Ice Cream Sandwiches, Thai Style

A girl waits for her ice cream sandwich by a market cart

If you're in a city in Thailand you won't have a problem finding a shop that sells ice cream cones as you'd expect to find "back home" (heck, even KFC sells those) but for a fine walk-away treat on a hot market day you can't beat a surprise like coming across an ice cream cart.

Instead of scooping the ice cream into a cone that will invariably drip out the bottom before you're finished the vendors there put it into a split roll, somewhat like a half of a hot dog bun. I've had several types of bread used, and the type that's closer to a Portuguese or Hawaiian-type sweet bread are the best. It's slightly sweet, slightly egg-y, and the aroma of fresh, yeasty bread is a wonderful compliment to the rich ice cream. I've seen coconut, mango, pineapple and a couple of other flavors over the years.

There are a couple of drawbacks: they can still be messy, and you have to ignore the lack of gloves on the hands of the vendor who touches your bread. That doesn't bother me, but I know some who would avoid it. It's cheap (maybe 10-15 baht) and delicious.

Detail of the lead photo