Ice Cream Tasting Party in Boston!

Hey fellow vegans! Next Tuesday, January 22nd, there will be a vegan ice cream tasting party from 7-9PM in ... Boston!

Anyone that would like to get their paws on some delicious Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream is invited to taste-test some of our favorite flavors at this upcoming event.

However, the location is top secret -- so in order to get the exact address, email us at icecreamproject2007@yahoo.com to add your name to guestlist! (Don't worry, we're not being exclusive, the event will be located somewhere in Chinatown - we just need names and a rough attendance count before we can open the doors. Everyone is welcome!)

Hope to see you there and be sure to RSVP!


Ice Cream Tasting Party
Tuesday, January, 22nd from 7-9PM
RSVP for address at icecreamproject2007@yahoo.com

We Heart New York

Hello vegan ice cream fans!

There will be a vegan ice cream tasting coming up in New York just for all you chocoholics. That's right, there will be several different varieties of vegan chocolate ice cream (including Wheeler's favorite, chocolate chocolate chip, and some vanilla and pumpkin flavors for those who aren't feeling the chocolate love) all put together in a lovely little tasting party held at Little Cakes art gallery (Check out some of their press here and here). According to Papermag Arts, "Hanna Fushihara Aron came to terms with her antiestablishment concerns by deciding to do good business. And even if the business she runs is out of the ground-floor railroad apartment that she shares with her husband, artist David Aron, and several animals, her gallery Little Cakes has lofty ideals."

Drop on by if you can, 'cause even though this gallery is notoriously tiny, the more the merrier when there's ice cream at stake!

Details:
Where? Little Cakes
625 East 6th Street, #1B
New York, N.Y. 10009
When? This Sunday, January 20th from 1-3PM
If you get lost, call 646-342-1056 (Little Cakes number). We'll put balloons or something out front to let you know where the party is AT!

See you there!

Vegan rules!

Just to clarify things one more time, we are 100% VEGAN. We do not make dairy ice cream or products. We will not make dairy ice cream or products!

In our original post, we were letting other "ice cream" companies know that Wheeler is highly capable of making other frozen desserts.

Just letting the haters know....

Regarding some of the concerns with our last post, we would like to make a few clarifications. WE ARE STILL A VEGAN COMPANY.

Because we are vegans, some ice cream company CEO's believe that we are "weak". This is obviously untrue. We are just putting all of the haters on notice that we CAN make other frozen dessert products.

Wheeler's Private Stock however must be labeled because of children. Those who have tasted our alcohol ice creams know they are nice. We will be creating a new blog for those who like to get their drink on with VEGAN products!

Wheeler's Sorbets all 100% VEGAN!

So if anyone needs further clarifications, call Wheeler. His number is (617) 216-9087, and he'll be happy to talk with you!

Anyway, to be completely honest, these multi-million dollar corporations DO have a reason to be concerned with us. Have you tasted our ice cream?

An Important Announcement from Wheeler's

Hello ice cream fans!

Since Wheeler’s Black Label Vegan Ice Cream started selling our product to the public back in October (was it really only in October? Seems like we’ve been doing this forever!), we’ve been trying our hardest to 1) create the best tasting vegan ice cream possible; 2) be an active presence that actually pays attention to the people we serve; 3) establish ourselves as an independent micro “creamery”.

While we’re pleased that the vast majority of communications we’ve received from reviewers, tasters, and food writers has been positive and encouraging, we’re also admitting in full honesty that we’ve received some “concerns”. Some of it is fair enough, and was made with good intentions, but some of it has not. And considering these critiques were coming from certain multi-million dollar ice cream companies, it’s clearly meant to intimidate us as a small, fiercely independent business.

So, in order to meet the needs and act in good faith on the requests of those who are trying to help us improve, we’re going to be making some changes to our repertoire.

Wheeler’s Black Label Vegan Ice Cream Company will officially be changing our name to Wheeler’s Frozen Dessert Company. This company will make five different types of product.

We wish to emphasize that our primary focus (Wheeler guessimated about 98%) will be on continuing to make fabulous vegan ice creams that give other non-dairy and cows-milk ice cream makers something to think about. Never fear, we’re not going to make our current flavors (even more) difficult to get a hold of. These products will run under the name Wheeler’s Black Label Frozen Desserts.

Another product we’ll be selling will be Wheeler’s Black Label Sorbets. The name is pretty self-explanatory – we’ll be producing high-quality, traditional style sorbets with the same standard of deliciousness as the vegan ice “creams” you’ve come to love.

For adults only will be Wheeler’s Private Stock Black Label Desserts. These are actually just all of our flavors that contain alcohol all dressed up in a pretty new label. Flavors in the Private Stock are modeled after popular alcoholic drinks, like Kamikaze, White Russian, and Pina Colada. We’ve separated them out officially because even though we’ve always been very clear to note which flavors contain alcohol, it never hurts to stress the point. Separating them into a different brand also gives us greater flexibility for distribution, so that vendors can choose whether or not to carry Private Stock products.

The Black Label will also acquire added significance. Now, all but two products will carry the Black Label, which will note that the product is Vegan. Now, before you get all flustered about us no longer being exclusively vegan, I’ll explain why we’ve chosen this course of action.

Backtracking a little, these next two product lines were created just to address the “concerns” of a few big corporations. They are Wheeler’s Frozen Yogurt, and Wheeler’s Ice Cream. Wheeler’s dairy line will be, to allay concerns by our loyal vegans (our very first priority), in a super small, extremely low volume, totally limited edition capacity. Wheeler’s Frozen Yogurt has been created as a response to communications we’ve received from two certain frozen yogurt companies (that rhyme with StinkBerry and Bad Tango). For these very special haters of Wheeler’s Black Label, we’re creating a small line of frozen yogurts that will actually meet the taste and quality standards Wheeler’s holds. If we are able to duplicate these flavors into a suitable vegan form, we certainly will, and they will fly under the Black Label. Until we work out the specific formulations though, assume all frozen yogurts will be dairy-based.

Now, regarding Wheeler’s (dairy) Ice Cream. We’ll basically be making it by custom request only. Why do it at all, then? Well, the number one “concern” we’ve had from non-vegans (and a few vegans too) about our vegan ice creams is that we have no right to use the word “cream” since it doesn’t contain any actual cream. They insist that we should be using the phrase “frozen dessert”. This seems nit-picky to us. We think of the words “frozen dessert”, and it could be anything (a frozen parfait, or an ice cream cake, or even a candy bar that’s been thrown in the freezer), but doesn’t necessarily imply a non-dairy ice-cream-type dessert. Wheeler believes that making a small, token quantity of dairy ice cream will quiet the critics and that yes, we do have the right to use “ice cream” as our chosen description of even our non-dairy treats.

Still reading? Good job. Thanks for staying with me this far. I know this has been a long post, but we’re optimistic about the fate of Wheeler’s Frozen Dessert Company in 2008, and are very grateful for the support and encouragement we’ve received so far. Thanks you, guys. Your regularly scheduled vegan ice cream posts will return shortly.

New Review! Bostonist

Wow, Wheeler's last round of shipping ice cream to people all over the country has really paid off! We're getting tons of new reviews from bloggers and publications alike. Here's the very latest from Bostonist.

"That's right, you're not seeing things - VEGAN ice cream! A common misconception about keeping a vegan diet is that you have you to totally give up all your old favorite and sinful foods. While being a vegan does mean that your diet is more focused on vegetables, fruits, and whole grains it certainly doesn't require that you sit at home eating nothing but broccoli! There are many yummy vegan desserts out there to satisfy your sweet tooth, and Bostonist was lucky enough to try four of the many great flavors of Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream: Pumpkin, White Russian, Pina Colada, and Chocolate Chocolate Chip. Our first reaction was simple. Wow!

Thanks again, Bostonist! And Bostonians (and assorted locals), be sure to check out Bostonist's new vegan food feature, the Veggieist, by Korri Leigh Crowley. It's updated every Thursday.

New Review! Melisser, The Urban Housewife

Hey everyone! Thought we'd share another fantastic review made by our great friend, Melisser, The Urban Housewife. After sending her scoops of our Chocolate Chocolate Chip and Passionfruit flavors, she graciously gave us an impressive 4 1/2 stars! Thanks Melisser! Here's a bit of her article to check out, but the full, delicous review can be found at her blog, here.

Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream!

"For those of you who are avid veg blog readers, you've probably been reading the hype about Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream. Everyone from Isa at the PPK blog, Emilie at the Conscious Kitchen to the crew at SuperVegan is raving about this tantalizing treat. Well, I'm here to say, BELIEVE THE HYPE. I was able to get my hands on two flavors of Wheeler's ice cream & I'm here to give you the scoop (sans additional puns).



"It all started with a visit to the VegNews headquarters where the goods were delivered after being flown in from Boston. That's right, an actual person brought them on a plane, then walked in the door with a box of ice cream for us to sample! I acquired Chocolate Chocolate Chip (rumored to be Wheeler's favorite) & Passionfruit, then quickly ran home to try them . . ."




Thanks again, Melisser! Your review rocked!

Wheeler's features Sweet and Sara for marshmallowy ice cream magic!

Wheeler's is super excited to announce that we have created two new ice creams that feature Sweet and Sara's amazing vegan marshmallows! Keep checking back here to see what other amazing things we whip up with our new marshmallow-making best friend Sara. These flavors are fantastic and you definitely don't want to miss out on them:

Sweet and Sara Hot Chocolate - Our classic double chocolate with tons of Mexican chocolate marshmallows mixed in to make it nice and gooey in all the right places.

Ambrosia - Made with Sweet and Sara toasted coconut marshmallows, mandarin oranges, banana and coconut, you'll have to try it to believe it! Pretty appropriately named, this ice cream could certainly satisfy the entire population of Mount Olympus!

And if you're wondering how to get your hands on these flavors, I'll tell you right now that we're still looking for people to organize Taste Teams. Sign up and let us know exactly what works, what doesn't, and of course get a preview of all the newest concoctions out of the Wheeler's kitchen! See this post for details.

Be a Wheeler's Taste Tester! Volunteers needed now!

Hello vegan ice cream lovers!

Have we got some exciting news for you! Wheeler's Black Label is going to be testing out a bunch of new flavors for the new year, and we're hoping that they'll be successful enough to take the vegan dessert world by storm and kick some booty. To do this, we need your help! Yes, you, gentle citizen of the internet!

Wheeler has decided to expand our test kitchen taste testers beyond us humble office staff and any random people in the vicinity of Wheeler's HQ.

We need volunteers to organize Wheeler's Tasting Teams in cities all over the US. As a representative of your city's team, you, the leader, will be responsible for rounding up a group of articulate connoisseurs who love ice cream and can give honest, constructive feedback, and hold formal ice cream tasting events for our new flavors. Wheeler's will send each team leader sample packs of different ice creams, the team leader will document critiques for our designers, send them back to us, and you'll have been a part of the process that makes Wheeler's the best vegan ice cream around!

Interested tasters and team leaders should shoot us an email ( icecreamproject2007@yahoo.com) telling us what city you can represent, and how you plan to conduct this event!

Good luck!

Happy New Year, Ice Cream Lovers!

Happy New Year, everyone! We here at Wheeler's hope you all had a great winter break, but now it's back to work and that means making more ice cream - for you! Right now we're working on shipping some express orders to lucky vegans and non-vegans alike across the U.S. in hopes they will give us some great reviews to kick off 2008.

Speaking of which, our new pal Kristin Thomas over at the Boston Vegan Association has given us a sparkling review of some of our delicious flavors! Check it out ...

I Scream, You Scream, Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream by Kristin Thomas

"My new best friends over at Wheeler's Black Label Vegan Ice Cream brought me some yummy samples to review. Wheeler's is a new vegan ice cream and they are trying to find a place to set up a shop here in Boston. This ice cream is seriously the best vegan ice cream I've ever had. It actually might be the best ice cream I've ever had (comparing to non-vegan brands from my pre-vegan days).

They brought me 4 flavors to try: Chocolate Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin, Pina Colada, and Black Raspberry.

The Chocolate Chocolate Chip was the favorite for both me and Mike. It was rich, full of dark chocolate flavor, and had thick flakes of dark chocolate in it (not positive but we thought maybe we tasted a little almond flavor in the background).

We also really loved the Black Raspberry. I do not even like Black Raspberry and I thought this was great and want to run out and buy more of it. I expected this to be like a sorbet, but it was definitely a creamy ice cream. It had an interesting (but good) flavor that we could not figure out - I thought it tasted a bit like taffy. That is probably why I liked it so much..."

Read more of her awesome review (with yummy pictures!) in her article here.




Thanks for the review and encouragement, Kristin! We're so glad you liked our ice cream!

Another New Review! Vegetalion

Hello again! We at Wheeler's have been in a very jolly holiday mood lately, and as such have been giving out tons of free sample packs to folks near and far. With the request that they give us feedback and write a little review, in return, of course. Here's an awesome review from Vegetalion over at her blog.

"Wheeler's uses high quality ingredients, is sweet but relies on the actual taste of the product to carry it, not the sugar-content, contains nothing to which I'm allergic, and has a texture that made a few of us BVAers do a double-take. Plus. It tastes awesome...."

"And then... the pumpkin. oh. my. god. I don't know how to explain this one. Imagine the best pumpkin pie you've ever had, then multiply that by 10, then make it ice cream. Yes. I'd had the chocolate before, but that didn't make it any less amazing. The chocolate chunks rival the ice cream itself for flavor. The texture is a dream. I couldn't stop smiling while I ate it - chocolate ice cream this good just makes you happy. I have to stop myself from going to attack my freezer as I write this."

Thanks so much, Sarah!

New Review! Emilie from The Conscious Kitchen

You may all remember the last time our local bff Emilie over at The Conscious Kitchen reviewed some of our ice creams. The resulting massively gorgeous set of pictures of phenomenal brownie sundaes would be hard to forget. She's been so awesome to us the past few months, and we office staff even got a chance to meet her at Cultural Survival's winter bazaar a couple weeks ago.

Anyway, she's been at it again and has done another beautiful review for us with tons of high-quality photographs. Be sure to check it out!

"Since they are creative vegan ice cream mavericks who have designed more ice cream flavors than I can fathom and who are always looking for new flavors, our vanilla request probably bored them to tears, but they came through with style, offering up this perfectly textured, deeply flavorful ice cream...."

Thanks again, Emilie!

Thanks San Fran! AND Wheeler's Needs YOU: invent a flavor!

We want to thank everyone to turned out to support us and celebrate the love of vegan ice cream this past weekend in San Francisco! You guys are awesome, and it was great to meet so many of you that we'd previously only known from the internet. We hope you had as much fun as we did! :)

Speaking of how much we love you guys, we're putting our ice cream where our mouth is (yum!) and calling for suggestions for new flavors. We always love feedback from the people who matter to us most: the folks who love our product, and particularly the creative-minded food geniuses we've met either in real life or online. Comment here to send in your suggestions, and they'll be formulated and whipped up for the lucky folks in the taste testing department. If they're truly excellent, you might see the flavor you invented at a Wheeler's event soon!

So.... show us what you got!

Attention San Francisco Bay Area!

Wheeler's is pleased to announce that we will be traveling to the San Francisco Bay Area on Friday, December 14th! We will be giving out free samples of our delicious, 100% vegan ice cream from 2pm-230pm. However, because we will be traveling with a limited amount, the first ten people to email us at icecreamproject2007@yahoo.com will get their hands on the best f*$%$%^ ice cream in the world!

EVENT This Weekend! Cultural Survival! Yay!

Hello all! I know I already posted about this, but here's a reminder and more details:

This weekend, Saturday & Sunday, Wheeler's will be being served/sold at Cultural Survival's winter bazaar! This is a really great event that will combine handmade crafts (perfect for unique holiday gifts!) with some fantastic ice creams. Even more exciting, we will be debuting a bunch of new flavors, never before tasted outside of test runs! The available flavors will be:

• Chocolate
• Chocolate Chocolate Chip
• Butter Pecan
  
• Passion Fruit
• Piña Colada*
• Kahlua*

* Totally authentic to the drinks, these flavors contain a small amount of alcohol.

We will also be offering ice cream floats for the first time, so that's super exciting! Plus, if you are a member of Vegan Ice Cream for All!, our meetup.com group, you will get a free Weegan-size (Wee + vegan = mini cup of Wheeler's!) of any of our flavors. All of these ice creams are super fresh and tasty - I'll vouch for it personally. Be there or miss out!

Event details:
Saturday, December 8th & Sunday, December 9th (that's tomorrow, and the next day)
11AM-7PM
Hynes Convention Center (Green line: Hynes/ICA)
And remember to join our meetup.com group for a free Weegan from Wheeler's!

-Amy