The popular Portland, Oregon-based ice cream purveyor Salt & Straw is opening its first-ever New York location on the Upper West Side on Friday — and debuting three Jewish flavors.
Famous for its inventive ice creams like Honey Lavender and Green Apple Wasabi Sorbet, the creamery is launching an exclusive “New York City series” — five flavors that are available only at the shop at 360 Amsterdam Ave. for the final two weeks of September.
The five limited-time flavors include three Jewish-inflected varieties: Chocolate Babka with Hazelnut Fudge, Cinnamon Raisin Bagels & Schmear and Pastrami on Rye (no, that’s not a typo).
The two other flavors are equally imaginative: Pistachio and Ricotta Cannoli and Merlot-Aged Sour with Figs, a partnership with Brooklyn’s Grimm Brewery.
In a video filmed inside an unnamed Upper West Side express subway station posted to Salt & Straw’s Instagram on Thursday afternoon, Tyler Malek, the company’s co-founder and head ice cream maker, introduces — and samples — the new collection.
The babka ice cream is a collaboration with Breads Bakery, a bakery with Israeli roots that is “one of my favorite bakeries in the entire world,” Malek said. “We take all that babka from Breads, we blend it into this basically babka butter … We’re adding a little bit of extra chocolate, a little bit of extra hazelnut fudge to kind of give it that decadence and gooeyness that fresh-baked babka is so famous for.”
Featuring real New York pastrami, the Pastrami on Rye flavor, Malek said, will “blow your mind.” The flavor incorporates a fruity spiced ice cream, rye crumble and something called “mustard custard.”
According to Malek, it’s “so fruity, so bright, with a hint of real pastrami.”
As for the final Jewish flavor, Cinnamon Bagels & Schmear, Salt & Straw is partnering with “literally one of the coolest companies in the country right now,” PopUp Bagels, a celebrity-backed bagel bakery that opened its first New York City storefront in 2023. To create the flavor, Salt & Straw used a “very famous, very exclusive batch of their cinnamon raisin bagels that we cook and candy into this ice cream.”
Jewish ice cream is having something of a moment in New York City: Earlier this summer, Morgenstern’s Finest Ice Cream teamed up with iconic appetizing spot Russ & Daughters to create three frozen treats similarly inspired by Jewish classics: halvah, bagels and babka. Meanwhile, Soho’s Museum of Ice Cream partnered with Ess-a-Bagel to create a pink bagel filled with cream cheese vanilla ice cream and topped with everything bagel topping.
Salt & Straw was founded by cousins Kim and Tyler Malek in 2011 as a pushcart; the brand has since expanded across the West Coast and in Florida, with Jewish chef Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group coming on as investors in 2017. The Upper West Side location will be its 42nd store.
“Get ready for long lines,” warns Eater New York, though there’s good news for those who can’t be bothered to spend hours in a queue: A second New York City Salt & Straw location is expected to open at 540 Hudson Street in the West Village.
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