By Rachel Hergett EBS COLUMNIST
“Do you know where to find the new maple creemee place?” my cousin’s fiancée, Jacqui, asked a couple weeks ago.
Not only did I not know, but I was a bit confused. Maple creemee? What the hell is a maple creemee? I demanded that Jacqui explain herself.
A maple creemee is essentially soft serve ice cream flavored and sweetened with maple syrup, Jacqui told me. Maple creemees are now found in stands and shops throughout New England, though credit naturally goes to Vermont, where maple syrup may as well be in the water.
“There’s nothing quite like a Vermont maple creemee,” I read on the Vermont Maple Sugar Makers’ Association website. The group has even created a “Vermont Maple Creemee Trail” with 14 stops around the state. “Cool, creamy, and flavored with real Vermont maple syrup, it’s one of the sweetest ways to experience summer in the Green Mountains.” But we’re currently in the Rockies, and I have never seen, nor tasted a maple creemee in this neck of the woods.
I forgot about creemee conversation until the next week, when I turned into the Town Pump on East Main Street to fill up my gas tank and spotted a small sign stuck into the ground with the words “soft serve ice cream” and a big arrow pointing down the street. Was this it? Did I somehow stumble on the sole stop on Montana’s maple creemee trail? I literally followed the signs to Mad Dawg Maple Co., a little trailer parked outside Roly-Poly Coffee Co. at 528 N. Broadway Ave. The creemees had officially been located.
Mattie “Mad Dawg” Mazur and partner Jake Lupien opened Mad Dawg Maple this year, combining their Montana and Vermont roots with a product that blends Montana-made Wilcoxson’s soft serve ice cream with maple syrup from Riverbend Farm in Fairfax, Vermont, an organic farm owned by Jake’s uncle.
“We did it kind of on a whim,” Mattie said.
But business has been booming. The Montana maple creemees are a hit. Though they plan to close the trailer at the end of September, Lupien and Mazur will use the break to plan for Mad Dawg Maple’s future. A brick and mortar location is under consideration for next year’s warm season.
Creemees are pretty much the only thing on the menu at Mad Dawg Maple Co. though the signage caters to people like me, who had never heard the term, and prominently uses “soft serve.” The options are maple, chocolate or twist. The lil’ dog size starts at $5.50 in a cup or a cake cone with upcharges for other cones (waffle and gluten free) and sprinkles (maple, chocolate or rainbow).
To maintain the purity of this new taste experience I decided to keep it simple with a cup of the maple soft serve topped with maple sprinkles—Nerd-sized pebbles of maple syrup that is boiled until it crystallizes.
With the first bite, I began to understand why maple creemees are craveable. The maple flavor is subtle but rich, a nice change of pace from a classic vanilla. It is, as the name suggests, both maple-forward and creamy. It is cold, sweet perfection.
I went back the next day with a friend and tried the twist—a swirl of maple-infused vanilla and chocolate. It was slightly disappointing, with the chocolate overpowering the maple and the maple cutting the chocolate flavor. I would choose maple or chocolate in the future.
Next, I decided to consult an expert, telling Jacqui that I had found the maple creemee place and asking her to join me late one afternoon.
“I’ve been looking forward to this all day,” Jacqui said when we sat down at a picnic table that Mad Dawg Maple shares with Roly-Poly.
To be clear, Jacqui is far more than my cousin’s fiancée: she’s a bad ass athlete and aspiring doctor, who also happens to be from the east coast, Pennsylvania specifically. She described how maple creemees were a staple of the New England summer vacations of her youth, and of her undergraduate college years in Maine.
“I’m not from Vermont, so I won’t call myself a true expert, but I’ve had a few maple creemees before,” Jacqui said, clearly understating her experience. “This is kind of the essence of it.”
In her estimation, a creemee place should be small, a mom-and-pop operation at its core. And the creemee should be fatty ice cream.
Later, I stumbled on some internet debate about how Vermont’s creemees, maple or not, differ from soft serve. It’s the fat content. True creemees are more akin to ice cream, with about 10% milk and butter fat. Soft serve usually has between 3 and 6%.
Wilcoxson’s soft serve, I learned from the nice woman named Teresa who answered the phone at their Livingston facility, has between 4 and 5%. When I stopped by for my fourth taste test—this time with my mom in tow—I asked Jake about the creaminess of the creemees. No, Mad Dawg Maple’s creemee isn’t as rich as one you would find in Vermont. But it is still by all accounts delicious, while incorporating local ingredients.
“And my stomach feels better after,” he said.
Rachel Hergett is a foodie and cook from Montana. She is arts editor emeritus at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle and has written for publications such as Food Network Magazine and Montana Quarterly. Rachel is also the host of the Magic Monday Show on KGLT-FM and teaches at Montana State University.
