Oxford is lucky to have three G&D establishments. The city centre one is located on St Aldate's. I'll cover the other two (on Cowley Road and in Jericho, in later reviews - any excuse). I haven't lived in Oxford for long so I asked a couple of locals if they could recommend somewhere in the city centre for ice cream and they were stumped. And so I had to resort to google to see my options.
George&Danver was the closest ice cream place to me. It's a self-styled ice cream café, offering mainly ice cream but branching out into teas, coffees and snack food. You can see on the photo below that there was a queue coming out the door. Always surely a good sign that something worth waiting for is afoot (and that the weather is good).
Inside, the café had a nice feel. It was a sunny day and it seemed very light. It was clean, but as it was busy there were a few tables which needed to be cleared. For those who prefer to sit outside, there are tables outdoors with a great view of Christchurch and the passing bus and taxi traffic.
I've always loved ice cream. If I had to choose a last supper, ice cream would definitely feature. Flavour-wise I'm a fruit fiend and I always enjoy a fruity flavoured ice. But what I like to see the most are more unusual flavours on offer. I can never resist gooseberry and I wish more ice cream places in the UK would follow the Italian model and always offer pistachio. You will discover my favourite taste combinations in later blogs.
G&D were offering no less than 12 flavours, pretty good going for artisanal ice cream in the UK. All of the standards were on offer (chocolate, vanilla, strawberry and coffee), along with some more unusual flavours (oreo, blackcurrant and honey, millionaire shortbread). The cold stuff is created in their Jericho branch and they say that ice cream is still at the heart of their business and they strive to use the best ingredients, which combined with a special technique makes ice cream with a 'superior taste and texture'.
As a nice touch, there were also petitions available where you can request a specific or new flavour. The blurb said that if they get 30 signatures they will consider offering it. I couldn't think of ideas so let me know if you have any favourites. Do you prefer chocolate or fruit? Does anyone really like vanilla?
The ice cream comes as standard in pretty Friesian cow pattern tubs, with an extra charge for a cone and the additional option of toppings (M&Ms, gummy bears, chocolate sprinkles).
The verdict
Expensive, but worth the money I paidI ordered:
Size: 2 scoops @ £3.35 (extra 30p for a cone)
Flavour(s): Oreo and Blackcurrant & honey
The service was excellent, the staff were friendly and apologetic about the wait. The ice cream itself was obviously freshly made. The Oreo flavour was very tasty with big chunks of biscuit and was more geared towards the white/cream part of the biscuit than the chocolate side, a bit different from other attempts at oreo ice creams I've tried. For me this was a plus. The blackcurrant was very colourful, with a good texture with some of the fruit visible. It was very creamy and I would have liked it a little sharper and more frozen. It was actually labelled blackberry in the fridge and I also wondered if it wasn't actually made from blueberries instead! As you can see from the photo, the scoops were generous.
http://www.gdcafe.com/website/index.php
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