Ample Hills and Zabar’s are turning an entire babka into kosher ice cream

There are collaborations that feel focus-grouped into existence and then there is Ample Hills Creamery turning an entire loaf of Zabar’s cinnamon babka into ice cream.

The Brooklyn-born scoop shop is teaming up with the Upper West Side institution (which is not certified kosher) on Holy Babka!, a limited-edition flavor arriving at all four Ample Hills locations on August 31. The timing puts it comfortably ahead of Rosh Hashanah, although we should clarify that babka requires neither a holiday nor a formal excuse.

To make the flavor, Ample Hills ice cream maker Jazmin Green blends a full loaf of Zabar’s cinnamon babka into a sweet cream base with Madagascar vanilla. More pieces of hand-cut babka are then folded into the ice cream as it churns, resulting in layers of cinnamon, buttery bread and the sort of unapologetic density one expects from a proper babka.

It is also kosher. As Pretty Kosher previously reported, all four Ample Hills locations received certification from National Kosher Supervision earlier this year, opening up the creamery’s famously mix-in-heavy menu to kosher New Yorkers.

Holy Babka! is a particularly logical next act: Ample Hills built its reputation by folding baked goods into ice cream, while Zabar’s has spent generations understanding that New Yorkers will reliably make room for one more carb. Together, they have produced what amounts to a frozen bakery order.

For those already prepared to move past summer—even though New York will almost certainly remain humid well into September—the creamery has also brought back Falling for Pumpkin. The seasonal flavor combines pumpkin ice cream made with Libby’s pumpkin purée, brown sugar and fall spices with house-made cinnamon-sugar cone pieces and marshmallow swirls. It is available now, coinciding with the annual return of Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte and the cultural insistence that August is basically October.

Both flavors will be sold at Ample Hills’ Prospect Heights shop at 623 Vanderbilt Avenue, its location at The Social at 816 Washington Avenue, the Astoria store at 34-02 30th Avenue and the Upper West Side outpost at 526 Amsterdam Avenue.

Some more details: Falling for Pumpkin is already being scooped and Holy Babka! arrives on August 31. If nothing else, it offers a convincing solution to the perennial question of whether babka counts as breakfast, dessert or a legitimate way to begin the Jewish New Year: apparently, all three.