Have you ever been curious about what it would be like to work in someone else’s shoes? We know we’ve been! jingkids is thrilled to introduce an exciting new series where we send our teen interns on a journey to try out different jobs in the city for a day. Our adventurous young reporter will step into the shoes of various professionals, experiencing the highs and lows of their daily routines and report on their experiences, sharing insights and lessons learned along the way.
Join us as we uncover the fascinating world of work through the fresh perspective of a curious teen, discovering what it takes to thrive in different careers with this “A Day in the Life of…” series.
This time, we sent our 12-year-old intern Margaret Yang, from Beijing City International School, to scoop ice cream for a day with the Nice Cream team at the Beijing Ice Cream Festival that took place this past weekend. Nice Cream started in Beijing in 2019 with the mission of making delicious ice cream but with less fat and sugar. Find out more about them by scanning their QR code.
As a sugar-allergic tween, going to an ice cream festival only means one thing: working at a stand for a day instead of enjoying all the ice cream that’s available on a hot summer day. And that is exactly what I did. I worked for Nice Cream for a day at their Beijing Ice Cream Festival stand (while also going up and down to get the mint chocolate chip milkshakes, as they were only made in Nice Cream’s shop below the fourth-floor festival). You may have heard about Nice Cream sometime before, but did you know about its creative process and future plans?
I went to the Ice Cream Festival on the first day of the three-day event, and it was already packed with liveliness and enthusiasm. There were also familiar ice cream brands like EIS Engelchen and MOVENPICK, but to my surprise, there were even quite a few pastry brands like Gontran Cherrier and even a kombucha stand that satisfied my interest with their product.
But at this festival, I was 100 percent on the Nice Cream team. They brought some of their super unique flavors to the festival, like pavlova (a fun bit of excitement on my day, the last customer I served for the day was actually an Aussie who probably knew more about pavlovas than I did), black sesame mochi, and purple rice wine. It was expected that mint chocolate chip would be the best seller, being a collaboration with MARVIS, the luxury toothpaste brand, but, surprisingly, the purple rice wine and coconut pineapple flavors got the most attention.
There were also ice cream brands that I had never heard of before. The stand next to us, fellow low-calorie and low-sugar brand Il Laboratorio de Gelato, got so much attention that my two colleagues couldn’t help but get two scoops of their most popular flavor and rave about them.
For those who’ve never worked in the stall of a food fest, it’s a whole different experience than attending a fest as a guest. Not only are you working and selling your own products, but you’re making friends with the teams from the other stalls as well. There’s something about an outdoor festival that brings out the cheerful side in us all. And one of the things that vendors always do at food fests is trade products with each other. It’s such a sweet way to make new friends and also try some tasty treats all at the same time. So, towards the end of the event on the first day, I traded two scoops of ice cream from the Nice Cream stand with the Gontran Cherrier team for two of my favorite matcha scones!
When interviewing Nice Cream’s founder, Michael W., he mentioned that even though a lot of current ice cream brands are being marketed as low-sugar or low-calorie, that bar is set in comparison to traditional American ice cream, which is extremely high in sugar and fat. However, Nice Cream started within rigid frameworks of low-calorie ice cream, thus allowing them to proudly put on the packaging of their products the exact amount of calories and sugar in every serving. This allows customers to make informed purchases of what they are going to be consuming.
Michael and his team work hard to create a balance between great taste and maintaining their ice cream’s low-calorie characteristics. Because of this, the award-winning brand is also focusing on fostering taste-oriented collaborations, like their recent collaboration with Chef Marino, culinary director of Giada Gardens, creating a “Cannoli from Sicily” ice cream flavor, which is available in Nice Cream’s shop in Baitasi. I didn’t get the chance to try this flavor since it wasn’t brought to the festival, so that’s exactly why I’m waiting for you guys to do that and comment below with your review!
Nice Cream aims to become the best healthy premium ice cream brand in China, and development of new, creative flavors is crucial to reaching this goal.
So, how does this process work? Inspiration comes from seasonal ingredients, special collaborations with other brands and companies and people, special holidays in China, etc. The brand develops new flavors every week, and these flavors will be taste-tested internally first and then brought to shops for customers to try for the second round of the trial. When Michael told me this, it was the exact moment I realized that there’s such a job as an ice cream taster. Can you imagine? Being paid to taste ice cream is actually a job!
“Ice cream or gelato can be super creative, so there are no limits to what we can come up with, and that’s one of the reasons we love what we do,” Michael states. Even though the French vanilla and chocolate flavors are always available for customers to choose as “safe” options, creative flavors such as mint chocolate chip and purple rice wine are what keep customers amazed by the brand and coming back for more time and time again.
After working at the Ice Cream Festival for a day, I can honestly say that I loved it. Perhaps it has something to do with how scooping ice cream and giving out samples is quite therapeutic and satisfying.
As an emerging brand with only around four years of history, Nice Cream is already going viral on numerous social media platforms and is being recognized by so many customers. I highly recommend trying Nice Cream for a healthy and satisfying ice cream experience.
Find it:
53 Palace Gate East Fork, Xicheng District
西城区宫门口东岔53号
Tel: 150 0127 3756
Images: Margaret Yang