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In a city that runs hot most of the year, ice cream isn’t a seasonal treat—it’s a year-round necessity. Houston’s scene includes small-batch drops that sell out in hours, walk-up windows, Spanish gelaterías, and pints that double as cultural education. Here are some of the most distinct scoops defining Houston’s ice cream scene.

Patra Lee’s Kitchen 1848

Available at plk1848.com

Rebecca Dirden Swindle spent more than a decade in corporate America before hitting a wall. “The glass ceiling was real for me,” she says. “I thought, ‘What am I doing? What do I have to show for it? What am I going to do with the rest of my life?’”

The answer came from memories of her grandmother Annie Rebecca Stubbs Dirden’s kitchen, where she made ice cream the slow way: egg custard and a crank machine, on which family members would take turns. “It was the thing everyone looked forward to,” she says.

Sparked by her son’s ice cream cravings, Dirden Swindle began investing in her ice cream education—buying books, studying ice cream chemistry, and giving away pints to loved ones and neighbors. “Food was love in my family. It was never a monetary game,” she says, but her husband helped her realize that ice cream was no longer a hobby.

Dirden Swindle enrolled in Penn State’s dairy program and started working at farmers’ markets, selling flavors that explored the pan-African diaspora, with a focus on the aftermath of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. “Wherever the ships dropped us, we brought a lot with us, and we left a lot behind,” she says. Her company, Patra Lee’s Ice Cream—also known as PLK 1848—takes its name in part from the year Edmond Albius was freed from slavery. At age 12, Albius had discovered a method of hand pollination for the vanilla orchid on the island of Réunion.

Patra Lee’s also serves as an homage to her great-grandmother, Patra Lee Shanklin Jones, and the cooking matriarchs in her family, with the “ice cream chemistry” she learned, helping the emotions and stories behind the flavors come alive.

By 2023, Dirden Swindle entered the Houston Rodeo Best Bites competition and won two buckles on her first entry. Buckshot, a caramel ice cream loaded with Ethiopian praline and chocolate stracciatella, was a nod to Black cowboy culture and the legendary Stagecoach Mary, the first African American female mail carrier.

Since then, she’s developed other standout flavors, such as a silky buttermilk and cornbread ice cream that calls to the American South; Zobo, a hibiscus sorbet that draws on West African tradition; a bittersweet chocolate ice cream spiced with West African Daddawa; and Aunt Sally’s Strawberry Cheesecake, an ode to Aunt Sallie Shadd, a formerly enslaved woman who became a caterer in Wilmington, Delaware, and whose frozen-cream-and-strawberry dessert was served at President James Madison’s second inaugural ball in 1813.

“I want to offer people joy and culture via a product that is beloved,” she says. “I want you to have an experience with it. While you’re having a culinary experience, you’re going to have a frontal lobe party and mouth party, with just enough fat to feel satiated.”

Pints are available through preorder online with Heights pickup, and if you’re up for a road trip, in San Antonio’s Pullman Market. Placement in stores across the state is in the works.

Milk + Sugar

Heights | Montrose | West University

Chou Wong was a dental hygienist when the idea first took root. Her boyfriend (now husband), who’s from New York, would take her to his favorite ice cream shop every time she visited—a place that mixed toppings directly into the ice cream, making flavors that felt genuinely inventive. It became their thing. Years later, burned out on dental hygiene and newly married, she remembered a casual idea they had to open an ice cream shop one day.

“I decided to open the ice cream shop,” she says. Wong jumped in without any experience. “I did everything the hard way,” she says now. She learned how to make ice cream on her own and kept the burgeoning business a secret from friends for nearly a year. Seven years later, Milk + Sugar has three Houston locations and a loyal following built on approachable, grown-up flavors that draw on familiar favorites and unexpected combinations.

Wong keeps 16 flavors in rotation at all times: 12 permanent and four rotating seasonals, including one that’s dairy-free. Her approach is straightforward: take desserts people already love and reimagine them as ice cream. Carrot cake, Biscoff Spread, and strawberry almond cheesecake—the first flavor she ever made—are among the most popular.

The shop’s Asian-owned identity shapes the menu in quieter ways, too. At first, Wong hesitantly offered Yum Cha—a chrysanthemum and pandan swirl named after the Cantonese term for “drink tea”—but quickly made it a permanent fixture after she couldn’t keep it in stock.

“I’m not a chef. I don’t make cheffy flavors,” she says. “I just try to make ice cream for adults—for people who want something a little bit fancier.”

Underground Creamery

Heights

Four years ago, scoring a pint of Josh Deleon’s ice cream required split-second reflexes and a narrow pickup window. Rich flavors fueled by creative incorporations of junk food and cobbler profiles kept his drops perpetually sold out. These days, it’s considerably more accessible.

Deleon, the self-taught founder of Underground Creamery, started making ice cream from his home and built his reputation on hard-to-get small-batch drops that sold out in under 30 seconds. That model worked, but he’s spent years quietly refining it.

Now with more staff, Deleon has built a team that has become a genuine family affair. His sister-in-law works the window. His younger brother, whose first job ever was at Underground, is now production lead. Pickup hours have expanded; walk-up flavors are now available next door at Pudgy’s Fine Cookies without preordering; and the stress of a two-hour window is gone (though reminder: flavors still sell out).

The flavors reflect the moment. “I feel like everyone’s hurting. They want something comforting,” he says. “I’m pretty empathetic to that. I want to give people what they want.” A rotating version of cookies and cream remains a weekly staple (Oreo MSG is a hit), while Soba-berry, a buckwheat tea ice cream with blueberry jam, rewards the adventurous. There’s also often something involving the most decadent Valrhona chocolate. Comfort is always key, but Deleon says he still likes to venture toward more complex territory now and again.

It’s still underground in spirit, just easier to get your hands on.