Kayleigh's Ice Cream is a brand new¹ ice cream shop on 129 in North Billerica². (There is also signage for "Hello! Tea" but that isn't currently a separate thing - it's just that Kayleigh's has fancy coffee drinks and bubble tea as well as ice cream.) Service is indoors; there are some inside tables, as well as a handful of outdoor picnic tables and a decent sized parking lot.

They didn't have a flavor menu for me to take pictures of - they just had two a pair of 8-bucket ice cream fridges, with the flavors written on the acyrlic cover in some sort of neon paint-pen, which was challenging to photograph. (They also had a pastry display.)

First Visit

I got Maple Walnut and Butter Pecan; the maple flavor came through more than most versions (most maple walnut is basically chocolate walnut, which is actually fine - but at Kayleigh's, the chocolate was good and the maple stood out, which was unusual.) The Butter Pecan was decent and had a nice texture too.

Next visit I'll probably try the "Billerica Rocky Road" (which is apparently snarky commentary on the local road quality) and possibly the "Best Chocolate You Never Have!!!".

Their website also credits Bliss Bros Dairy in Attleboro, MA as their upstream dairy source.

Two weeks after Labor Day and they are still staying open until 9pm - which was convenient for me, but they didn't have any other customers at 8:30pm so I wouldn't count on that persisting.

Sterling Ice Cream is on 62 just southeast of 190. It's a fairly large building but there's only really one or two ice cream windows; the other half of the overhang is for fried food and hotdogs, and the other half of the building is "Cafe Fresh Bagel" (which seems to be what has the drive-in service, not sure if you can get ice cream on that side - the bagel places closes at 2, so it's definitely a separate thing.) At least for the summer there's a huge tent with a dozen picnic benches; there's also a vast amount of parking. It's about half a mile from the Davis Mega Maze; it's also not far from Rota Spring Farm Ice Cream.

While tagging pictures, I discovered that this was not my first visit; I was there 11 years ago and had a soft serve dip cone - which seems to no longer be on the menu.¹

I got Monster Mash (lots of candy and cookies in a vanilla base) and Butter Pecan. The Monster Mash was ok, but not nearly as creamy as you find at most ice cream places around here; it may have just been the vanilla base, I should try their "Extreme Chocolate" for comparison. They also had a "Campfire S'mores" and a "Maine Black Bear" flavor.

This is also the second place I've seen listing "Ice Cream Nachos" - the other one was Friendly's who call it "Sugar Cone Nachos". (They also have frozen yogurt, sherbert, and coconut-milk-based "vegan" ice cream.)

Just before I started this blog, a friend mentioned that we should go somewhere for National S'mores Day. "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first" so we went to Friendly's (see below) for a S'mores Sundae before I did my usual research¹ into the background of the holiday.

Background

The deteriorating state of internet search combined with ephemeral marketing content means I was unable to find a really convincing "patient zero" for S'mores Day - although I found references going back to 2007, it wasn't clear if those were actually early references or just the time horizon on search (some of my better references were only available in the Internet Archive's occasional scrapes of Twitter, which is not an impressive quality metric.)

Factoids

• It is definitely 10 August.
• It's the birthday of Henri Nestlé. (Rather less relevant is that it is also the birthday of Leo Fender and Antonio Banderas.)²
• "Tramping and Trailing with the Girl Scouts" (1927) is a widely cited early-but-not-actually-first publication of the recipe. (See page 71 and 72 of the book at the Google Books link above, under the subheading “Some Mores”.)
• Late Addition The Google Doodle for 9 September 2024 was about S'mores in general, because "On this day in 1925, article called Patrol Leaders Have Outing came out mentioning some-mores' being introduced as a new dish at Camp Andree (national Girl Scout camp)" and also adds the vague claim that "the s’more first appeared in a 1920s cookbook and was called a “graham cracker sandwich.”" It turns out the article is actually available online (page five, column B) as quoted in a S'more enthusiasm blog and review site that started in 2019. Noone is actually claiming this as an alternate "S'mores day", just a 99th anniversary of an early newspaper mention, but the google doodle gets a lot of visibility...

Timeline (2020-2024)

In 2021, Krispy Kreme partnered with Hershey to make Hershey S'mores Donuts in two variations: S’mores Classic Doughnut and S’mores Fudge Cake Doughnut. Unfortunately, https://www.krispykreme.com/promos/smores is a dead end, and it isn't clear from the Internet Archive when it went away more precisely than "before 2023", so it may have been a single year promotion.

(Dunkin Donuts also introduced both a S'mores donut and several S'mores coffee products in 2017, some of which went away but the coffee is still available in 2024 via Target.)

Timeline (2015-2019)

NASA posted about National Smores Day in 2015 archive.org, twitter saying "For #NationalSmoresDay, may we suggest Sun S’mores? How to harness sun's energy to make them: http://climatekids.nasa.gov/smores" (an article that details building a solar oven out of a foil-lined cardboard box and using it to cook s'mores - definitely an edge case to challenge my "S'mores must involve Fire" theory below.)

Another popular calendar site, Days Of The Year first posted about it in late 2017, crediting the "National Confectioners Association". Founded in 1884, they have an active twitter presence at @CandyUSA, but twitter itself has deteriorated a bit and scrolling back manually only gets to 2019 which doesn't look like a first post; oldest on web.archive.org is 2008-10-26 but nothing crawled in August until 2013 (and that didn't mention the day.) So it appears to not have been part of their social media presence even though they had one very early in the game (they had an account when twitter was still only two years old - their account is almost as old as mine is) which makes it somewhat unlikely that they actually founded it - also, noone else mentions them as an instigator.

In 2018, CNBC worked out that, based on the recipe from "Tramping and Trailing"...

• The original ingredients would have cost $0.81 in the 1920s;
• Inflation adjustment makes that equivalent $11.66 in 2018;
• Purchasing the ingredients from Target in 2018 was $12.50.

In 2016, Hershey did a brand marketing exercise about the day itself: "Hershey's sponsored the #SmoreFun hashtag on Twitter yesterday,", "Stacie Stauffer³, senior brand manager at Hershey’s Brand", "“Relive the joy of your first s’more. Have #SmoreFun this National S’mores Day by sharing your favorite treat!”"⁴ (The internet archive version of the article is more complete than the MarketingDive mirror, and actually has a datestamp and a screenshot of the referenced Hersheys posting, which itself is (unsuprisingly) dated 10 August 2016 and links to a HersheyLand Recipes Page that is still online..)

Timeline (2010-2014)

• In 2010, popartdiva says "“National S’mores Day” is on August 10th each year - this date was instituted by the Hershey Company" which is the earliest citation I have that credits Hershey.
• In 2011, meanderingwithbev note that "While the holiday is not official (which an act of Congress requires) it has been celebrated for years" as sort of an anti-citation.
• The #NationalSmoresDay hashtags goes at least as far back as 2013.
• Ben And Jerry's mentions the day in 2014, with "Happy National S’mores Day! How about S’mores on s’mores to celebrate? #peaceloveicecream"

Timeline (2000-2009)

The oldest references I have are from 2007.

• The Pittsburgh (PA) Post-Gazette wrote "Who knew? National S'mores Day is nigh" in 2007, describing Hershey's engagement (they are after all a local company) with "The Hershey Company is doing its part in celebrating 80 years of this gooey, chocolatey confection by coming up with unique twists to the original combination of milk chocolate, graham crackers and toasted marshmallows" but without shining any light on the founding of the day.
• The Baking Bites blog also provides an anti-citation - "I’m still not entirely sure who comes up with these days"

Places with S'mores Ice Cream

Having now tried a few of these options - they are certainly interesting but my traditionalist side insists that they're not S'mores if you didn't set something on fire to make them 🔥. That said, mid-August isn't a great time for outdoor fires; I happen to have an opportunity to do make S'mores in late spring during an annual community "spring cleaning" yard-scraps bonfire, which happened to overlap with the 2024 solar eclipse but Walpurgisnacht bonfires are also an option. Even as late as the 4th of July, S'mores on the leftover barbecue coals is great, but by mid August, noone wants to add fire to 90F temperatures - so S'mores Ice Cream is at least worth considering.

Nanabette's

Nanabette's has a S'mores Ice Cream (haven't tried yet as of review time.)

Friendly's

Friendly's introduced a S'mores Sundae in time for S'mores Day 2024. Chocolate ice cream, graham cracker crumbs, chocolate syrup, small-but-not-mini marshmallows on top. Unfortunately the "raw" marshmallows basically failed - they were much too sweet and weren't "gooey" so it didn't really work.

They actually have a Limited Edition S'mores ice cream in 1.5 quart containers but that wasn't used for the Sundae.

Also in 2020 they had a Sundae Kit: "S’mores without sticky fingers. Just in time for 4th of July, our All-NEW Build Your Own S’mores Sundae Kit is now available. Kit includes: One carton of vanilla ice cream, graham cracker crumbles, hot fudge, marshmallow topping, whipped cream, cones and cups."

Ben and Jerry's

(See "Timeline (2010-2014)" above for history) They used to have a "S'Mores" flavor with a chocolate base, dropped it, and now have "Gimme S'More" and "PB S'more". They also have S'mores Mix Snackable Graham Cracker Cookie Dough & Marshmallow Truffles in pouches. No idea if they actually have any of these in stores, though.

Rota Spring Farm

Rota Spring Farm has an amazing Graham Central Station (graham cracker ice cream with chocolate-covered graham cracker bits) which turns out to be a better S'mores than Friendly's version even without marshmallows. Top it with some marshmallow sauce and wave a torch over it for ten seconds (you may have to bring your own torch) and it would win the day.

Meadowlands Homemade Ice Cream

Meadowlands Homemade Ice Cream has a S'mores flavor, described as "vanilla ice cream w/marshmallows, chocolate chips, graham cracker" which looks tempting (but may only be a short term special, it was on their Specials board 2024-08-22.)

Theatre Creamery

Maynard Theatre Creamery has a "Campfire S'Mores" ice cream which I actually tried on my first visit. Didn't stand out in comparison to the Rota Spring Farm Graham Central Station (and I haven't yet tried Theatre Creamery's own Graham Central Station) but it's an option if August 10 falls on a weekend (like it did in 2024, and will in 2025, but will skip 2026 2027 and 2028; 2029 it's back on Friday.)

Big Dipper

Big Dipper also has "Campfire S'mores" on their menu; haven't yet tried it. Big Dipper is on route 28 on the north end of North Reading - east of I-93 and south of I-495.

Cherry Hill Ice Cream

Cherry Hill Ice Cream has a S'mores flavor that is "toasted marshallow flavored ice cream w/a graham cracker swirl and chocolate chunks" which is tasty and gets pretty close to "essence of s'mores" without involving actual fire.

The Ice Cream Cottage

The Ice Cream Cottage lists a S'mores flavor (which it gets from Acushnet Creamery according to their grand opening news article.) Not yet sampled.

Breakers Ice Cream in Woburn (no web presence) is on Winn Street, a couple of blocks north of Woburn Common. While it has a 4 windows and a set of well-lit benches with umbrellas along a large parking lot, it's not actually that visible from the street - it's tucked in behind Mike's Place Pizzeria and has a relatively small street sign. Since it's after Labor Day, they were notably one of the few places in the Burlington area that were actually still open¹ after 9pm (they were actually serving people right up to 9:30.)

They might have indoor seating, I couldn't tell if it was that or that Mike's Place extends around behind them (a disadvantage of late night ice cream runs, even the well lit places aren't all that conducive to wandering around, though google maps shows that the extensive parking continues around the back of the building too.)

First Visit

I went with "Death By Chocolate" (which had a proper dark chocolate flavor to it, as well as mixed in brownies and other chocolate.) Followed it with "Green Monster" which is a traditional mint with stuff in it; not all the way up to "grasshopper" level, but plenty of mint and plenty of chocolate.

Next visit I might try "Maine Black Bear" (raspberry) or Totally Turtle, though if their machines are up a chocolate dip cone is just as likely.

The menu lists soft serve and dip cones; they also have frappes and slush.

After dining at The Cask And Pig (excellent brisket, and novel appetizers like Spicy Deviled Eggs and Hanging Bacon) in Dartmouth, my friends decided that "we should go generate content for your blog" so we ended up at The Ice Cream Cottage in Fairhaven.¹ The Cottage is tucked in down some one-way streets a block in from the waterfront. Smaller than most - one order window and one pickup window under an overhang, a public lot across the street, one bench (the breakfast shop next door² also has a bunch of benches and closes at 5pm, seemed like a popular overflow spot.) Opened in 2023 on the site of the former Brady's Ice Box.

We got lucky, this was the last weekend they were open late, and after Labor Day they're only open on weekends.

First Visit

The Cottage has a medium-length list of flavors, plus soft serve (twist, but no dip cones), dairy free and sugar free flavors. (The article on their own website credits Acushnet Creamery, about 4 miles up river, for the ice cream itself.)

They also have a 4-scoop "Ice Cream Flight" (seen previously at West Side Creamery), Hawaiian Shave Ice, frappes, floats, and Ice Cream Cookie Sandwiches. (Also hot dogs.)

I had a cup of Coffee Oreo Cookie with Butter Crunch underneath. Reasonably strong coffee flavor, and the butter crunch was actually crunchable (in some versions, the crunch bits are too hard to actually bite down on, these were fine.) On a future visit I'll probably try the Hawaiian Shave Ice, especially if it's still hot out; otherwise the Espresso Brownie Fudge, Mocha Peanut Butter, and S'mores are on the short list. They also list a Very New England "Cranberry Harvest" - one hopes that hip waders are not required for serving it.

Cherry Hill Ice Cream¹ is in Lunenburg - just past Leominster on rt 2 and about halfway between 2 and 2A. (There's another one in Townsend that might be larger; the Lunenburg one is a barn-shaped building, with Holstein-cow-colored trash cans, leaning in to the "farm" image.) Vast parking, a handful of serving windows under an overhang, and a bunch of picnic tables (some sheltered.) It is on a hillside, but the parking and benches are level with the building.

First Visit

So far this is the only place I've reviewed that has dip cones but that I didn't try them - their soft-serve machines were offline. They do have a lengthy menu with a mix of creative flavors like "Cowabunga Crunch" and "Monster Mash" along with basics like Strawberry, Banana, and Coffee. They also have a separate board with vegan, yogurt, and no-sugar options.

I got Java Crunch, described as "Columbian Coffee" with mixins; on the spectrum of "tastes like coffee" to "tastes like coffee ice cream" it was pleasantly but unusually far over on the "actual coffee" end of the scale. I also tried their "S'mores" which has a "toasted marshmallow flavored ice cream" base, and definitely gets a lot closer to "essence of s'mores" than most shops do, at least for something that doesn't involve fire. (Note about the picture: Cherry Hill and Chelmsford Creamery are the only two places I've been to so far that serve icecream in clear plastic cups - not necessarily great for insulation but very convenient for food photography!)

On a future visit, top priority is to try their dip cones (but if they can't keep their soft-serve machines running, "I want a dip cone" is a distinct craving from "I want ice cream" so I'll probably end up at Dairy Joy instead, just on reliability...) but after that I'll try Monster Mash (vanilla with oreo pieces, M&Ms, malted milk balls, and caramel swirl - basically "all the crunchies") but Chocolate Cookie Monster, Grasshopper, and Cannoli; they also have a Lemon Meringue Pie Ice Cream which sounds "wrong" to me, but I have some friends who may be willing to give it a shot. Definitely a long and creative menu that I'd work through if I was that far west more often.

This is my 20th ice cream review! There's a long way to go to hit every ice cream shop in Massachusetts, but I think this is a pretty good start, having only been at it for a month...

After a trip to Luna Rossa (a fine Italian Restaurant with particularly good Arancini) I forewent coffee and Tiramisu to go try another ice cream shop: Big Dipper in North Reading. Another late evening visit, though this place has flood lights covering the picnic benches in addition to the generous lighting of the serving counter and menu signs. Be sure to take note of all of the signs - aside from a permanently-printed menu, they've got a whiteboard of specials and a whiteboard of "things on the permanent menu that they're out of". (Having it on a sign is a huge help, especially when you're combining flavors and might want to change both parts even though only one is missing; that said, I'm still a little disappointed at not getting to try Espresso Toffee Crunch.)

They do advertise soft serve, frozen yogurt, and vegan options, as well as hotdogs and slush.

First Visit

Once I saw "Everything Chocolate" on the menu, the main challenge was finding something to pair with it; "Espresso Toffee Crunch" would have been great (and probably satisfied a little bit of the after-dinner coffee craving) but that was out of stock. "Peanut Butter Caramel Cookie Dough" worked well - different texture, chocolate and peanut butter always pair well, and anything subtle would have been lost next to the Everything Chocolate... not that Big Dipper has anything subtle; the only flavors with less than a paragraph of description were plain "Banana" and "Coffee". (Most of the names aren't short either.)

Flavors to try next time - Espresso Toffee Crunch, "Big Dipper" itself, and Campfire S'mores. (There are a bunch of restaurant options in that area, it is a good choice for dessert at least while they're still on summer hours.) Also their "Southern Peach" sounds like a good summer option if I'm looking for something a little simpler (but it would need to compete with the peach ice cream I make at home.)

The entire side of the building is an ice cream themed mural (even the dog has a "ripple" name tag); the colors in this picture are mostly "samsung doing battle with artificial lighting" but per their own website the background really is the bright purple color of their logo.

Theatre Creamery is attached to the Maynard Fine Arts Theatre - there's a ramp that leaves the theater¹ and goes directly to the outside ice cream window. One outside serving window and an inside counter; a handful of benches but an entire roomful of indoor seating (late August was perfect weather for it - I got the last outside bench but there were only two people seated inside.)

One odd bit: they're only open Saturday, Sunday, and for a little bit on Friday evenings - so while this is one of the closest places to where I live, it took some planning² to actually make it here when they were open. They are across the street from the Maynard Center municipal parking lot (which even has a low power Chargepoint EV Charger.)

First Visit

They have an interesting menu - about average length, but they do have some unusual flavors like Graham Central Station and Salted Caramel Pretzel. My first dish was half Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and half "Campfire S'Mores". I probably should have gone with just the S'Mores since it was a little hard to tell it from the other flavor (same basic vanilla, not quite as creamy as most of the farm-stand-ish shops, but the mixins themselves were fine.)

On a return visit I'll probably try Mississippi Mud or Cow Prints, but if I'm looking for something different, the Cotton Candy stands out.

I made a summer evening visit to Meadowlands Homemade Ice Cream ¹ While they have a large parking lot and a field with picnic benches, they basically only have the lighting you see in this picture, so you'll have to take my word for it about the benches. The usual "a few serving windows under an overhang", with a whiteboard off to the left describing special flavors in detail (and little signs by the serving windows with just the names.) They're just inside 495 and just east of Route 3, a couple of blocks from the Billerica town line.

First Visit

Turns out the signs aren't entirely consistent; the Triple Play sounds good, but the other menu only listed Triple Threat (which was tasty but was described at the counter as having chocolate swirl and chocolate cookies rather than peanut butter.)

Triple Threat was tasty - with more of a dark chocolate taste than you usually get in ice cream.

The other half was Coffee Cookies and Cream - good coffee flavor, the orange color may have been the artifical lighting (inside my car) interacting poorly with the phone's idea of white balance, but it had lots of texture from the cookies, and paired well with the chocolate.

Next Visit

When I go back I'll probably give the Fluffernutter or S'mores flavors a try, but they also have a good range of classics like Maple Walnut, Butter Crunch, and Peppermint Stick; "Coffee Fudge" also has my attention.

One of the places I go for wildlife photography and exercise is Wachusett Dam, in Clinton - convenient parking on Route 62 at the top of the dam, and a pair of 250ish step staircases down into the basin and back up the far side. (There's also a more gentle but much longer access road if you're at the bottom and find the stairs overwhelming - which is also a prettier path if it's Fall and the leaves have started changing.)

Turns out that the closest ice cream place is Rota Spring Farm (around the northwest side of the lake - on what is basically a shortcut from 110 back to 62, which you can take to 190 to 2 and be directly on the fast path back to Boston; alternatively, if you're doing the Fall Tourist thing, Davis Megamaze is right there too.) Plenty of parking, the shop itself is a couple of serving windows under an overhang, with another window for hotdogs and subs, as well as a "farm stand" shop. Lots of picnic tables (including a handful under an overhang) with a very New England-scenic view of the adjacent farm with cows and goats (the farm is down a small hill and wasn't a strong smell, but it had just rained for 20 minutes before I arrived.)

First Visit

One thing that the more interesting ice cream places have in common is concocting their own flavor mixes, and naming them. While at this point things like "Moose Tracks" (vanilla ice cream, chocolate swirl, chocolate chunks) and "Green Monster" (mint chocolate chip with chocolate cookies) are reasonably consistent across the state, more advanced combinations need more of an explanation. While the server was happy to explain "Ruby's & Onyx" (chocolate chip with maraschino cherries) when I asked, they also had a detail menu with all explanations (right next to the serving window - I didn't notice it before I asked, but that's on me.)

I ordered a large, and since that's three scoops the server asked which one I wanted more of - which ended up with me getting three flavors instead of my usual two: Butter Crunch, Graham Central Station, and Chocolate Peanut Butter Swirl.

The butter crunch was actually "crunchable" - sometimes the crunch bits are too solid to safely bite down on, this didn't have that problem. The ice cream itself was good - not as strong as the Bright Yellow variant from Chelmsford Creamery but that was unique; this one was fine, and the "crunch" part was far above average.

Graham Central Station (which as a train geek I picked just for the name as anything) turns out to be a Graham Cracker Ice Cream with chocolate-covered graham cracker pieces - which turned out to be a better "S'mores" ice cream than any of the ones I've had so far that were trying to be. They should add a sundae that's just this, a dollop of marshmallow sauce, and wave a torch over it for ten seconds.

Finally, the Chocolate Peanut Butter Swirl. This is one of those where the peanut butter makes the chocolate taste more chocolate (or maybe decades of Reese's ads have eaten my brain.)

In the future when I go for three flavors they probably shouldn't all be complicated multi-component ones, but they're so tempting...

Future Visits

I'll definitely try Cowabunga Crunch, Coffee Oreo or Cappuccino Chip, and Maine Wild Blueberry. They also have meatball and roast beef subs made from "[their] own grass fed beef" but the non-ice cream bits of the shop close down at 7 so it would need to be an earlier visit.