With the opening of an ice cream parlor next door to her Beverly Hills flagship bakery, Candace Nelson is on a mission to start another dessert fad
Candace Nelson’s new ice cream shop opened just days before we visited (Elizabeth Street’s cameras were the first to capture the new location), and the queue was already out the door—the mirror image of the infamous one-hour line at the nearby Sprinkles Cupcake Bakery. While on the premises, we heard tales of the many friendships built (and phone numbers exchanged) in line, not to mention the eager Sprinkles-goers snapping Instagrams of themselves with the signature red velvet waffle cones.
The red and white décor of Sprinkles Ice Cream is sleek yet playful. One wall displays the same Warhol quote that employees sport on their t-shirts: “Rodeo Drive is a giant butterscotch sundae.” On the overhead rotunda, you can read Thomas Jefferson’s recipe for vanilla ice cream, penned in his own hand, which Nelson had scanned and sent over from the Library of Congress. The shop even has its own “I love Sprinkles” jingle, which loops into the music track every 20 minutes.
Nelson, who is busy enough raising two young boys at home, certainly has her hands full these days, with business expansion plans reaching as far as Kuwait, and her gig as a judge on the Food Network’s Cupcake Wars. We were thrilled that she took the time to show us how to whip cream to perfection, and how to concoct the kind of ice cream sundae that’s sure to launch another dessert craze.