Bubbies Homemade Ice Cream & Desserts — munchies review — Hawai’i

Posted on June 12, 2010 by Kris Nelson

I had a classmate that worked here. Pardon my French, but everyone thought she was très bitch (I didn’t, but I never really talked to her). But when she was at work at Bubbies, she transformed into a rainbows and unicorns sweetheart. Hmm.

Bubbies Homemade Ice Cream & Desserts is the naughty potty-mouthed premium ice cream shop your momma warned you about. With dessert names like “Knock Me Up on the Blower”, “Maybe the Bag Broke”, “Functioning Prostate”, “Come Here Little Girl”, “Multiple Orgasm”, “Poke & Stroke Sundae”, ordering is just part of the fun. For the shy, they have the easier-to-say-aloud-in-public Bubbie’s Navels (three-bite outie-nubbin-like sandwiches with their “fetal-sized” mini scoop pressed between two chocolate chip mac nut cookies, all half-dipped in Belgian chocolate) and truly awesome Mochi Balls (pictured above), which (probably thanks to Oprah’s approval), you can find at Andronico’s, Whole Foods, Draeger’s here in the Bay, at Dean & DeLuca in Napa Valley. You know those stores aren’t known for being cheap, so yes, expect to pay about $1 per Ball, or about $7.60 for a package of eight. I’d say they were worth it if I didn’t know how to make my own at home for a fraction of the cost. Except I don’t hand-crank my own ice cream.

Hand-cranked. The friend who popped my Bubbies cherry in my Freshmen year (she was a Sophomore… scandalous) kept repeating that phrase over and over. “The ice cream here is hand-cranked. It’s hand-cranked ice cream, you know?” I wonder if I could tell the difference if she hadn’t told me. Probably. It’s ultra rich, beyond creamy, and the sorbet is smooth (not icy) and flavorful. Now that I know they have a factory in Aiea, I’m not so sure about the whole hand-cranked thing, but handmade, sure.

And what flavors do they have?, you might ask. Green Tea, Azuki Bean, Lychee, Sakura, Guava, Passion Fruit, Mac Nut, Tiramisu, Strawberry Cheesecake, Coconut Delight, Kahlua, Banana Royal (sic?) just to name a few patrons’ favorites. Over 200 rotated flavors are posted up on removable eye-hooked wooden slats that are sometimes temporarily obscured by handwritten or cringe-worthy laminated WordArt banners. You can get a fresh waffle, wafer, or sugar cone, and on display are the fetal-dip cones, which look as though someone just messily chewed an inch off the tops, or else they had rats go nuts in the back.

There’s also the novelty “Bathtub or Toilet Sundae” ($15) served in miniature (what else?) bathtub or toilet “bowls”. Order that with their “Garbage Can” or “Trashy” Coffee to complete the foul souvenir set.

Also a novelty, the delectable “Eat My Balls” which is a mini-scoop sampling of every current flavor they have (~14) for about $17.50. I’ve had that with several different groups of different friends; def better to share with girls than guys unless you’re the fastest spoon in the West. If you feel really keen on a flavor, and really mean to the servers, you can order take-home containers from pint to half-gallon size, and watch them heartily scoop for days, rotator cuff injury-inducing torture with a flat paddle.

The decor is pretty rustic-cute with wooden floors, posts, stained glass door insert displaying the shop’s name, tin-look ceiling tiles and lots of fake hanging pothos plants. There’s a water jug with teeny dentist-spit-cup-sized cups at the end of the counter if you get thirsty (and you will). Conscientious, no?

I’m partial to the First Night ice cream pie (left), which is white chocolate ice cream with an Oreo cookie center layer on an Oreo-raspberry crust with Belgian chocolate swishes latticed on top when you order. Their Green Tea ice cream isn’t as bitter nor as dark evergreen as Dave’s Hawaiian Ice Cream; good for days you want a hint of sweetened matcha. I was addicted to the rarely offered Moët Champagne sorbet, which is like eating fresh-fallen snow in Dubai, I’d imagine. (If it snowed in Dubai, I’d bet it’d snow Moët is what I mean).

TRIVIA TIME: Named in tribute to the creator Keith Robbins (a Nutrition graduate student at UH) strove to reproduce the Endicott-style ice cream he loved from his upstate New York roots. Bubbies Homemade Ice Cream opened to the public on Coyne Street in 1985, only to be destroyed by a fire the next year.

Bubbies Homemade Ice Cream
Varsity Center location (across the street from Puck’s Alley)
1010 University Ave – Honolulu, Hawai’i
(808) 949-8984

HOURS
Mon-Thurs noon – midnight
Fri-Sat noon – 1am
Sun noon -11:30pm

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Koko Marina Shopping Center location
7192 Kalanianaole Hwy Ste D103 – Honolulu, Hawai’i
(808) 396-8722

HOURS
Daily 10am -11pm

About the Author

Kris Nelson is an avid food adventurist who has tried everything from jellyfish to sea cucumber to chicken gizzards. She loved liver and onions with ketchup and cayenne pepper ice cream as a kid. She despises chocolate. She is now a happily mercury-poisoned pescetarian sushi lover.