One thing you will notice about the average Danish person is that they love ice cream. I mentioned this to a Danish friend and as usual she agreed but hadn’t really thought about it.

Now this isn’t just a summer thing, ice cream has its place all year round. I recall a friend having a frustrating journey home, stuck behind the ice cream van one evening in her car mere minutes from home, whilst her neighbours stocked up. It was November and the outside temperatures hovering around zero, but all the ice cream shops do close over the winter so you need to get your supplies somewhere! In hospital when my son was a baby, there was an ice cream and ice lolly vending machine in the lounge – it was November again and I am sure this machine is well used all year round.

Ice cream really does come into its own here in the spring and summer when all the big ice cream scoop shops open for the summer season – on the first of March! People, including us, queue down the street outside various shops such as Social Food (see above left), Paradis and many others for the first (and on the opening weekend) free scoop of the season. My dad is an ice cream fiend and loves visiting us in the summer as he could practically have a scoop every ten minutes whilst wandering around the city on a summer’s day.

There are defining features of a Danish ice cone. Firstly the cone is a waffle cone and many shops make them on site. The photo on the right above is Maja Ambeck Vase, one of the authors of Lykken er Chokolade, making waffle cones in Social Food last weekend. Secondly once you have chosen your ice cream you can add guf (a pink sugary foam), a flødebolle smashed on top instead of a flake (as we do in the UK) and whipped cream as well. For kids there are even more options to pimp your ice cream. I noticed yesterday in Paradis they had a new wider menu of additions for this year. The world is your (ice cream) oyster here.

Yesterday we stopped on our way home from lunch for an ice cream and sat in the spring sunshine enjoying our scoops and it almost felt like summer!