Now it feels like someone has a heat gun to my head and I’m chasing down ice cream trucks…

When we were little, the ice cream man parked at the elementary school, played music, and flashed us. That was Mr. … Softee. Of course.

Here in New York City, the tasteful yellow Van Leeuwen truck has extremely tasteful ice cream that has so little air in it, it makes you chew more slowly (but the pistachio needs salt, and the ice cream man is graver than anyone who sells ice cream from a truck ought to be).

The Big Gay Ice Cream Truck has all the air that VL is missing and an ice cream man who is so gleeful, I want to tell him all my secrets. Right after I finish the chocolate cone with Sriracha and bacon. Yes, yes, yes.

Then there’s the Cool Haus , which is in L.A., but I mention it because I wish it were here. They make their own ice cream sandwiches with their own ice cream. In Fort Greene, there is a Rasta-operated vegan ice cream truck with a spotty attendance record and really good soy ice cream, but as of this posting, it hasn’t been seen since before Hurricane Bill.

And parked in front of elementary schools and parks throughout the city, there’s… Mr. Softee

In the dead of New York Winter '08, I used a heat gun/paint stripper to simulate the effect of what New York Summer '08 would have on this ice cream cone, shot by Kenji Toma.

The August 2008 issue of Bon Appétit.

Here are some pictures of the most recent Häagen-Dazs campaign I worked on with Raymond Meier. It was for FIVE. their new product line. It should be called TEN because that’s how many pounds I gained while testing the stuff, which was entirely outside the scope of my duties but couldn’t be resisted.