Part of the fun of a road trip is the food – the snacks we pack to get us through those long stretches of open road and the places to stop to eat where the locals do. And when a sweet treat is in order (isn’t it always?), there’s nothing quite like a stop at a local ice cream shop or classic soda fountain. Real Food Traveler’s Hospitality Editor, Ron Stern, made his way through Nebraska, visiting with some really nice people, enjoying the really delicious creamy treats they have. We suggest incorporating his guidance into your Nebraska road trip plans.

Save this guide to Ice Cream Shops and Soda Fountains in Nebraska to Pinterest. Clockwise: Tin Roof Sundae at Potter Sundry; Grayley’s Creamery Victorian Style Soda Fountain Flight of 7 Scoops; Potter Sundry interior; Ed and Wally’s Omaha owner; River House Soda Fountain and Cafe Banana Split; Springfield Drug Counter items. Photos by Ron Stern. Graphic by Real Food Traveler.

One Sweet Road Trip: 11 Must-Try Nebraska Ice Cream Shops and Soda Fountains

I’ll readily admit, I’ve had a long-standing love affair with ice cream. Given a choice between offered some hoity-toity food, a giant homemade cookie or even a Grand Cru wine, ice cream would win every time.

The New York Gazette reported the first ice cream advertisement in 1777. George Washington reportedly spent $200 on ice cream for his family and Thomas Jefferson had a detailed recipe for vanilla dating from 1780. If you visit Mount Rushmore, you can try Jefferson’s original cool confection which they make on-site and is still my hands-down favorite vanilla ice cream.

As for soda fountains, that distinction goes to physician Samuel Fahnestock in 1819. He developed a method of pumping carbonated water through a spigot that could be concealed under the counter.

Like our early pioneers, I set out on a road trip across the Nebraska Heartland. I planned on visiting ice cream shops and soda fountains in small towns and larger cities alike. My research promised some secret family recipes, hidden origins, and iconic favorites. Whether you love floats, sundaes, syrups, or scoops, come along as I discover what makes up a part of this country’s rich ice cream lore.

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Potter Sundry, Potter, Nebraska

Potter is just a tiny blip on a map. Seemingly, just another small town of barely 350 people off Interstate 80 in the Nebraska panhandle. This is the sort of place you might pass by on your way to somewhere else, I thought. But that would be a huge mistake. This is home to one of the most famous sundaes in the world, The Tin Roof!

Created in 1916, the pharmacy-soda fountain building still displays its original woodwork, ice cream dispensers, and upholstered counter seats. The pharmacist’s son, “Pinky” Thayer layered vanilla and chocolate ice cream into a sundae glass with overflowing chocolate syrup and gooey marshmallow cream and topped it with Spanish peanuts. He called his creation the Tin Roof Sundae named after the tin ceiling of the pharmacy.

Ice cream lovers from all over the world seek out the town of Potter for its iconic role in ice cream history. I happen to think it’s also a pretty cool town as well with some interesting sites and a new coffee house located in a converted old-time gas station that serves, among other things, a Tin Roof Latte.

Potter Sundry’s interior.

Double Dips Ice Creamery, North Platte, Nebraska

Owner Lori Bergman calls her Double Dips Ice Creamery a “dessert destination.” This cool family-friendly hotspot offers 24 flavors of hand-dipped goodness in homemade waffle cones.

Lori was formerly a nurse who loved selling ice cream on weekends. Realizing that the town needed an ice cream shop, she took the risk and converted an old dusty building into a frozen oasis of fun for locals and those just passing through.

Their signature is a Buffalo Bill Cody sundae in honor of this famous Western personality who owned a large ranch in the area. The concoction starts with peanut butter ice cream which is then festooned with homemade peanut butter hot fudge and finished with whipped cream and pecans. Buffalo Bill would have been proud.

The Buffalo Bill Cody Sundae at Double Dips Ice Creamery.

UNL Dairy Store- Lincoln, Nebraska

Residents of Lincoln have long been schooled on where to go for locally-made, premium ice cream. When the craving hits, they head to the Dairy Store at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where they have been churning out unique flavors for well over 100 years.

You can find it on the east campus along the aptly named Dairy Store Drive. The not-for-profit location serves to teach students about food science, business and working with the public.

They have eight permanent flavors as well as a bevy of rotating seasonal specials. I tried their “Big Red Sundae,” a flavorful combination of Scarlet and Cream Ice Cream, strawberry syrup, and hot fudge. The red and white colors match those of the university: “Go Big Red!”

UNL Dairy Store ice cream cone.

River House Soda Fountain and Café, Plattsmouth

Plattsmouth, Nebraska, looked to me like something out of a movie set with idyllic small-town charm. Jennifer Roby and her husband spent months cleaning and restoring a historic 1910 building. During the process, they uncovered a tin roof ceiling, 25-foot wooden bar, and a red mosaic tile floor.

After dabbling in antiques, they transformed their location into a soda fountain serving homemade food and traditional ice cream specialties. They had many of my childhood favorites as well. You know the ones with funny names like banana splits, Black Cows, and Green Rivers.

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Ted and Wally’s, Omaha

Ted and Wally’s 1920s gas station is an Old Town icon now turned into a hip ice cream shop. As I stepped inside, I saw two practically extinct White Mountain freezers over 100 years old churning away while employees added rock salt and ice. Ah, I thought, here’s a place that makes things the old, old, fashioned way.

Owner Jeanne Pittack and her brother Joe have made 3,000 flavors over the years. They have 15 daily specials with exotic flavors like Lemon Custard, Milk Tea, and Bittersweet Ukrainian Chocolate.

Everything is made from scratch using local vendors. Heavy cream, eggs, and sugar are all part of the mix which translates into a mouth-pleasing sensation. The secret is 20% butterfat which Pittack claims is beyond premium ice cream and is the highest anywhere in the nation.

Ted and Wally’s Omaha owner, Jeanne Pittack.

Coneflower Creamery, Omaha

It was easy to find Coneflower Creamery as it was the only shop on the street to have a long line out the door.  What’s their secret? Owners Brian Langbehn and Katy Arant-Chapman were both pastry chefs in their previous careers. They applied their natural desire to create deliciousness from scratch using locally sourced vendors and ingredients to their creamery which they call a “Farm to Cone Ice Cream Shop.”

While they have daily taste tantalizing choices such as Tart Cherry Crumble and Grandma Minnie’s Lemon Bar, they are best known for Blackstone Butter Brickle. Made with bits of homemade toffee and chocolate, it’s the local crowd pleasing favorite.

As I discovered, Butter Brickle Ice Cream is sort of “a thing” here in Nebraska. It was first introduced at the nearby Blackstone Hotel (now the Kimpton Cotttonwood) in the 1920s. They serve Coneflower’s Blackstone Butter Brickle in what they call the “best and closest” recipe in their Orleans Restaurant.

Coneflower Creamer owners Brian Langbehn and Kite Arant Chapman.

eCreamery, Omaha

If you’re a fan of the show Shark Tank, you might have seen an episode featuring what I would call burgeoning Ice Creamateurs Becky App and Abby Jordan. They pitched the idea of personalized, premium ice cream pints that could be shipped directly to the customer. Although they didn’t get a deal, a fact still lamented by at least one shark, they persisted and opened eCreamery in 2007.

After much trial and error, they created a hybrid recipe between ice cream and gelato that is incredibly dense, flavorful, and doesn’t degrade when transported long distances.

Their main brick-and-mortar location in the Dundee neighborhood of Omaha is where I was able to try some incredibly decadent samples. The best part is that you can enjoy their products yourself. Simply go online and choose any combination of flavors that you can customize with your choice of mix-ins and personalized labels. They will ship your pints in a cooler packed with dry ice ensuring that they stay fresh upon arrival.

Not getting a deal on Shark Tank and going it alone turned out to be fortuitous as they are currently doing about five million in annual sales. They are still very grateful for the exposure though, even creating a Shark Bait ice cream made with sea salt caramel with chocolate covered pretzels.

eCreamery Omaha serves personalized ice creams and homemade cookies.

The Durham Museum Soda Fountain, Omaha

I felt like I was walking back in time inside the Durham Museum. This former Union Train Station has been completely renovated preserving the original floors, wooden seating, and ticket counters. Bronze sculptures in the form of passengers are strategically placed throughout the hall with a voice-activated narration of what life would have been like from 1931-1971.

Part of this historic preservation includes the old-time soda fountain with original woodwork, jerk handles, and vintage glassware. As I sidled up to the bar, I settled on a chocolate malt which was served in a vintage old-time soda fountain glass. They also gave me the leftovers in a metal mixing cup, just in case I didn’t get enough which, if I am being honest, I never do.

Springfield Drug Old Fashioned Soda Fountain, Springfield

You could say that Keith Hanson is a little ice cream obsessed. He has been collecting ice cream fixtures, including soda fountains, and memorabilia for most of his adult life. Calling himself the “head soda jerk,” he jokingly said he would like to be buried with his ice cream scoop in his hand.

One of the only working pharmacies with an ice cream soda fountain, Keith serves up all the traditional favorites but loves making clown sundaes for the kiddies. He uses scoops of vanilla and chocolate and tops them with marshmallow and chocolate syrup. He adds a cherry for the nose, M&M’s for the eyes, whipped cream for the beard, and a cake cone for the hat. Of course, I had to have one—for The Children, of course!

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Graley’s Creamery and Confections, Papillon

Housed in a converted general store, this felt like a time warp back to the late 1800s. The floor and ceilings are original as is much of the woodwork underneath the long white bar. Here they serve ice cream sodas, Brown and Black Cows, and everything in between with a side of down-home Nebraska friendliness.

The owners turned their love of all things ice cream into what has become an iconic, family-friendly, small-town soda fountain. They have 24 different flavors including their out-of-this-world Butter Brickle made from a proprietary secret recipe. Their signature item though is a flight of 7 colorful scoops of ice cream served in converted candle holders.

Papillon means butterfly in French and there are currently 120 hidden butterflies hidden all over the shop for the kids to find. I lost track after two.

Arapahoe Pharmacy, Arapahoe

Located roughly 3.5 hours southwest of Omaha in the small town of Arapahoe, The Arapahoe Pharmacy’s soda fountain has had a long history dating back to the turn of the century and has endured various incarnations.

The current owners are busy renovating the space to bring it back to its full ice cream glory. In the meantime, they are open, and you can enjoy a vanilla or chocolate phosphate, ice cream soda, or sundae. They will even be continuing a long-lost art of making their homemade vanilla syrup in copper kettles. Now that’s what I call commitment!

Like drive-ins, old-fashioned ice cream shops and soda fountains are, sadly, vanishing scenes in America. Fortunately, though, some are still going strong while others are being brought back to life for all generations to enjoy. A road trip is the best way to see these oases of happiness that dot the state’s landscape. What I also discovered is that all of them come with a huge scoop of gracious Nebraska hospitality.

Save this list of Nebraska Ice Cream Shops and Soda Fountains to Pinterest to help you plan your trip. Clockwise: Durham Museum Soda Fountain; eCreamery Omaha; Double Dips Ice Creamery: Thomas Jefferson Ice Cream photos by Ron Stern. Graphic by Real Food Traveler.

To learn more about visiting Nebraska, start with their website.

–Story and images by Ron Stern, “The Global Gumshoe” and RFT’s Hospitality Editor

Please note, Ron was hosted at each of these stops, but, as is Real Food Traveler’s policy, our opinions and impressions are always our own.