Humphry Slocombe

After all that walking in what was threatening to be rain, we finally arrived at Humphry Slocombe. Yeah, I thought that was a really unwieldy sounding name. Turns out that the name is derived from "Mr. Humphries and Mrs. Slocombe" who were were characters on an old lowbrow British sitcom “Are You Being Served?”. Now how's that for obscure?

It's really nondescript looking. Across the street is a place interestingly called, "Usulutan" which served Mexican and El Salvadoran food. Man, I wish we had room for actual food, but I really wanted ice cream...again. Dammit.

This place makes their ice cream by hand using natural ingredients, etc. They are also known for their wildy imaginative flavor combinations.  Check out this wanna be Warhol. The flavor on the lower right is fake. I asked about it. I'm sure the workers get that a lot.

The line wasn't as long as Bi-Rite. I was excited just looking at their flavors...

Here's a few of them...

Thane would end up getting the Secret Breakfast (Bourbon with cornflakes - score!!!). His other flavor was the hilarously named, "Jesus Juice" (red wine and Coke). Bert got the Blue Bottle Vietnamese Coffee and the Balsamic Caramel. I thought the balsamic ice cream was rather vile but Bert looooved it. I liked the Vietnamese coffee ice cream much better. There is a Blue Bottle Coffee place at the Ferry Landing and one in the SoMa district but we didn't end up goin there. I'd heard rave reviews about their coffee. I guess having the ice cream was the closest approximation Bert could get.

This shot happened to have both of TC's flavors: Carrot Mango sorbet and Lemon Buttermilk Sherbert. You know how she likes those fruity flavors. I told her that the carrot was probably not noticable, but the carrot flavor was actually quite pronounced. She ended up liking it and thought it went well with the mango.

The counter...

Here's Thane's cup of ice cream: Secret Breakfast on top with Jesus Juice on the bottom. Yes, both ice creams had some sort of alcohol in 'em. I liked the Secret Breakfast much better than the one with the red wine. The thing with these flavors are that they are VERY INTENSE. You could really taste that bourbon and that wine in there. It's okay after one or two spoons but having a scoop of each would've been overkill for me. I don't think Thane even finished this.

Here's all four of our ice creams. TC is holding her Lemon Buttermilk Sherbet with Carrot Mango Sorbet. Going clockwise is Bert's Blue Bottle Vietnamese Iced Coffee with Balsamic Caramel on the bottom. Then, there's Thane's alcoholic ice creams (mentioned earlier). Lastly, the one with pink is mine. That's the Szechuan Strawberry on top (Man, it had a kick to it and made my lips numb too! Szechuan peppercorns will do that to ya!) and Black Sesame on the bottom.

I have to say that I liked the Black Sesame much better. Although the strawberry was really sweet and fruity, the heat of the peppercorns were a little to much for me. Again, the flavor was pretty intense and I ended up not finishing the strawberry portion.

I'm glad we were able to try this place out. I also wanted to go to another ice cream place, Mitchell's in the Noe Valley, but we didn't have enough time for this day and tomorrow, I already had our itinerary planned.

More reviews on Humphry Slocombe:
Gastronomer from the blog "Gas*tron*o*my" went here in Spring 2009
Alice from "Alice Q. Foodie" went here Summer 2009
and more recently, Kirbie from "Kirbie's Cravings" went on a dessert rampage this past May! Lucky her! Aaand, here are the Yelpreviews to top it off.

Here are a couple of cool articles:
"I'll Take a Scoop of Prosciutto Please" from the NY Times and
"Ice Cream Through the Ages from SFStation.com

Check out this short video from the webshow, the "Snack Attack". They didn't have this flavor ice cream when we went there (the Boccalone prosciutto)!

We walked a few blocks before taking the BART back to Thane's place. This is La Reyna Bakery on 24th St. Lots of delicous looking pastries in the window...

Here's the Napper Tandy Bar, also on 24th St. My former student whom we had dinner with the night before was going to be here later for karaoke.

Some murals near an empty lot...

Detail of one of those mural, the Virgen de Guadalupe...

This was so cool - here's a utility box with Bruce Lee on it.

The other side had a Dia de los Muertos skull, the title, "Identity" as well as Malcolm X.

Close up of the Bruce Lee portion...

This was a super long day - the Filipino American History Month celebration at the SF Asian Art Museum and the "Singgalot Exhibit" at the neighboring SF Library, sisig tacos from the Senor Sisig foodtruck, the Mission Dolores and ice cream at two places.  Oh,and TC saw her first drag queens today too.  Time to head back and relax before going out to dinner...