This Ice Cream Roulette Shop Fires Blanks

A review of Surprise Scoop, the East Village’s newest viral dessert spot

Cake Friends,

What happens when ice cream becomes a tech-powered guessing game? This week in the newsletter, Aliza Abarbanel teamed up with our friend and writer Savannah Sobrevilla to visit the East Village’s viral “ice cream roulette” shop—where you get mystery scoops, zero human contact, and possibly a dash of psychological warfare. Read on for the full report.

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In theory, the world’s “first roulette ice cream shop” should be designed to spark joy. But I’ll admit to journalistic malpractice from the jump: I walked into Surprise Scoop fully prepared to be a hater.

A $10 double scoop of ice cream of unknown origin, blowing up on TikTok for the supposed excitement of guessing the flavor—even though nobody at the shop will confirm or deny it? It felt like classic late-stage gentrification of the East Village and those who frequent it—the type of clientele who rely on TikTok trends to come up with ways to spend their time and cash in one of the most exciting and expensive cities on earth. Do we really need to outsource spontaneity for $10 a cup?

I don’t want to be a hater, at least one without reason. Maybe the ice cream was actually good? So I hit up my friend, writer and East Village icon Savannah Sobrevilla, to investigate.

Immediately, it was clear that the small storefront is designed to be photographed; it’s lined with an expansive selfie mirror emblazoned with slogans, including the ominous “TheY WiLL LearN to Like it.” Um, okay… But the purple floors were heavily scuffed and dirty beneath the glaring fluorescent lighting, an unappetizing backdrop for supposedly viral food pics. The experience is designed so there is absolutely zero human interaction—POS terminals line the walls for ordering, and ice cream is deposited through a hatch by a disembodied hand. The overall slapdash, soulless effect was reminiscent of the ill-fated Willie Wonka Glasgow immersive experience. My hopes wavered.

“What is this? Looks cool,” a middle-aged man popped his head into the store, clutching no less than four pints of ice cream from the Van Leeuwen storefront just a few blocks away. We didn’t know how to answer him at the moment, and honestly, I still don’t.

It’s tempting to call Surprise Scoop a scam, but the POS machines are very clear on what you will be getting. Before ordering, you must consent: “I understand that I will not know the flavor and I’m okay with that. :) NO EXCHANGES/REFUNDS.” Surprise Scoop says they offer 10 distinct flavors a day, and some Google Reviewers say they have received edgy flavors like garlic and Hot Cheeto. I hoped for something similarly thrilling, something I wouldn’t be able to get anywhere else. Soon, the hatch opened and we received two identical, pale yellow/cream scoops beneath a cloud of whipped cream, caramel sauce, and a cherry. One was obviously vanilla, the other tasted like some kind of tangerine creamsicle. At first I thought there was a hint of Sichuan peppercorn in the citrus, but disappointingly, I think the icy scoop just made my tongue numb.

According to the brand’s Instagram comments, the ice cream is in fact made in house, but nothing about the flavor or texture conveyed this. (Häagen-Dazs remains far superior.) I honestly didn’t believe it until I learned that the owner, Jackie Luu, previously used the storefront to run Stuffed Ice Cream, a donut ice cream sandwich shop with similar aspirations to viral appeal and one remaining location in Bensonhurst.

Am I being too harsh? Here’s Savannah’s take:

“Surprise Scoop was fun—it is rarely the case that ice cream is not fun—but the experience felt incomplete since they don’t seem to reveal the flavors at any point in the experience. (Their marketing materials suggest that you may find out what flavor you got if you post a photo to your IG and tag them, but that feels like a lot to ask of a customer.)

Secretly, I hope someone—perhaps the attendant behind the Ozian mini door through which the ice cream is served—is getting off on this. Maybe we are unknowingly entering a dom/sub dynamic where we must relinquish our right to choose (and ever know) which flavor we experience. Or perhaps the camera in the far left corner of the store is live-streaming all of us on Twitch, with viewers voting on which flavors to give us.”

Maybe the whole thing is designed for data harvesting, a theory bolstered by the fact that the POS consoles made it impossible to order without providing a phone number, even though we were paying in cash and there wasn’t anyone waiting in line ahead of us. Honestly, I think the truth is infinitely more boring but equally sinister: It’s just ice cream, marketed to shock instead of simply taste good. My biggest regret in writing this review is that it will inevitably fuel the hype machine that leads people to play flavor roulette in the first place.

Spare yourself: There are at least eight other ice cream shops within a five block radius of Surprise Scoop, all of which provide more compelling flavors and transparent ingredient practices for far less. I promise you, if you ask the ice cream scooper to surprise you and close your eyes, they will do so. You’ll even be able to find out what flavor it was when you’re done.

-Aliza Abarbanel

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Pitch: Our friends at Third Place Zine are looking for pitches for Vol 2: Movement Building. They’re asking: “How do spaces like gyms, dance halls, theaters, or community halls foster belonging, joy, and resistance?” Submissions due 5/18.

Attend: Join Cake Zine co-founder Aliza Abarbanel for a lunchtime chat on the state of indie media at MagCulture’s pop-up shop at the Vitsoe store in Manhattan this Fri, May 2. Free RSVP here.

Shop: The newsletter Scremes Report is throwing a birthday party at Betty in NYC’s Chinatown on May 5, featuring a shoppable newstand of indie mags, including Cake Zine. Free RSVP here.

Bake: Malted banana milk tiramisu from Kassie Mendieta…just perfect.