Here’s the inside scoop on Duck Island Ice Cream’s latest winning creations

New Zealanders eat more ice cream than anyone else in the world.

In this country, we enthusiastically consume 28.4 liters a year, gaining far ahead of the United States where Americans eat 20.8 liters per person and Australia where each person only stores 18 liters.

The fondness we Kiwis have for ice cream is a testament to the high-quality dairy products the Waikato is renowned for, as well as our creativity and production know-how which increasingly includes dairy-free and vegan delicacies. .

Here in the Waikato, we love our licks, and this week, as part of our Mighty Local story series, the Waikato Herald gets the scoop on award-winning company Duck Island Ice Cream, which now has its new factory. and its headquarters in Hamilton East’s Made precinct, an indoor market and dining destination which will open mid next year.

Known for its huge variety of inspired flavors, modern day cult classic Duck Island Ice Cream is the brainchild of three chefs – Cam Farmilo, Kim Higgison and Morgan Glass.

They started making frozen desserts when they owned a restaurant in Hamilton. To meet growing demand for their lip-smacking creations, they opened their flagship Duck Island store in 2015, selling the restaurant soon after to focus on their new business.

Today, this hometown Waikato success story also has ice cream shops in Auckland and Wellington, while Duck Island takeaway ice cream is stocked in supermarkets across the country, from Kerikeri in the north to Invercargill in south.

With ever-changing flavor combinations like Orange Blossom Chocolate Chip and Mango Passion Fruit Sorbet, or Roasted White Chocolate Miso and Pecan Butterscotch, Cam says Duck Island’s goal is to always keep customers intrigued by new, innovative taste sensations, so they keep coming back to try the latest, or for more of their favorites.

Along with their own young children, Cam, Morgan and Kim recently decided to let the kids have fun too and launched a national flavor maker contest to encourage young ice cream lovers to imagine and create their perfect ice cream.

As a return, they also decided to commercially produce the winning ice cream and sell it in their limited-edition Duck Island stores, with all proceeds going to the winner’s school to help fund innovation projects, of creativity and science.

The inaugural competition attracted over 6,000 entrants and was won by 11-year-old Stirling Maclean from Auckland with a Mexican-inspired ice cream he named Fiesta and described as a “mouth party”.

Fiesta is on sale in scoop shops on Duck Island during school holidays until October 16, with proceeds going to Stirling School, Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

Olivia Whittred, 7, of Hamilton, and Toaiva Faafia, 12, of Wellington, won second prizes.

“Our judges worked on all of the creations diving into all of the different stories, concepts

“Then our flavor developers went to the kitchen here in Hamilton East to bring the shortlist to life, ultimately selecting the top three creations.”

He says Fiesta wasn’t the only Mexican-themed entry in the competition, but stood out due to the addition of salsa corn chips.

“We only had to give Stirling’s invention a go and we were pleasantly surprised at the salty, crunchy tang the corn chips brought to the ice cream – and we just couldn’t stop. to eat it.”

Fiesta is cinnamon ice cream with little nuggets of churros, white chocolate covered corn chips and gooey dulce de leche caramel swirls.

Olivia’s creation, Crystal Canyon, has a chocolate ice cream base and includes Smarties, chocolate covered popsicles and cookie dough pieces.

Toaiva’s, called Korokoro Koko, is based on a dessert she enjoys while visiting Samoa and features a rice and coconut infused milk chocolate base along with honeycomb pieces, bubbles of rice, cocoa nibs and chocolate shavings.

In addition to selling Fiesta in its stores, Duck Island also made special batches of the three creations and showed up at each student’s school to give classmates a taste.

Cam describes Duck Island as a small-batch ice cream producer, making from scratch the ice cream bases and baked ingredients that go into most creations.

“Our ice cream is made from the freshest, highest quality seasonal ingredients we can find. In addition to dairy-based ice cream, we offer an extensive dairy-free and vegan range where we use milk coconut as a base.We have gluten-free and hypoallergenic choices.

“We are delighted that our customers find that our specialty lines can be just as delicious as dairy-based ice cream.”

He says the company’s scoop stores offer a rotating selection of 50 flavors at all times.