Bruster’s Real Ice Cream

When you search online for the best ice cream in Orange County, a few names tend to pop up – we love Saffron & Rose, Wanderlust, and Tocumbo for different cultural variations, but for American-style classics, Blue Scoop, Salt & Straw, and Handel’s all have fervent fanbases. Over the last several years, a national chain named Bruster’s Real Ice Cream has been expanding aggressively in the county, tripling its footprint with scoop shops across Dana Point, Fullerton, Huntington Beach, Orange, Seal Beach, and Yorba Linda. Bruster’s originally opened in Pennsylvania as a Handel’s franchise, but went independent in 1990, and now has over 200 independently owned locations across 22 states.

That origin story explains a few key similarities between Bruster’s and Handel’s, including their promises that ice cream is freshly made in-house, massive lists of possible flavors (here, 150 with a rotating daily collection of 24 choices), and some unique-to-them recipes, including Graham Central Station and other graham cracker variants. They also share a focus on decidedly old school American flavors, such that five or ten of any day’s flavors are likely to be chocolate-based, each adding ingredients such as brownie or marshmallow bits to a similar-tasting chocolate base. Five more will mix chocolate chips with other base flavors, and the rest will be common fruit, nut, caramel, and vanilla variations.