Odd-Fellow-Haus Zürich

Is This New Cheese Ice Cream Any Good?

"We tried a $5 scoop at OddFellows made with Murray’s Cavemaster Reserve Annelies — a cows’-milk cheese from Switzerland’s Appenzell Valley aged for two years in Murray’s caves — available at all five OddFellows locations through Sunday. Trust us, it really tastes like cheese: the official description touts “sweet flavors of roasted hazelnuts and vibrant alpine grasses, with lush undertones of butterscotch and cocoa,” but the ice cream comes across as grass and herbs, a musty European-basement note, or a nice pecorino; yet it still somehow reads as ice cream. After the jarring first licks the cheesiness mellows into something like sweet sour cream (think mild blue cheese on buttered bread taming wilder flavors). Toppings matter: blueberry syrup was tasty but mostly a cover-up, while spiced almonds were the strongest move, adding a salty crunch without diminishing the experience. Like many of OddFellows’s more outré flavors — manchego with pineapple and thyme, Malt Maitake Peanut, scallion — the Annelies scoop is impressive even if it isn’t necessarily “delicious” in the traditional sense, and we say go give it a shot; you’ll try something truly new and can always order another cone afterward." - Nikita Richardson