In the UK, ice cream consumption is well and truly up. We just love our frozen treats, whether it’s sumptuous cookie dough chunks or a simple, refreshing vanilla flavour.
We also love seafood, which naturally leads us to posit; how about… seafood ice cream?
Perhaps you recall our article on 10 strange Lithuanian ice cream flavours which included mackerel ice cream? In it we explained that “the subtle smokiness of the mackerel combined with fresh notes of mulberry and lime makes for a balanced meeting of sweet and savoury”. Did our description make your mouth water or have you recoiling in disgust?
Whichever side of the fence you fell, seafood ice cream is guaranteed to divide opinion, that’s for sure.
With the help of Sam Barrington Jr., Marketing Director for PanaPesca USA, a seafood importing and marketing company who provides a range of sustainably sourced, high-quality shellfish and finfish to the food service, retail and online grocery markets, here’s everything you need to know about the strange world of seafood ice cream.
Where Did Seafood Ice Cream Come From?
First, we need to debunk a myth. Many people assume that seafood ice cream comes from Japan, where seafood and ice cream are both incredibly popular, and the chefs of the country are as inventive and ingenious as anywhere on the planet.
In reality, seafood ice cream might have been established somewhere on the other side of the Pacific. Enter Ben and Bill’s Chocolate Emporium in Maine, USA.
Maine is well-known for its high-quality fresh seafood, especially lobster, and reputedly, in 1988, Ben and Bill’s Chocolate Emporium began selling the infamous lobster ice cream.
Why? Well, The Company Has Two Theories
One theory was that they created a lobster flavour to convince a customer that Ben and Bill’s ice cream was homemade. The second theory is that this flavour was dreamed up in response to a customer joking that the ice cream parlour had all flavours except lobster, which Maine is famous for.
Regardless of why it started, the novelty of ‘lobster ice cream’ hasn’t worn off. Decades on, Ben and Bill’s lobster ice cream is still a major attraction for tourists in the summer.
What Does Lobster Ice Cream Taste Like?
The combination of creamy lobster with sweet, buttery ice cream is certainly not for everyone, but many say it’s a good pairing.
Perhaps surprisingly, most, however, are indifferent. An employee of Ben & Bill’s manager explained to Mic that “on the scale of ‘repulsed’ to ‘enraptured’, most people fall somewhere in the middle with comments like, ‘it’s not bad, it’s just different’ and ‘nothing like I imagined.’”
So, what does it taste like? One writer in Takeout who tried this infamous ice cream explains; “first, you get the taste of incredibly rich, buttery ice cream. Then comes the lobster. It’s fishy, to be sure, but it’s still lobster”.
Is Seafood Ice Cream Popular?
Lobster isn’t the only unusual ice cream flavour that has been catching on in recent years. Many other flavours have become popular, including more left-field tastes like jellyfish.
In 2010, Fredericks Dairies ice cream manufacturer produced fish and chips flavoured ice cream in the UK to celebrate National Ice Cream week. The fish and chip ice cream flavour was reprised in Australia in 2011 by businessman George Kailis in collaboration with the ice cream chain Il Gelato.
Of course, fish and chips are considered an emblematic staple in the UK and one of the nation’s most popular dishes. So it’s no surprise fish and chips had to become an ice cream flavour at some point in the UK! The ice cream itself was creamed cod filet with vanilla and pepper batter. And the chips? Potato ice cream chips with salt and vinegar seasoning with lemon wedges. Delicious!
In 2017, Canadian ice cream manufacturer Mister Artisan Ice Cream served up smoked salmon ice cream sandwiches. They were followed by Miami’s Dasher & Crank in 2020, who poached smoked Chilean salmon in a cream cheese ice cream base — innovative!
More recently Chef Josh Niland, who owns a highly acclaimed fish restaurant in Sydney, has been serving his patrons fish eye ice cream.
He told FEMAIL that making ice cream with fish eyes has been an amazing discovery; “By removing the vitreous humour from the eye of the fish we have worked out that it carries a very similar composition to that of a chicken egg resulting in a product that has no taste of fish but the same viscosity as a chicken egg based custard.”
There you have it, fish eye ice cream everyone!
Is Seafood Ice Cream… Useful?
Contrary to popular belief, seafood ice cream is more than just a food fad in some places.
Let’s take a quick trip back over the Pacific to Japan. The nation has struggled with an increasingly elderly population and a steadily declining birthrate. More and more young people are moving from rural areas to urban ones.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has made the revitalisation of Japan’s rural areas a key goal for his premiership. One of the ways the Japanese government has done this is to encourage rural areas to showcase their signature dishes and foods made with regional ingredients.
In Aomori prefecture, Northern Japan, ice cream made from scallops has become a favourite with patrons. Further south in Yaizu city, squid ink-flavoured ice cream has increased the presence of tourists and locals in the city, celebrating unique flavours.
In Japan, then, it could be argued that the unusual appeal of seafood ice cream is an important socioeconomic device in encouraging people to visit rural areas.
The Bottom Line
The pairing of seafood and sweet treats may not sound like a pleasant experience at first, but don’t knock it until you’ve tried it, we say!