TC Scoops
Is there anything better than going to get ice cream on a summer night?
This past weekend was really lazy for me. It seems like so many of my weekends are packed trying to get thing done around our travels. Two weekends ago, I spent all day Saturday doing chores then worked all day Sunday. I was exhausted. I ended up working a 60 hour workweek last week and just needed some time to do nothing.
I had some meat in the fridge that needed to be cooked so I made dinner fairly early on Saturday. Everyone actually ate so a little while later, I asked if anyone wanted ice cream.
J had actually suggested that earlier in the day. She said ice cream for dinner….which isn’t a bad idea….but I went the more traditional route of ice cream after dinner.
J’s suggestion earlier in the day was TC Scoops and I saw no reason to pick somewhere else.
TC Scoops is a new walk up ice cream spot on Texas Drive and South 8th Street in the Texas Corners business district of Texas Township. Pro-tip, there is no entrance to the business from Texas Drive though. You need to go up to the entrance for Texas Corners Brewing Company to get to the parking lot….and on a busy Saturday night in Texas Corners, that parking lot is going to be pretty full. I’m guessing a lot of people are turning on Texas Drive and having to turn around because the first house past the shop had a garbage can in the middle of the driveway blocking people from turning around. We ended up parking in the lot of a building next door that wasn’t open but that’s probably not the best idea during business hours. Anyway, once we got parked, we made our way to the new building. The family owned ice cream shop fills a void left by Lafayette Creamery which closed back in 2020.
TC Scoops is one of the classic neighborhood walk up ice cream spots. There is no “inside.” All ordering is done from a window and the ice cream flavors are visible through large windows that look in to the small kitchen area. The menu hangs in a glass enclosed display case next to each of the order windows. They have ice cream from all of the major suppliers in the area and don’t stick to just one exclusive ice cream company.
I was the only one who didn’t get hard pack ice cream. I ordered a medium TC Flurry with cookie dough bits. The treat is a pretty standard flurry/Blizzard made with vanilla soft serve and little bits of cookie dough. I’m not sure how they measure but the cup wasn’t quite full when she handed it over to me. It was close enough. There was still plenty of ice cream and loads of those soft cookie dough bites.
The rest of the family went with hard pack…and I’m not going to lie. I didn’t write down what each of them got and since there’s not flavor list because there are multiple ice cream companies, it’s going to be hard for me to figure out exactly what each of them got.
I know J got some kind of Sea Salt Caramel. A single scoop in a cup and it was more than enough ice cream for her.
L always does a waffle cone. She also got a single scoop which turns out to be like three scoops on a waffle cone. There is a bit of an upcharge for the waffle cone. I think it was $1.00
B also got a single scoop in a cup. I know one of his ice cream choices was Superman. I think the other was a cotton candy. Either way, B is the world’s most frustrating to watch ice cream eater. I know he likes the Superman but he cannot eat ice cream without making a complete mess. He’s 10 years old now….I would have thought he’d figure it out by now but he instantly started complaining that it was melting too fast and he doesn’t know how to take a bite without pushing down on the whole thing and forcing the melted ice cream to ooze over the top of the cup. Fortunately, there were metal mesh tables so it just fell to the rocks below…and all over his legs.
We stayed and ate at the shop because it was such a nice night out. There is a little area off to the side of the building with several tables but those were all full. Like I mentioned above, there are a couple of metal picnic tables in the rocks in front of the building so that’s where we ended up sitting.
The cost for the four of us to get ice cream was right around $23.
I’ve been complaining for years that Kalamazoo doesn’t really have any of the traditional walk up, summertime ice cream joints. Ritter’s Frozen Custard in Portage and Dairy Queen on Centre Avenue in Portage are about the only ones. There are no local neighborhood ice cream places like so many communities have. TC Scoops invades that space. There were a lot of people who clearly walked the nearby trail and walked from nearby neighborhoods to get ice cream with their kids. It’s also a great stop for dessert after dinner at Texas Corners Brewing, Fletcher’s Pub or one of the many other great restaurants in Texas Corners.
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