For Central Ohio ice cream lovers who are bored of the usual vanilla or chocolate rotation and craving something worth bragging about, this guide rounds up 6 of the wildest, most unique flavors and creations in the region. These are the kind that give you a real “you won’t believe what I ate” story, not just another cone.
Here’s your hit list for this summer.
The Craziest Ice Cream Flavors in Columbus and Central Ohio This Summer
1. The Birthday Cake Milkshake, Shake No.8 (University District)
1537 N High St, Columbus, OH 43201
Shake No.8, on North High Street near Ohio State’s campus, built its whole reputation on shakes that are more dessert tower than drink. Their birthday shake tops any milkshake flavor with an actual slice of birthday cake, a balloon, and colorful caramel popcorn, basically a full birthday party stuffed into a cup. It’s the kind of thing you order specifically because you want a photo before you want a sip.
2. The Unicorn / The Buckeye, The Yard Milkshake Bar (Short North)
1055 N High St, Columbus, OH 43201
The Yard’s whole concept is “milkshake as souvenir.” Every extreme shake comes in a mason jar dipped, rolled, and stacked with toppings, and you keep the jar. The Unicorn piles cotton candy ice cream, marshmallow drizzle, sprinkles, and rainbow candy strips into one sugar-saturated jar, while the Columbus-exclusive Buckeye shake works in honey-roasted peanut butter ice cream and real buckeye candies for a more local flex.
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3. The Clown Cone, Johnson’s Real Ice Cream (Multiple Locations)
Johnson’s has been a Central Ohio institution since 1950, first opening in Bexley and now spread across ten locations (it’s still actively expanding, with a Lewis Center shop that opened this spring). Tucked into its otherwise classic, hand-dipped menu is the Clown Cone: an ice cream cone flipped upside down and decorated with piped frosting, candy, and a swirled sugar cone hat to look like a grinning clown face. You’ll find these in the freezers, though as with any single novelty item at a shop with this many locations, it’s worth confirming a given store still carries it before you make a special trip… juuuuuust in case they don’t have it!
4. Tamarind, Elote, and Tequila-Almond Ice Cream, Dulce Vida Ice Cream Factory (West Broad Street)
4201 W Broad St, Columbus, OH 43228
Dulce Vida makes everything in-house, and their flavor list reads like nowhere else in the city: tamarind, guava, blackberry cheese, Ferrero, passion fruit, and, if you’re feeling bold, tequila and almond or corn ice cream. It’s a genuinely different flavor universe from the typical scoop shop, plus an enormous paleta (Mexican popsicle) selection if you want something lighter.
5. The Crazy Shake, Sugar Rush (Reynoldsburg)
8114 E Broad St, Reynoldsburg, OH 43068
Sugar Rush’s Crazy Shakes come in two sizes, “mini” and “extreme,” and the extreme version arrives with a full-size cupcake, a mashup cookie, and a mountain of toppings balanced on top of the shake itself. This is a bakery first and a milkshake bar second, so the toppings are genuinely house-made, not just squeezed from a bottle.
6. Kesar Pista, Mardi Gras Homemade Ice Cream (Hard Road)
1947 Hard Rd, Columbus, OH 43235
A small, family-run shop tucked into a strip mall that most people drive right past, until they find out it makes some of the most unusual ice cream in the city. Kesar Pista blends saffron, cardamom, almond, and pistachio into something closer to a dessert you’d find in Mumbai than in Ohio. It’s awesome and full of flavors you wouldn’t expect would work so well together.
Summer Guides
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