The Juggle Zone: Bargain Blog

1,000 flavors and a little romance
A kosher ice cream parlor's fare: Vanilla, garic, lox - and dates.

By Miriam Hill
Inquirer Staff Writer

KEW GARDENS HILLS, N.Y. - Surely it was something in the heavens that brought Max and Mina together in the midst of the Great Depression.

But lox and ice cream? Now that required a human matchmaker.

It came in the form of Max and Mina's grandsons, Bruce and Mark Becker, two guys from Lawrence, on Long Island, with a taste for - well, this year's hot pick is babka ice cream. Other flavors of the Beckers include lox, garlic, sweet corn, gefilte fish and ketchup, along with chocolate, vanilla, and other more conventional choices at Max & Mina's ice cream parlor in Queens.

Since the brothers opened Max & Mina's in 1997 in a shopping strip next to Shimon's Pizza Falafel Dairy Restaurant, they have spawned 1,000 flavors and more than a few romantic relationships.

(They count generously; cookie dough and cookie batter are two different flavors.)

In the heart of an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood bursting with women in long skirts and head coverings and men in black hats or gray fedoras, Max & Mina's is the place to cozy up with your bubele after Sabbath.

"It's ice cream, it's kosher and it's fun," David Wallach, 25, said as he stood in a line 10 people deep.

Elina Badalbayev and Igor Sattakhov melted for each other while scooping ice cream at Max & Mina's.

"We were working and talking and one thing led to another," said Badalbayev, 19, a rosy-cheeked, dark-haired education major at Queens College.

"It's a very small environment," she explained. "Everyone's Jewish, and Max & Mina's is in the center of Main Street."

Family members or friends help Orthodox singles find a shidduch, or match.

"Guys would meet girls, girls would meet guys," she said. "I've seen people who've come in with their fiancees, and now, two years later, they're married with kids."

One man proposed to the woman who became his wife by combining her favorite flavors, mint Oreo and mint chip, and dubbing it "EngageMint."

The ultimate pair behind Max & Mina's is the Beckers. Two years ago, People magazine put them on its list of most eligible bachelors. A crush of female attention followed. One adventuress sent them a thong in a cone. Mark, 30, is still looking, but Bruce, 36, married last year.

"I'm gone," Bruce said. He has whipped up a new flavor, named for his wife. "Dalia's Choice" is vanilla ice cream with whiskey, caramel, pralines and butterscotch chips.

The brothers turned to frozen fantasies when, simultaneously, Mark finished his business degree at Queens College and Bruce decided he'd had enough of Wall Street and quit his job. With both looking for a new pursuit, the lifelong ice-cream lovers decided to take the plunge.

"It's like an instinctive thing from our childhoods," Bruce said. "Our parents always took us all over the country, tasting different things."

They had held on to the recipes of their maternal grandfather, Bronx chemist Max Sockloff, for everything from toothpaste to ice cream. They soon added their own concoctions to Max's ice cream list - horseradish, jalapeno, pizza, and such seasonal choices as watermelon for summer and candy corn for Halloween.

The Beckers make their product with at least 16 percent butterfat, putting it in the gourmet category. A mouthful melts luxuriously on the tongue, infusing taste buds with the chosen flavor. "That's a Garlic" packs real chunks of the stinky stuff, and beet ice cream - glowing pinkish red - is as sweet as the cotton candy flavor.

All Max & Mina's ice creams are kosher, but some flavors adhere to stricter dairy guidelines called cholov yisroel.

The shop's decor features an array of Wacky Packages bubble-gum stickers, an etching of Jerry Garcia, and old-fashioned signs with sayings such as "Hippies Use Side Door."

The Beckers won't disclose sales figures, but in addition to the shop, they have a healthy wholesale business. Gourmet restaurants also order from them, and their catering jobs have included tobacco ice cream for cigar-lovers.

"Most of the time, when you see an unusual flavor - a red pepper, a corn, a caramel - on a menu, nine out of 10 times, that's us," Mark Becker said.

The Beckers hope to start selling in New York City food stores this summer. For now, getting a taste of Max & Mina's is a chore for anyone who doesn't live nearby - 30 minutes on the F train from Manhattan to Queens, then a quick bus ride.

A few hours after sundown on Saturdays, the devoutly quiet Sabbath streets come to life and fill with people heading to Max & Mina's.

Most customers stick to traditional flavors, but Breakfast Bash, which includes French toast, waffles and pancakes, currently is very popular.

On one recent evening, Meir London, 10, who comes to the shop at least three times a week with his father, Howard, and twin sister, Aviya, dared, for the first time, to try lox ice cream.

A lick. A grimace.

"Terrible," he said. He ordered chocolate instead.