No need to go screaming for ice cream when in Cincinnati (or around the country, actually). Approaching 150 years in business, Graeter’s Ice Cream is still looking mighty fine – delicious, in fact. Writer Betsa Marsh takes a look, and a few licks, at this unique ice cream business.

Keep some Graeters ice cream handy for your next hankering on Pinterest!

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Graeter’s Ice Cream at 150

Anyone who’s ever bent a spoon diving deep into a pint of Graeter’s ice cream would be astonished to taste it fresh from the churn. Just off the production line, my black raspberry chocolate chip is as pillowy as soft-serve.

This is just one of the surprises from a Cincinnati factory tour with none other than Bob Graeter, one of the family’s fourth-generation ice cream masters. Along a chilly hallway, we peek into the frost-rimmed rooms where the ice cream mix is blended, churned in century-plus French pots and hand packed into pints. Graeter narrates the tour, an expert who started in the business putting lids on pints when he was about 10.

Bob, his brother, Chip, and cousin, Richard, are guiding the family’s frozen empire, beloved by Oprah in her pre-WW days, into its 150^th year in 2020.

The hometown icon ships across the country, of course, but also sells in more than 55 scoop shops and 4,000 grocery stores in 46 states, plus Wal-Mart, Whole Foods and Fresh Market. They churn out a 1.5 million  gallons each year.

“On the third Sunday in July 2020,” teased Tim Philpott, vice president of marketing, “we’ll be commemorating our anniversary with birthday flavor releases.” The Graeter clan, however, is sharing no news scoops. As we wait, the company is rolling out six to eight new flavors during the summer, and several more in fall and winter.

As flavor developer, Bob Graeter follows consumer trends, buys the ingredients and tests in the lab. Tastes are always shifting. “Twenty years ago,” he said, “caramel was one percent of the market.” Now, of course, caramel rules. Maple is moving up, too, and Graeter conducted trials for three or four years before introducing Maple Cinnamon Crunch. It’s a creamy ode to French toast, with maple ice cream and cinnamon-dusted shortbread bits.

Recently, the company popped milk chocolate pretzels into malted ice cream for the new Malted Pretzel Ball. Hefty nuts roll through the new Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan. Each novelty has to reach final approval from the leadership team.

Graeter’s most famous inclusion, of course, is its chocolate, slabs like tectonic plates. Family fights can break out over any perceived mis-scooping of these treasures.

“In the early ‘80s, we put chips in black raspberry,” Philpott recalled. It’s the best seller among Graeter’s 30 standard flavors, followed by vanilla, and then a war for third place between chocolate and cookies and cream.

Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip with fruit from Oregon’s Willamette Valley.

Graeter’s chocolate is not the little chips that other brands toss in. “We use really good quality chocolate that people would eat [by itself],” Graeter said. “We use soybean oil to keep it soft, so that it melts in your mouth faster, at the temperature ice cream melts. It’s like eating a real candy bar.”

Peter’s Chocolate, with roots back to Vevey, Switzerland, isn’t quite as old as Graeter’s. Daniel Peter introduced the world’s first milk chocolate in 1875. Today’s, it’s part of Cargill.

The chocolate is legendary, while nuts and fruit have their followers. Is there anything Graeter’s won’t churn into his ice cream? “We can’t do swirls. It has to be a harder inclusion. We’re captive to our process.”

Each mix is churned in a classic style, using 21/2-gallon French pots from the original recipe.  “We whip very little air into the ice cream,” Graeter said, “so it’s very rich and dense.”

Like a jeweler surrounded by gems, does luscious ice cream ever lose its luster for Graeter’s?

“I don’t have any time to just enjoy it,” the flavor developer lamented. “Although I do eat it at home.”

Suddenly, one of his employees can’t resist. Sotto voce, he reveals “his favorite dessert is Rice Krispie treats.”

Bob Graeter with a pint just off the production line.

Want some? Where can I get Graeter’s Ice Cream near me?

Graeter’s has 19 locations in its Cincinnati hometown, as well as shops in Columbus, Dayton, Oxford and Cleveland. Beyond Ohio, Graeter’s scoops up its flavors in Chicago, Indianapolis, Louisville, Lexington, Pittsburgh and Northern Kentucky. The company also ships pints across the country.

— Story and photos by Betsa Marsh

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