Jeni’s Ice Creams has unveiled Appalachian Acorn Pie. Half a decade in the marking, the new limited-edition fall flavor is made with flour milled from foraged Ohio oak acorns.
The new flavor is a testament to the lengths the Columbus, Ohio-based company will go when it gets curious about something. Back in 2021 the Jeni’s R&D team began pondering what seemed like an innocuous question: “Would it be possible to make an ice cream with acorns?”
The answer seemed simple enough. Acorns are abundant in the United States and have historically been a food source for indigenous Americans. But acorns also aren’t commercially regulated or distributed — and so Jeni’s started by looking abroad for sources.
“Those early international sources for acorn flour gave us a first taste of what this ice cream could be, which was so fragrant and nutty and beautiful. It was unlike anything I’d ever eaten, but also felt wildly familiar,” recalled Beth Stallings, senior director of innovation at Jeni’s. “From that moment, we knew we had to find a way to make this flavor, whatever it took. And it took a lot of amazing work.”
After those international sources fell through, the team realized that if it was going to make an acorn ice cream, it would be necessary to build a supply chain domestically from the ground up.
Jeni’s partnered with Route 9 Action Network, an agricultural cooperative based in Carroll County, Ohio. Its main crop is chestnuts, but there was interest in expanding. So, Jeni’s signed multiple grant letters to help Route 9 grow the business so that it could forage and process the acorns needed for this ice cream. This included washing and leaching the tannins from the nuts so they would be safe to consume.
From there, the acorns went to a nearby Amish farm to be milled into flour. This required a few extra layers of communication — Jeni’s had to rely on snail mail, a community phone, and in-person visits to stay in contact. All to achieve the end result: fragrant, Appalachian grown and milled acorn flour that Jeni’s could fold into cream.
After five years of foraging, milling, and testing, Jeni’s has released a very limited supply of Appalachian Acorn Pie, an acorn ice cream with a graham cracker swirl. It’s nutty and sweet — somewhere in the realm of hazelnut, coconut, and chestnut. The limited-time flavor launched online October 1 at Jenis.com and is available at more than 90 scoop shops Jeni’s scoop shops across the USA, while supplies last.
