The Outside Scoop

I’ve walked to their ice cream truck that’s parked in downtown twice this week (due to the nice weather) and enjoyed both trips. They have some familiar flavors and some unique ones. You can ask for samples too. I’ve tried the chocolate brownie, cookie dough, and chocolate with reeses. All 3 taste really good. Creamy with big chunks of reeses and cookie dough. They offer a cup or cone for the ice cream.
Only negative thing is the price is quite high for a scoop. But the great service, convenience factor and that I’m supporting a local business outweighs the price. Will visit this truck many times during the summer.

I hate to say that I totally forgot to write this at the time of us visiting them.
We found them at the
October 10^th.
We found some great stuff that day, saw some great friends and ate some excellent food!
The guys at The Outside Scoop have some of the most amazing ice cream there is! The mini-​yelper got a one scoop bowl of chocolate frosted cup cake and the wife and I both got apple cider floats with vanilla bean ice cream.
We highly recommend these guys for a very tasty treat whenever you see them!!!

Oh my goodness! This is one of the best ice cream places I’ve ever been to. Just a little local business making a big mark in the world of ice cream!
They regularly have a changing selection of homemade flavors: usually around 15 or so it seems on their chalkboard; and their complete with originally offerings, like chocolate Oreo cookie dough, mint Oreo, Peanut Butter, along with the usual ones of vanilla, butter pecan, and whatnot. They even have cereal flavored selections, like Lucky Charms!
One of the best things about them is that they put actual pieces/​chunks of the real ingredients into the ice cream, not the «off brand.» If it’s Oreo ice cream, they use real Oreos.
You’ll have to try it in a homemade waffle cone too. They twists them narrower than most, so it’s not so cumbersome and when you get to the bottom you’ll have about three layers of waffle to munch through! Yum!

Love the key lime Graham flavor. It’s worth the drive from Des Moines. The shop’s interior is also inviting with wrap-​around booths.
Very reasonable prices with a variety of options: cones, shakes, sundaes, etc

My favorite ice cream in central Iowa, worth a trip to Indianola. Now that food trucks are allowed in Des Moines, hopefully I won’t have to drive as far for my favorite flavors, I’ll be able to get it downtown from their ice cream truck! Last summer, my family visited us from Eastern Iowa and after they sampled the ice cream, they ran over to Hyvee for a styrofoam cooler and dry ice to take several pints back home with them. If they have the apple crisp, that is my favorite flavor with a bit of caramel syrup. The blueberry or strawberry lemonade are a close second.

This place is outstanding, It’s locally owned, family friendly and the ice cream is homemade and the owner isn’t afraid to experiment with some funky flavors that can be scary, but fun!
The place is opened seasonally (it reopens May 10, and trust me, I’ll be there!), and is always serving someone. He’s also got a giant pink truck that sells on the road at local events. Don’t overlook it if you are out and about. He’s definitely worth the drive or extra price for real, homemade ice cream.

Upon returning from San Francisco, a trip which included frequent visits to Bi-​Rite Creamery and Humphry Slocombe, I found myself wondering why there were so few artisan ice cream parlors back home in Des Moines. As if on cue, Charlie mentioned a recent Register article he’d read about the Outside Scoop in Indianola. I looked it up online immediately. All I had to read were the words «maple bacon» and we were zooming down to Indianola to check it out.
This is a cute local place that’s an easy drive down from Des Moines, but I wouldn’t say it exactly satisfied my artisan ice cream craving. Still, it was pretty decent if (like me) you do not intend to set foot in a Dairy Queen and you’re not in the mood for soft serve (like Snookies or Van Dee’s).
On this particular day, I was pretty bummed to see that the ice cream selections all seemed pretty normal. Maybe we were just here on an off day, but I was hoping for some more adventurous choices (salted caramel, honey lavender, roasted banana, etc). The maple bacon flavor we’d read about was nowhere to be found. Instead, our options were numerous but straightforward: vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, peanut butter, apple crisp, cookie dough, blueberry lemonade, pistachio, etc. There were no «crazy flavors» with the notable exception of sweet corn, but since no samples were permitted of sweet corn, I didn’t get to try it. Instead I ordered a four-​scoop sampler of the wackiest flavors I could discern: banana walnut, s’mores, nutter butter, and dark chocolate raspberry. Charlie ordered a s’mores sundae (oddly enough, this was made with vanilla ice cream rather than the s’mores flavor I’d ordered in my sampler).
While Charlie’s sundae was pretty creatively constructed — vanilla ice cream ringed with graham crackers and topped with hot fudge and a roasted marshmallow — I couldn’t help but be a little disappointed that my ice cream wasn’t exactly what I was hoping it would be. Don’t get me wrong, it was good — I was just hoping for a more intense flavor. I really can’t blame them — with the Indianola location, I would guess the flavor selections probably end up being more family-​oriented. A 10 year-​old doesn’t want honey lavender ice cream, after all — they want cookie dough!
Even though this wasn’t exactly what I was hoping it would be, it’s one of the only places in the Des Moines area that makes «small batch, from scratch» ice cream and that’s something I will continue to support. So it gets an «A-​OK» from me. I will keep watching for the more experimental flavors to show up, and I will be back when they do!

All the ice cream is «homemade». There is always a great variety of flavors. My favorite so far has been chocolate with pretzels. We’ve also tried banana, red velvet cake, pumpkin, cinnamon, cake batter, and several other flavors. They are always quick to let you try a new flavor and the prices are very reasonable. The helpings are LARGE! I can usually barely finish 1 scoop in a sugar cone. They pre pack the cone and then put a giant scoop on top. Great local business!

The Outside Scoop boasts some of the most delicious ice cream in all of Indianola! I’ve thoroughly enjoyed each of my trips there. They have a huge variety of different flavors and different delicacies one might try. I had a delicious sundae once and had some amazing chocolate chip ice cream on another occasion. Their hot fudge is particularly delectable. I’d recommend this highly to anyone needing a sugar fix.