Mid-Week Insta-Nom: Rose Geranium Sundae at Sweet Rose Creamery

*Update: Just heard from Sweet Rose Creamery that this sundae will now be available through Sunday, 5/12!

Here’s your mid-week Insta-Nom to help get you over the hump:

Rose Geranium Ice Cream Sundae

 

“What’s your favorite restaurant in LA?” is a loaded question for me, impossible to answer without factoring in considerations such as type of food, location and price. Answering “what’s your favorite ice cream in LA?” on the other hand, is easy: Sweet Rose Creamery.

 

Located in the Brentwood Country Mart, Sweet Rose Creamery makes small batches of artisanal ice cream with organic, fresh and seasonal ingredients. Overachievers in the best, most delicious way, they even make their cones, toppings and sauces from scratch daily. The cheery, old-fashioned shop is owned by Josh Loeb and Zoe Nathan (Rustic Canyon, Huckleberry, Milo and Olive), and its menu of both classic and rotating flavors such as Fresh Mint with Homemade Chocolate Chips and Brown Butter with Lemon Wafers is the brainchild of chef Shiho Yoshikawa.

 

This week marks Sweet Rose Creamery’s third birthday and, to celebrate, they’re serving up an epic birthday sundae. The Rose Geranium Ice Cream sundae features generous scoops of their seasonal Rose Geranium ice cream with fresh raspberries and blackberries, swirls of chocolate syrup and raspberry coulis and is topped with fresh whipped cream (whipped to order!), chocolate shavings and edible floral petals ($7.50). After scarfing down one this past weekend, I can attest that, yes, this sundae is as delicious as it is beautiful…but hurry because it’s only available until tomorrow, May 9th!

Sweet Rose Creamery
www.sweetrosecreamery.com
www.twitter.com/sweetroseicecrm
225 26th St. #51
Santa Monica, CA 90402
(310) 260-2663

Milo and Olive

As a superfan of both pizza and the wife-husband team of Zoe Nathan and Josh Loeb (Rustic Canyon, Huckleberry, Sweet Rose Creamery), I was long overdue for a visit to Milo and Olive. The pizzeria sits on the same stretch of Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica as Rustic Canyon and Huckleberry and, like its sister eateries, spotlights locally-sourced, seasonal ingredients (and also showcases Zoe’s phenomenal pastries).

Recently, my boyfriend and I found ourselves in Santa Monica for an impromptu errand with no dinner plans. Since the tiny, twenty-four seat Milo and Olive doesn’t accept reservations, it seemed like as a good a time as any to pay them a visit. Our initial estimated wait time of 45 minutes crept up to over an hour thanks to some lingering diners, but I refused to let a (serious) case of the “hangries” come between me and my pizza.

Once seated, we started with the Wood-Fired Garlic Knot ($7.50), a plump satchel of pizza dough stuffed with olive oil, thyme and whole garlic cloves– lots and lots of them.

With a delightfully crisp exterior and pillowy soft, garlicky interior, it’s no wonder the garlic knot is one of the restaurant’s most popular dishes.

For our entrees, we opted for two of Milo and Olive’s specials.

The Bacon and Brussels Sprout special arrived with pliable, crispy pizza dough topped with a hearty helping of brussels sprouts, Nueske bacon slivers, red onions and sottocerne cheese ($20.00). I wished that the brussels sprouts and bacon had more a tad more char and crunch but, overall, the pie was pretty delightful, and the all-important crust ranked among the best in LA.

Our second entree was the off-menu Black Truffle Pizza special with truffle cream and taleggio cheese ($40.00) When we were informed that only two of these remained and heard the couple across from us order one of them, I quickly stated my case for the splurge to the boyfriend. Could we really miss out on this pizza and be subjected to watching our neighbors enjoy the truffle goodness? Absolutely not. The creamy, umami-laden pizza boasted a generous helping of truffle shavings and more than justified the price tag in our minds–especially when you consider the leftovers of the sizable pizza that we took home.

There’s a reason that Rustic Canyon, Huckleberry and Sweet Rose Creamery are at the top of my list of favorite spots, and now Milo and Olive joins them.

Milo and Olive
www.miloandolive.com
2723 Wilshire Boulevard
Santa Monica, CA 90403
(310) 453-6776