Ten of London’s Best Ice Creams to Order for Dessert

The mala ice cream sundae at Julian Denis’ Facing Heaven (FKA Mao Chow) in Hackney could drive a person wild. A scoop of vanilla – cold and soothing – is slathered with chilli oil – hot and numbing, the yin-yang combo brought together with a slick of salty, sticky soy sauce caramel. The at-home hack, a dribble of Lao Gan Ma on your Häagen-Dazs, is not quite the same.

Along with that quivering caramelised whey tart, soft serve ice cream has become something of a signature at Fallow in St James’s. Resident pastry pro Anna Williams explores the possibilities of the form, introducing Wimbledon-worthy strawberries and cream and a smart take on retro raspberry ripple that involves cultured crème fraîche, ripe fruit and lemon thyme. Top marks for zero waste go to the sourdough and sea salt flavour. Eat in or take away.

From London Bridge to Thailand, lickety-split. Kin + Deum’s homemade ice creams take their names from Thailand’s most famous destinations. The Phuket coconut soft serve with coconut flakes and a honey is a perfect day on a tropical beach; Chiang Mai chocolate celebrates the home of Thai cacao production; and salted palm sugar takes you the sweltering streets of Bangkok. New one-woman brand Araw supplies the pandan and Filipino ube flavours. Takeaway available.

The scoops and pandesal ice cream sandwiches at Bintang in Camden are supplied by viral sensation and sister brand Mamasons. Your choice — not an easy one — is between such characteristically Filipino flavours as ube (purple yam), calamansi lime, Milo chocolate malt, guyabano (soursop), black buko (coconut), and queso (cheese). If in doubt, match to your outfit.

Tacos Padre’s al fresco evening pop-up is back for its third summer season at Borough Market. The menu of Mexican street food is better than ever thanks in no small part to their new ice cream machine dispensing swirls of chocolate and mezcal and black sesame and ginger soft serve. One of each please, obviously.

Prolong a languorous summer lunch at Rochelle Canteen in Shoreditch over spoonfuls of ice cream or cooling sorbet in the garden. The flavours come and go with the seasons. Melon, mango and strawberry sorbets appear in the heat of summer, with or without a shot of ice-cold vodka. Malt ice cream flecked with dark chocolate ranks among their greatest hits.

Going straight in at the top of the must-try list at Rita’s in Soho is the new vegan sundae, creation of pastry chef Florence Robinson. Picture sunflower seed ice cream and coconut and oat cream, topped with brownie and snappy sunflower praline and dripping soy caramel with every greedy spoonful. Wow.

The booza (Syrian ice cream) at Imad’s Syrian Kitchen on the top floor of Kingly Court is sweetened the traditional way, with mastiha, a fragrant resin harvested from mastic trees on the Greek island of Chios. It’s the mastiha that gives the ice cream its distinctive taffy-like stretchiness. Chef Imad Alarnab studs his with pistachios and tops with puffs of cloud-like candy floss.

At her contemporary West African restaurant Chishuru in Brixton, Nigerian-born chef Adejoké Bakare churns ice cream daily. The flavours are hers from her heritage, such as plantain and baobab with an icy lime granita, the climax of the £30 lunch or £45 set menu, or breadfruit with caramel and preserved hibiscus.

There’s only one dessert to follow pizza, as the Italians well know, and that’s ice cream. At Pi Pizza in Battersea Rise, they make it soft serve in Italophile flavour ways such as limoncello curd, espresso martini and salted caramel chocolate. Indoor seating in the orangery or on the pavement out front where you can watch the world go by.