So what happens before noon?

Plums are becoming sorbet Two scoops of purple sorbet in a waffle cone the coldest way to eat October.

Melty is a twelve-seat parlour on Example Street. Every morning we cook whatever the market had into twelve small batches, and when a tub is scraped clean, that flavour is done until next year.

See this week’s flavoursHow a batch is made

This week in the freezer

Twelve tubs behind the glass, five of them new this week. When one is scraped clean, it is gone until the fruit comes back next year.

Cups, cones and pints
  • A scoop of bright plum sorbet in a waffle cone

    Plum & bay leaf sorbet

    Victoria plums from Marta’s orchard, cooked down with one bay leaf from the allotment. Tart first, then jammy.

    • Dairy-free
    • Till the plums run out
  • Two scoops of pale green pistachio ice cream in a white cup

    Salted pistachio

    Whole pistachios ground into the milk the night before, a pinch of sea salt at the end. Tastes green in the best way.

    • Contains nuts
    • Every week
  • A scoop of golden honey ice cream in a glass bowl on a red table

    Burnt honey

    Heather honey from the Okafor hives, taken just past caramel so it turns a little bitter. Our oldest recipe.

    • Every week
  • A curl of dark chocolate ice cream lifted from a tub

    Dark chocolate & rye

    Seventy per cent chocolate with toasted rye crumbs from the bakery next door. It’s oat milk underneath, so everyone can have it.

    • Dairy-free
    • Contains gluten
  • A hand holding a cone of yellow lemon curd ice cream in a park

    Lemon curd & thyme

    Curd stirred by hand, folded through a thyme cream in ribbons. Bright enough to wake you up on a grey afternoon.

    • New this week

Before you’re up, we’re at it.

At six we buy Dark plums and nectarines from the market laid out on a white table what the market has, cook it into a base Fresh ice cream turning in the bowl of a churn, churn it cold and scoop it Five fresh scoops in small bowls, seen from above by noon.

  1. 1

    Market at six

    Stall 14 keeps the ripest, ugliest fruit aside for us. Ugly is sweeter.

  2. 2

    Cook the base

    Milk from Hollow Lane, warmed with the fruit or nuts until it smells like the flavour should.

  3. 3

    Churn it cold

    One small machine, six litres at a time, twelve runs before eleven.

  4. 4

    Rest till noon

    Two hours at minus fourteen so it scoops clean. Then the shutter goes up.

Asked on every hot Saturday:

Will it survive the walk home?

Pints leave in a lined paper bag that keeps them firm for forty minutes. Going further? Ask for a block of dry ice at the till. It’s free, and it fizzes.

A paper cup of ice cream with a wooden spoon in it

Asked by a very polite eight-year-old:

Is there one for my dairy‑free friend?

Always at least four. Our sorbets are fruit, sugar and water, nothing else, and the oat-milk chocolate runs on its own churn on Tuesdays and Fridays so nothing crosses over.

Mango sorbet scoops in a white bowl

Asked every week in May:

Can we bring the whole birthday?

Up to twenty of you on weekday afternoons. Everyone gets a tasting flight of six, and the birthday person names a scoop for the board. Book a week ahead, right here.

Two friends laughing over their ice creams in the street

Same price for every flavour, always.

Cup, cone or a whole pint

Five waffle cones with different scoops laid in a row

  • One scoop

    In a cup, or in a cone we baked this morning.

    £3.20

  • Two scoops

    Two flavours, or the same one twice. We won’t judge.

    £5.40

  • Three scoops

    Comes with a second spoon whether you ask or not.

    £7.20

  • A pint to go

    Packed to order in a lined bag, any two flavours.

    £9.50

  • The family tub

    A litre and a half, three flavours side by side.

    £17

Toppings, 80p each: hot fudge · brown butter crumbs · sea salt flakes · toasted hazelnuts · rye crunch

Tasting spoons are free. Ask for two.

Glass bottles of fresh milk standing in long grass

Their field

A hand holding a cone covered in sprinkles against a pink wall

Your cone

From their field to your cone

Everything in the freezer comes from people we can walk or cycle to. These are the neighbours in this week’s tubs.

Two people preparing ice cream at a steel kitchen counter

Saturday churn school

Two hours in the back kitchen with whoever made this week’s flavours. You pick fruit at the market stall, cook your own base, run the churn and take home the pint you made.

When
Saturdays, 9 to 11
Who
Six of you, eight and up
Price
£45, pint included
Book a Saturday

The Pint Club

One delivery a month, picked by us from that week’s twelve. Collect it on your way home or we cycle it over in a cold bag. Skip a month whenever you like.

A tub of chocolate ice cream with a spoon resting in it

  • Solo

    £11 a month

    One pint of whatever is best that week.

    Join solo

  • Duo

    £20 a month

    Two pints: one fruit, one cream, never the same twice.

    Join as a duo

  • Freezer full

    £36 a month

    Four pints and a jar of our hot fudge for the shelf.

    Fill my freezer

Overheard at the counter

  • The plum one tastes like my nan’s gardenIris, here since the first summer
  • I came for one scoop and left with a pintDev, on a Tuesday
  • Best tasting spoons in town, and they mean twoHana, six spoons in
  • My son now says “ugly is sweeter”Paul, churn school dad
  • Burnt honey should be illegalAma, weekly regular
  • The dry ice made it to my sister’s, forty minutes awayLeo, tested it
  • Finally a dairy-free chocolate that isn’t sadSam, oat milk forever
  • We booked the birthday and nobody wanted to leaveNadia, mum of twins

Come and taste before you choose.

1 Example Street

Ten minutes from the station, right by the lock. Twelve seats inside, a bench outside and a hatch for when it rains.

Monday to Thursday
12:00 – 21:00
Friday and Saturday
12:00 – 22:00
Sunday
12:00 – 20:00
Churn school
Saturday 9:00 – 11:00

020 0000 0000 hello@melty.example

A hand holding a tall swirl of vanilla ice cream in a cone

Book a birthday, a school Saturday or a pint