Hot Sauce Is The Ice Cream Topping You Need To Stop Sleeping On

There's nothing like an ice cream sundae for cooling down on hot days. Part of the fun of these treats is that you can customize them to your heart's delight, piling on hot fudge, whipped cream, maraschino cherries, and so much more. While these are a couple of the more common ice cream toppings, there's one often slept-on addition that can really level up your dessert — hot sauce.

One reason this combo works so well is the contrast between the hot sauce and the ice cream. Whereas the hot sauce brings on the heat, the ice cream provides relief from the spice and also adds sweet notes that balance out the fire. What's more, there are tons of different flavor combinations that you can come up with, whether you focus on turning up the sweet notes of the ice cream or go for something that brings out earthy or peppery notes in the hot sauce. Better yet, you can pair the whole thing with other sundae toppings, whether that's fruit, herbs such as mint, or even crushed red pepper flakes.

When pairing hot sauce with ice cream, it's never a bad idea to start with some basics. Vanilla works like a blank canvas, allowing the flavors of the hot sauce to shine through. Or, you could go with chocolate to add some rich cocoa notes and create a twist on a Mexican chocolate ice cream.

But, beyond these basic flavors, you can also start to play around with pairing different types of ice cream. For instance, an apricot ice cream could work well with a cayenne pepper hot sauce. Or, try combining a citrusy orange ice cream with a smoky paprika sauce. Moving away from fruity ice creams, a cookie dough or Oreo ice cream could pair well with something a bit spicier thanks to the vanilla base. In that case, Tabasco could even work. Play around with different pairings to come up with one that you love.

Beyond the ice cream itself, you can also experiment with different hot sauce toppings. A blueberry hot sauce can add some extra touches of sweetness to your dish, for instance. Or, you can focus on smoky, earthy flavors and add a chocolate hot sauce. Another option is to use hot honey to give your ice cream sweet notes while still turning up the heat. Or, for something fruity, try using pepper jellies.

If this all sounds surprising, it might not actually be as uncommon as you think. Ghost pepper ice cream, for instance, made an appearance at Baskin Robbins back in 2018 and can also be found in some smaller, local ice cream shops. Another flavor you might not have expected is wasabi ice cream, which has a surprisingly refreshing taste.

Alternatively, if you're after something that focuses a bit more on the sweet rather than the spice, you could take a bite out of Marco's Spicy Peanut Butter Caramel flavor, which features Aleppo pepper and chile de arbol to bring on the heat. And, of course, there's the much more common Mexican chocolate ice cream, packed with spices such as cinnamon and chili pepper to give it a bit of a bite. Whether you try one of these hot flavors or add the heat on your own by topping your ice cream with a bit of hot sauce, this cold dessert can get a real upgrade with a bit of fire.