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Business & Tech

Beat the Heat the Old Fashioned Way - With Soda and Ice Cream

Cool off with these choice cold treats.

The temperatures will be in the upper 90s for the next few days (and likely many more times this summer). Yes, summer has arrived in Brooklyn.

The winter seemed especially long this year, and while back then it was hard to imagine the glaring sun, the need to blast air conditioning and the constant hot, sticky, humidity, it's here now. You don't need to imagine anything.

Luckily, there are many ways to cool down. One of the best parts of a hot summer day are the cold treats - the refreshing and delicious sorbets and ice creams, shakes and sodas - that go along with it.

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And so, here are some of our favorite sweets in the neighborhood that ought to do the trick.

Swing by Sweet Melissa's at 276 Court St. between Butler and Douglass streets for the raspberry chocolate truffle ice cream, a vanilla ice cream laced with ribbons of raspberry, with miniature dark chocolate truffles filled with raspberry sauce. If you need an excuse to eat it in the earlier part of the day, get it on top of a belgian waffle.

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There is also a raspberry sorbet here that is particularly refreshing.

This sweets shop at 68 Dean St. (right off of Smith Street) makes ice cream sandwiches with their homemade whoopie pie shell, which comes in chocolate or pumpkin. The two soft cookies surround New York’s own Il Laboratorio del Gelato’s ricotta gelato.

It's almost like a meal! A cold, sweet meal, that is.

This new and locavore centric small bites and beer cafe, at 61 Bergen St. between Smith and Court Street, has a menu packed with local foods, so it seems only fitting that they would be one of the few restaurants in the area to sell Brooklyn Soda Works’ Apple Ginger Soda.

All Brooklyn Soda Works’ sodas are made with organic cane sugar, and the delicious and fresh flavors they employ will satisfy your taste buds while bringing down your body temperature.

If you don’t know this ice cream shop at 81 Bergen St. (and Smith Street) already, maybe you recognize the name Van Leeuwen from the many ice cream trucks that travel the city.

The ice cream here is all about the ingredients, which are free of preservatives and artificial flavors. The most popular flavor is the peppermint and chip ice cream, with organic peppermint from Oregon and Michel Cluizel chocolate chips, but other flavors include gianduja, pistachio and currants and cream.

Delicious and ICE cold!

This ice cream shop on 196 Court St. (near Wyckoff) is well known for their ice cream, but the root beer and ginger beer floats are a favorite of ours. Must be something about the bubbles...

They also sell ice cream cake, which you can be sure will be gone ten minutes after you bring it to that barbecue or birthday party you’re attending next weekend.

Blue Marble uses New England dairy products, and also boasts seasonal flavors, so be sure to check their always changing stock. 

The old fashioned Brooklyn Farmacy and Soda Fountain, located at 513 Henry St. (near Sackett Street), specializes in chocolate, vanilla or coffee egg creams, made with Fox’s U-bet syrup (a Brooklyn ingredient), whole milk and soda water.

If a milkshake seems too thick, an egg cream is the way to go, and its not too sweet like so many frozen drinks are. If you want something a bit fancier, try The Pink Poodle, which is hibiscus soda with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Go back in time while you chill out!

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