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You never know what you’re gonna get.
At Surprise Scoop, a new ice cream shop in the East Village, customers don’t get to choose a flavor. The only menu item is “surprise ice cream” ($9.18). Customer order via a touchpad in the sparse, nearly empty storefront, noting allergies and preferences if they desire. (The former will be honored, but there are no guarantees about the latter.) They can also specify if they want whipped cream or a cherry on top.
Moments later, a scoop of ice cream in an open cardboard takeout container appears in a small pickup window.
New Yorkers, accustomed to getting exactly what they want at all hours, are enjoying the element of the unknown.
“I love the chance of it all,” said Hunter Burroughs, a 25-year-old med student who lives in the Bronx. He visited the shop on Saturday afternoon with two classmates during a study break. His ice cream had a chocolate element and some other flavors he couldn’t quite identify, but he liked it.
“I love that you don’t know what you’re going to get,” he told The Post.
His friend, Victoria Lovallo, a 29-year-old Westchester resident, got something she thought was sweet cream topped with something that tasted like tahini.
“This one is crazy,” she said, admitting, “I’m not going to be upset if I get something else next time.”
Their buddy Keegan Church, a 24-year-old who lives in Far Rockaway, said his ice cream tasted like cream cheese with everything bagel seasoning on top.
“It tastes like a New York City bagel, but ice cream,” he said.
Surprise Scoop was opened at the end of 2024 by Jackie Luu, a 32-year-old Brooklynite who also owns Stuffed Ice Cream, a shop in Bensonhurst known for its ice cream bouquets and cruffs — glazed donuts stuffed with ice cream and covered with toppings.
He said he got the idea for Surprise Scoop after going to restaurants and asking the servers to surprise him with the items they brought to his table.
“We all tend to go for what we are comfortable with … but there are a lot of new things out there [to try],” he said.
When he first opened the shop, he thought he had to play it safe and surprise customers with traditional flavors such as vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry. They weren’t very popular.
“We got a lot of bad reviews on Google,” he said. “People were mad they were paying so much for chocolate. A lot of people wanted something more adventurous.”
So, in January he started offering more unique flavors, such as pickle, the tropical plant pandan and Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.
“At least 90 percent of our flavors are flavors you wouldn’t find in any other ice cream shop,” Luu said.
Customers can post photographs of their ice cream on social media, tag Surprise Scoop, and guess which flavor they got.
“We will tell them if they are right,” said Luu. “But only three flavors have been correctly identified so far.”
Customers can’t, however, ask shop employees to tell them what they’re eating. Surprise Scoopers work in another room, delivering the ice cream anonymously at the pickup window. That’s by design.
“If you don’t see the staff you can’t pressure them to tell you what the flavor is,” said Luu. “Also if you don’t see anything you are a little more scared, a little more skeptical, and I think that makes it a lot more fun.”
Greg Chi, 31 who lives in Manhattan and works in marketing, tried very hard to identify his ice cream, even sniffing it and having his friends taste it and give their input.
After much deliberation Chi, who makes online content about ice cream in his free time, came to a shocking conclusion conclusion.
“I think it is vanilla,” he said. “I like vanilla, so I’m not too upset, but I am upset I didn’t get something weird like everything bagel sprinkles.”
Surprise Scoop, 139 1st Ave., Instagram.com/SurpriseScoopNYC
