The world's weirdest ice cream flavours

Monday, 28 May 2012 3:38 PM

If you can think of a food – literally any food - you better believe that someone, somewhere in the world, has turned it into ice cream. Our global top 10 is just a snippet of the weird and wonderful flavours that are out there, and now only one question remains; which one would tempt your taste buds?

Gold
The Frrozen Haute Chocolate Sunday, sold in New York’s Serendipity 3 restaurant, contains a combination of 28 different kinds of cocoa – including 14 of the world’s rarest and most expensive kinds – mixed with edible 23-karat gold. The all important topping? Whipped cream, gold leaf and a Le Madeline au Truffle from the famous Knipschildt Chocolatier. If that wasn’t enough decadence for you, it’s served in a golden goblet, complete with edible gold lining and eaten with a golden spoon which has been studded with white and chocolate diamonds. It’s a snip at £12,000 – the world’s most expensive dessert.

Pizza
We want to thank the heavens that someone has finally been ingenious enough to merge our two favourite foods. Max & Mina’s Homemade Ice Cream in Queens, New York, have made quite a name for themselves in the ice cream world – pioneering new, exciting flavours like apple ice cream with jalapeno peppers. However, the cheesy tomato concoction is possibly one of their most adventurous creations. No word as to weather it comes shaped like an actual pizza...

Beer
And to wash down your pizza ice cream... Devon House Kingston in Jamaica, make a fine Devon Stout – but it’s not for drinking from a bottle on a hot day… it’s for licking out of a cone. Of all the wacky flavours, we imagine this one would be pretty delicious (and perhaps even a little intoxicating), and visiting the 19th century home would give you a great taste of Jamaica’s history too.

Horse Meat
We’d like to think that the internet’s favourite ‘weird’ ice cream is just an urban myth, but unfortunately images do exist. It’s actually quite common to eat raw horse meat in Japan, or Bashimi, – it’s served very finely sliced, a bit like steak tatare - but someone decided to take it one step further by inserting the meat into ice cream. If you’re after even more weird and wonderful flavours, head to Ice Cream City - part of the food-themed section of the Namja Town amusement park - where 300 flavours range from the fishy sounding eel, to the exotic sounding orchid root.

Calamari
The Heladeria Coromoto ice cream parlour in Venezuela makes a whopping 860 flavours of ice cream - yep, that is offically the most flavours made in any ice cream parlour in the world. We think the idea of calamari ice cream is a little weird, but to be honest, when you’ve got that big a range - you’re bound to create some unusual concoctions.

Foie Gras
Trust the French to produce this luxurious sweet treat - or should that be savoury? Apparently gourmet ice cream makers Phillippe Faur had been making delicious ice creams for a while before they decided to try more experimental flavours. The fois gras ice cream is 50 per cent bloc de fois gras de canard, and was manufactured in collaboration with fois gras specialist Rougié. It’s so tasty, that it went on to win the Philippe Faur Grand Prix International d’Innovation award in 2007. We’ll have to take their word for it - seeing as we can’t afford to try it ourselves!

Egg and bacon
Heston Blumenthal made his name - and some would say the name of British cuisine - with his experimental, Michelin star winning restaurant, The Fat Duck. Although it’s become a bit of a mecca for foodies, what made it famous with the general public is arguably, not the expert cuisine, but the bizarre flavour combinations which seemed so different from anything done in the past. So, it would be a shame to miss out one of the restaurant's most recognised dishes - the egg and bacon ice cream. Sounds weird, tastes delicious.

Cow Spleen & Artichoke
Andrew Zimmern tried this gourmet treat in Sicily as part of his Bizzare Food series, way back in 2008. You’ll have to watch it to find out what he thought though…

Liquorice
The aniseed sweet is a bit of a love/hate food - but it’s proving pretty popular in ice cream form in the UK. It’s available from some specialist ice cream shops, or, if you really want to you can make it at home.

Haggis
Scotland’s famous national dish turned in to an ice cream for a few days, being served in Harrods in 2008 as a ‘Taste of Britain’ event. Other unusual flavours included Arborath smokie (smoked fish), black pudding (blood sausage), Cornish pasty and Welsh Rarebit (cheese on toast). The ice cream's creator, master gelatiera Gino Soldan, told the BBC that the ice creams weren’t to be eaten as desserts, but as a savoury platter, or in combination.