I've always loved ice cream (who doesn't, right)? I discovered the smoothness of frozen custard,…read morewhen I lived in St. Louis, and thought I'd found the best frozen dessert. It was WAY smoother than regular ice cream. Well, move over Ted Drewe's, there's a new "best frozen dessert".
My grandson and I have a tradition of getting ice cream when I pick him up on the last day of school. I think this makes the ice cream taste just a little bit better than usual. At N7, you pick your "liquid", ranging from cow's cream to coconut milk or yogurt. Then you choose a flavoring, like my favorite, birthday cake. They also have regular flavors like vanilla, strawberry and chocolate. Then you choose from dozens (30, actually) of "mix-ins", like chocolate chips, sprinkles, fruity pebble's, etc. Then they move your concoction over to a hefty mixer and bubble liquid nitrogen into it while the mixer works. The phase change from gas to solid happens so quickly that ice crystals don't have a chance to form. This makes the mixture smoother than regular ice cream. Those mixers have to be very powerful to be able to mix everything together. There is also a bunch of nitrogen "steam" released and, since nitrogen is heavier than oxygen, the steam cloud hugs the countertop. If you understand about science things like phase change, etc, it could be a learning experience for kids while they wait for their treat to be done.
The only things I didn't like about the place is that there was only one employee working when we got there, and it's more expensive than other ice cream places. The reason there was only one employee working is probably because we went around lunchtime, not usually their peak time. The poor woman had to take orders and money, then go make the ice cream treat. There were only a couple of people in front of us when we got there, so it wasn't too long of a wait. But after we got ours, there was a crowd of people, probably 20 or so, waiting in line. Finally, another employee came in to help. We scarfed-down our ice cream so we could give up our table. If you love ice cream, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND you try N7.