Moose tracks is RI's favorite ice cream? Mark Patinkin gets the scoop on the real choice

Moose Tracks?

The favorite ice cream in Rhode Island ?

That's what a national survey said last week .

It named the top flavor in every state, with vanilla the first pick in 20 and chocolate in a dozen.

Two picked Moose Tracks.

Michigan. And, allegedly, us.

I understand Michigan. That’s where the flavor was created – vanilla with crushed peanut butter cups and fudge. Plus, they have a lot of moose there.

We don’t.

The survey was done by an outfit called Holiday Calendar, whose purpose is to list every obscure “official” day. Since Wednesday alone that includes Chicken Finger Day, Drive-Thru Day and – I’m not kidding – Thermal Engineers Day.

But it doesn’t sound right that Moose Tracks is the favorite ice cream here, so I decided to do some investigative journalism.

Meaning I called some well-known homemade ice cream shops.

So here – forgive me – is the real scoop.

I began with Steve Brophy, of legendary Brickley’s Ice Cream in South County, and asked his number one flavor.

Admittedly, he doesn’t carry Moose Tracks, but he doubts it would eclipse his top seller.

Which is, drumroll: Coffee Oreo.

“Not a surprise here in Rhode Island,” said Steve. “Anything with coffee is popular.”

He also sells a ton of vanilla, but that’s partly because of milkshakes and sundaes.

His real number two flavor is Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, followed by Chocolate Brownie. As for his frozen yogurt, the top pick is Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip.

I asked where he got the idea for Coffee Oreo.

It was a customer suggestion. A friend’s daughter worked as a teller at Steve’s bank, and whenever he went in, she asked him to try mixing crushed Oreos with coffee ice cream, so he finally did, and the rest is history.

Steve, by the way, now runs just one Brickley’s, in Wakefield, having recently sold his Narragansett location to Brendan Kenny.

So I called there next, and got Brendan’s brother Kieran, who’s the manager. Both brothers worked for Steve Brophy for years.

The Kennys are about to rebrand the Narrangansett Brickley’s as Baron’s, named after Brendan’s dog, a Chow-Lab mix.

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Kieran confirmed that the local favorite at his shop is also Coffee Oreo.

A pattern was developing.

Forget Moose Tracks – here, the taste of coffee has got to be in there somewhere.

Plenty of states, of course, are into coffee as a beverage, but Rhode Island stands out in culturally embracing the flavor itself. Of course, the biggest sign of that is coffee milk , the official state drink that nobody’s heard of beyond our borders. And when they do hear about it, they think it’s weird.

But not here.

Next, I tracked down Warren Sternberg, who opened Clementine’s Homemade Ice Cream in East Greenwich in 2017 and now has two more locations, in Portsmouth and Middletown.

There must be something about ice cream and dogs, because Clementine’s is also named for one – Warren and his wife’s chocolate Lab. Warren used to be a corporate recruiter but also worked for Brickley’s while growing up in North Kingstown, so he's returned to the ice cream world.

Clementine's sells a lot of it – about 1,500 gallons a week in the summer.

Warren says the Moose Tracks ranking doesn’t sound right.

“That one threw me for a loop,” he said.

His shop's top flavor is Cookie Dough.

But in keeping with the coffee thing here, Clementine’s also sells a ton of Coffee Heath Bar, with straight coffee flavor not far behind.

I had a brief call with Three Sisters on Providence’s East Side, which confirmed my investigation.

“A lot of people like Coffee Crunch,” said Mariani, a staffer there who answered the phone.

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And Coffee Cookie Dough is big, too.

Its biggest seller?

“Coffee,” said Dawn.

A pattern was also emerging around Black Raspberry – that’s often Gray's second top seller.

But not far behind is yet another coffee flavor – Mocha Chip.

I asked if they have many daily regulars.

For sure said Dawn. One notably gets a coffee frappe every day.

I asked Dawn her own favorite flavor.

“You’re going to laugh,” she said. “Coffee.”

Finally, I reached Kim Caron, owner of The Ice Cream Machine in Cumberland, which her parents started in 1977.

They also make their own, including a version of Moose Tracks called Cow Tracks.

It’s popular.

But you know what’s more so?

Their Coffee Oreo.

So is Cookie Dough and Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip. Oh, and once again, Black Raspberry.

“I call it the new Strawberry,” says Kim.

But as with the other places, The Ice Cream Machine sells a ton of Rhode Island’s top flavor.

“We love our coffee,” said Kim. “That’s my favorite.”

Many of their 70 flavors include it.

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Aside from straight coffee, popular choices there are Coffee Heath Bar, Coffee Oreo, Mocha Chip, Coffee Yogurt and Mudslide Crunch – a combo of coffee and Irish Crème.

Why, I asked, is it so big in Rhode Island?

“I don’t know,” Kim said. “Coffee syrup and coffee frappes started here. It’s just part of the culture.”

So take note, national survey people.

You got our ice cream preference wrong.

Moose Tracks may have fans here.

But this being Rhode Island, it’s all about coffee.

mpatinki@providencejournal.com

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Moose tracks is RI's favorite ice cream? Mark Patinkin gets the scoop on the real choice