Sonya Hu
Google
Super fun ice cream shop with a ton of unique, Indian-inspired flavors! I stopped by Malai on a Sunday evening in July, just a few weeks after they first opened. There was still quite a long line, but it moved pretty quickly and we were soon able to escape the swampy DC heat and cool off with a bit of ice cream (and AC). My friend and I were feeling indecisive about which of their many flavors we should get, so we ended up both getting two flavors and splitting them. She got the mango cream and fig on fig, while I got their two sorbets -- the pineapple pink peppercorn and guava chili.
Each of the flavors were phenomenal, but both of our favorites were the pineapple peppercorn and fig on fig. Both ice creams were rich and creamy, but the mango cream was a bit lacking in mango flavor. The fig, however, absolutely delivered on their promise of fig on fig, and had plenty of the complex, honey-like sweetness from the fruit. It had bits of fig mixed in, so there was the occasional crunch from the tiny seeds or bit of chewiness from the flesh of the fruit.
The sorbets were also both delightful, but it was a bit too much to get two spicy flavors together. It would have been a bit more balanced to get one peppery sorbet and pair it with a complementary ice cream, but we ended up basically achieving that outcome by sharing with each other. The guava chili had quite a kick, so it definitely would have needed creamier, richer pairing, but the pineapple peppercorn was a bit more subtle and leaned further into the pineapple.