The Penny Ice Creamery | Town & Country Village — Restaurant in Palo Alto

I had to check out Palo Alto’s newest ice cream shop! The shop is bright and cute and the people who work there are extremely friendly. They let me taste like seven different flavors!

The ice cream style is a little more icy than creamy/fatty, it reminds me of gelato. What really stood out though are the flavors! Someone in the kitchen is a flavor master.

The chamomile apricot tasted like an apricot creamsicle. The pineapple sorbet tasted so fresh and juicy, like pineapple when it’s perfectly ripe. The mint is very herbal with bitter chocolate. The bitter caramel is pleasantly sweet but with a bite, similar to Salt and Straw’s old rye flavor. The vegan chocolate rivals Humphrey Slocombe’s - it’s intense, dark, and satisfying. But my favorite was the verve coffee flavor. It’s a flavor burst on your tongue, with a little nuttiness and sweetness.

They let you do a little tasting called a mini triple so you can get three flavors in one (woohoo for indecisive people!) Don’t miss their light and fluffy bruleed...

Ice cream was fine. Service was terrible -- one person was walking around behind the counter offering no help and answered rudely when we asked if we were standing in the right line. The other was trying to serve customers but about as slowly and inefficiently as one could imagine. Prices are very high. Not worth the hassle or the indifference. For the management: Perhaps (1) instruct your associates that when a long line forms, they should stop what else they're doing and help serve customers; (2) instruct associates to at least make eye contact and say "I'll be right with you" to those waiting; (3) reorganize your process -- person at the counter had to keep going back and forth between the ice cream case, the scooping station, the cups, the cones, and the toppings. Looked like a comedy routine where the goal is to maximize customer...

Marshmellow fluff was very fun- ice cream was fine. But for $8 all in, this needs to be more than just fine. A group of family friends and kids came for ice cream and hung out at their little inside seating area for 15 minutes chatting. The place was empty on a Sunday 2:30pm on a heat wave day (never a good sign for an ice cream business). A lady then came over to tell us we were too loud and she can’t hear her one customers’ order - she did not do so in a nice way. It was clearly to ask us to leave (and leave her store empty again). Unfortunate customer service experience when paying $8 for a scoop of ice cream that I really...