Van Leeuwen finds home in Brooklyn

Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream
632 Manhattan Ave. (btw. Bedford and Nassau avenues), Brooklyn
Truck locations vary, but you can follow them on the company's Twitter page.

You've probably seen the yellow Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream trucks putting around NYU, serving up some of the city's best ice cream, coffee and pastries. On Feb. 27, the purveyors opened their first "brick and mortar" store in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

The store's cream-yellow sign is a quaint find on a street filled mostly with white block lettering on colored awnings. Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream is a welcoming, warm little store on one of Brooklyn's most crowded avenues. Inside, the walls are paneled with dark wood, giving off the vibe of an early 20th century candy store. I'm tempted to order an egg cream, but it's not on the menu, so I just get a latte ($4) and a cheddar chive scone ($3).

The barista notices I'm clutching "Falling Man" by Don DeLillo. He remarks that he's only ever read "Great Jones Street." I tell him I've only ever read "Falling Man." I feel I could easily wax poetic about how typically New York the whole place is as a warm, worn-in space in Brooklyn, birthplace of the once-ubiquitous egg cream. Accoutrements for the coffee are located on an embankment underneath a giant window at the front of the store, open to let in the cool breeze of one of the first truly warm March days.

Soon a small line forms, equal part hipsters and parents walking kids home from school. The barista serves me my latte in a plain, clear glass with Van Leeuwen's signature tree design delicately painted in foam floating at the top. The scone arrives on a plate intricately inscribed with organic floral patterns that echo the kind seen elsewhere in the store. The room's overall aesthetic seems to borrow more than a bit from the Rococo sensibilities of today's Brooklyn-hipster interior designers. A cream-yellow business card is taped to the cash register with "CASH ONLY :)" written in pen.

The Intelligentsia-brew coffee is some of the smoothest I've tasted. Though the cheddar chive scone is quite good and cheesy (as advertised), to truly understand Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream, you have to try the Hazelnut Brown Butter Cake. It's a spongy concoction that, for utter lack of a better way to describe the sensation, really does melt in your mouth. I doubt that the New World has ever experienced a more perfect coffee/pastry pairing than a latte and Hazelnut Brown Butter Cake. As a cafe, it is as close as any American will likely ever get to fabled, nameless joints known only to locals in the backstreets of Rome. It's nearly divine.

Of course, the namesake ice cream is more than worth mentioning, especially with Mr. Softee himself beginning to wake up from a deep sleep. It can be expensive — $3.95 for a small, $5.75 for a medium and $7 for a large — but who else has flavors like ginger, currants and cream, or gianduja (a kind of chocolatey hazelnut)? My personal favorite is Earl Grey. On cooler evenings, you might want to try an affogato — ice cream drowned in espresso.

One wall of the store features a drawing of a Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream truck erupting with balloons. Sadly, as I leave, I realize that I'll likely be limited to the joint's original mobile form for the time being. Fellow Manhattanites might want to stick to the trucks as well (if you can keep up with them on Twitter), but Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream's permanent location is a delightful new Brooklyn cafe that will hopefully serve its neighborhood well for years to come.