fifteen-foot-tall standing banners to wave in my direction. Each pillar of information was vertically tattooed with the name of a food across the center of its body. Providentially, one displayed the word “SOUP” and the other exhibited the words “ICE CREAM”. Prior to this afternoon, I had never heard of Madeline’s Sweets & Savories. Perhaps they’re one of the many Ev Dog Blog fanatics, or more likely, their “roaming repurposed vintage camper” with the confluence of my two major food groups was both the ideal first location and the positive omen of a spectacular Scoop Friday Season that I had been searching for.
Fortunately, like Ace of Base, I also opened up my eyes!
With little time to spare, I parked my car as close as possible and hastily analyzed their two-column menu. Always the pedant, I was vexed, even in a time crunch, by the fact that they incongruously listed the Savories on the left and the Sweets on the right. Despite this discrepancy with their own namesake, my eyes quickly locked onto the Cookies–N–Cream option. As someone who has recently been craving Oreos, it sounded delectable at that very moment. However, I reminded myself that I should go outside of my comfort zone this summer when the opportunity presents itself in order to avoid having a myopic palate. With ten different flavors of ice cream, I knew I had a few unfamiliar options to consider beyond my typical preferences. While Honey Lavender and Blueberry Crunch intrigued me, I’ve wanted to try coffee ice cream for years. A bizarre trepidation of wasting a few dollars on a frozen treat I might not like has stopped me from buying it in the past, but that would end today. Not to mention, your boy needed some caffeine (even if it’s just twenty mg), so it felt like the most advantageous pick of the choices on multiple fronts. I turned to the two-person operation and informed them of my decision of Coffee Crunch in a dish.
In an effort to make my lunch more well-rounded while also commemorating my first Soup Friday of the 2025-2026 Soup Season, I also added a bowl of the white chicken chili with cornbread to my order. (Due to it being Scoop Season and not Soup Season, I will neither go into great detail about the white chicken chili nor add the traditional cornbread bonus. It was subpar, but I’d be willing to try another one of their soups this upcoming winter.) Suddenly, I was left aghast when the one employee turned around their Point-of-Sale system display to reveal a $19 bill. With little time to protest and too timid of a personality to nix the chili order, I rapidly overcame my state of incredulity and tapped my credit card on the appropriate spot. I then reexamined the menu and observed the small print at the bottom that resembled a late-morning game show on CBS because the price was right. For $6 a scoop, my expectations expanded significantly.
As they prepared my food, I waited productively by calling the doctor’s office to let them know I was going to be ten minutes late. I hit the end call button and the history of my relationship with coffee emerged in my mind. Like most kids, I despised the smell of coffee and always opted for a glass of chocolate milk or apple juice to start my day. However, on occasion, I weirdly enjoyed finishing the remainder of my mom’s cold cream-laden coffee that had been sitting on an end table for twenty minutes since her last sip. (Maybe I was ahead of my time with cold brew and didn’t realize it!) The only other childhood memory I have with coffee is oddly from the movie Jaws. The movie not only influenced my fear of swimming in a pool during the summer of 2003, but even worse, one unrealistic scene bugged me for years. One lucky kid in the tense flick that got attacked by a shark survived and was asked by his distressed mother what he wanted. The injured boy responded with a list of demands including “coffee ice cream.” Seven-year-old Evan disdained this lousy request when one could have asked for cotton candy ice cream (young me was not aware that this flavor wasn’t invented until decades after the events in the movie took place) or another sugary flavor engulfed with various pieces of candy and sprinkles that make you feel sick for the next two hours after consuming it.
In college, I primarily drank energy drinks if I needed caffeine for a late-night cram session or writing a research paper that was due in five hours. However, at this time in my life, I also started to consume coffee on a more regular basis in the forms of vanilla frappés (basically a milkshake with caffeine) and free Dunkin’ coffees after each football team win. For whatever reason, after graduating, I started drinking two or three cups of coffee (with cream) per day and have maintained that daily intake for the past eight years. Over that period, I’ve consumed an estimated seven thousand cups of coffee and zero scoops of coffee ice cream. That ratio would change today. A hand holding a paper tray containing a wrapped up piece of corn bread, a covered paper container of chicken chili, and a white Styrofoam dish with a brown dome approached my line of sight.
I carefully jogged back to my CRV and cranked up the AC on full blast to prevent the ice cream from losing its contour. I positioned the chicken chili and cornbread safely in a cooler. After five seconds of vigilantly backing out of my space in the busy parking lot, two oblivious geriatric women ambled right in front of my bright white reverse lights. As I waited for them to complete their trek, I took my first couple of bites. My first reaction was that it tasted like how a specialty coffee store in a mall or market smells. The espresso chips brought a nice subtle change in texture but lacked any noticeable taste to amplify the scoop. Suddenly, I noticed I was already at the halfway point. I reminded myself that coffee is best enjoyed slowly with small periodical sips and began to adjust my approach in a similar manner with the ice cream. Like coffee, over time, the overall taste grew on me. I started to appreciate the Coffee Crunch’s slightly bitter beginning on the tastebuds that eventually transformed into a sweet finish as it progressed down my gullet. I don’t think I’ll be adding two or three scoops of coffee ice cream to my daily routine at any point soon, but I do believe it could join the rotation of ice cream flavors I regularly order or buy at the grocery store barring that it doesn’t cost $6.
Hi, I’m Ev Dog! Welcome to Scoop Friday!
As a trained ice-cream-eating professional, I have vast experience at devouring sweet treats while driving. This skill afforded me with the ability to both savor the second half of the Coffee Crunch and maneuver around the Mechanicsburg area like Ryan Gosling in the movie Drive. While the Coffee Crunch lacked the qualities to become the paragon of ice cream flavors, it did galvanize me with a java-fueled jolt to arrive at the doctor’s office five minutes before my appointment’s scheduled start time.
He’s literally me!