BOISE, Ida. — Summer is just around the corner and one cool event is coming to town: the first Boise Ice Cream Festival!
Restaurants around the Boise area, chefs and more are all taking part in the festival that features fun mixed with a delicious learning experience. Events will feature participants like Chef Lou Aaron of Westside Drive-In, Chef Erika Claassen of The Modern Hotel, Tim Burgin of C4 Creamery, Hector Garcia of Waffle Me Up, Nick and Bill Hawes of Fanci Freez, Billy Pothikamjorn of Mai Thai and many, many more!
The festival runs from Tuesday, May 28th through Saturday, June 15th and features a series of events around Boise. It highlights locally made ice cream, delicious and creative flavors, restaurant collaborations, and exclusive chef creations. The Collaborate events feature ice cream producers pairing up with top Boise restaurants. You'll be able to enjoy a free inspired selection of ice cream creations after your meal. Drive Up events highlight Boise's historic drive-in scene and feature new flavors and items whipped up just for the festival.
Other themes throughout the festival include Chef Inspired and Explore events. Chef Inspired is similar to Collaboration and features local head chefs and pastry chefs creating their own frozen feature desserts that you can check out for a limited time. Explore events are a mixture of learning, laughing and tasting with a focus on outside of the box (well, outside of the cone) uses of dairy and ice cream. A few family events will involve trolleys, comedians and 15-person bicycles.
The festival wraps up with a Grand Tasting event on Saturday, June 15th. Guests can sample more than 200 flavors of ice cream (plus gelato and Italian ice!) from a dozen local and regional ice cream producers with additional sprinkle stations and topping options. Tickets are still available to one of three 90-minute sessions that will be held at JUMP in downtown Boise. Tickets can be purchased here.
There are other opportunities to take part in the Boise Ice Cream Festival, including free desserts at a mini-tasting session during the Boise Farmers Market on Saturday, June 1st or during Collaboration events at Bacon, Juniper, and Lemon Tree. There is also a beer launch planned at Barbarian Brewery in Garden City on June 10th where guests can try a new cookie dough ice cream ale before it's released to the public.
You can find tickets, information and a full list of events on the Boise Ice Cream Festival website. You can also stay up-to-date on social media: Facebook and Instagram.
The festival's founder, Scott Wink, is no stranger to bringing attention to the top eats in the City of Trees. He runs Boise's Best Bites which you can find here and on social media: Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
