Chillin' with Uncle Louie

My first encounter with Uncle Louie G’s was back in the late 90’s when it was a small storefront on Coney Island Avenue near Park Circle. Tiny, well-lit and run by a series of incompetent high school girls it was a Mecca (for two or three summers) for the best Italian ice in Brooklyn, and that’s saying something. Soon, however, that series of small stores was razed and Uncle Louie’s moved around the Circle to the corner of Vanderbilt Ave. and Prospect Park West, even more convenient for me.

Success followed and, now franchised, there are a number of Louie G’s spotted around Brooklyn and the other boroughs (and far beyond--down the eastern seaboard and, I’ve heard recently, Florida). Even though ice cream seems to be the product of choice for most people, it is to thank the powers-that-be they are still selling Italian ices. I’m not a big fan of their particular brand of ice cream but, luckily, the lemon ice remains special; tart and tasty and a really nice splash of oral frigidity on a hot summer day.

I’m not too happy that a double dip (shown here) now costs $3.50 but I guess we can, as usual, blame the current economic downturn for the (over)price of even this little slice of Italian/Americana. Anyway, as you probably suspect, I just got home from Uncle Louie G’s with sticky fingers and a cool uvula.