Earlier this week, we walked into the Clumpies production kitchen in St. Elmo, the place where all the Clumpies ice cream is made.

Today's National Ice Cream Day, so, obviously, we thought we'd kick the tires a bit, have a look-see.

You know, we thought we knew Clumpies. Founded in 1999 by the son of a third-generation of a Chattanooga candyman. That Frazier Ave. flagship store that changed the North Shore.

Grasshopper, easily the best flavor.

You know, Clumpies.

We left stunned, mouths open, our ice-cream mustaches frozen in awe.

"We still make everything in-house," said Ashley Bottoms.

Ashley's a pastry chef - The Biltmore, baking for celebrities in Nashville, courses at Penn St., - who carries a formal title as director of independent foods. Really, she's like the Clumpies chef.

"It takes more time," she said, "but it is a dedication to craft."

The inside scoop on Clumpies is like learning your favorite uncle is really a trapeze artist or WWII spy or rhythm guitarist with Journey. Like: I knew you were cool, but had no idea how cool.

Clumpies pasteurizes its own ice cream, some 16,000 gallons annually.

Apparently, this is unheard-of in the industry.

Not a mix, mind you.

Instead, fresh milk arrives weekly from the Borden truck, then is mixed into a 200-gallon pasteurizer vat.

"It's very normal for 99 percent of ice cream companies to buy mix pre-made and churn ice cream that way," Ashley said.

It's a nearly cow-to-cone process that begins - well, there's no way to say this politely - off South Broad, in a former slaughterhouse now devoted to Cookies N' Cream and Sangria Sorbet.

Inside, the production kitchen's divided into two parts: the hot side, the cold side.

Let's start hot.

"We are putting together all the ingredients," she said. "It's a fun science."

It's like a small, partial kitchen for a pastry shop or bakery. Shelves are stocked - spices, corn flakes, Nutella - with tons of non-ice-cream items. When Clumpies sells, say, Burnt Sugar Brownie ice cream, Ashley's team actually bakes trays of brownies.

For Birthday Cake, they make sheets of confetti cake. For Oatmeal Apple Butter? They make their own apple butter.

Earlier this week, they launched a Peach Sorbet flavor; the week prior, cases of Georgia peaches covered the countertops, soon to be turned into jams and simple syrups.

In many cases, they source locally: Chattanooga Whiskey, Harrison Bay Honey, Lookout Lavender. Local apples for their apple butter.

By my count, Clumpies sells 107 flavors, from seasonal offerings to year-round flavors to boutique, rare, B-side hits.

There's Dirty Banana. Sweet Corn Blueberry.

Blood Orange Olive Oil Cake? London Fog? Are you an ice cream or a fever dream?

It's like Andy Warhol and the Fairy Godmother milked a cow together.

Dulce de Leche Buttercrunch? Almond Florentine? Sugar Plum Sangria Sorbet?

Poor plain vanilla. You never had a chance.  

Ashley - the author and creator of all those recipes - is joined by  four full-time folks and seasonal part-timers.

(Hat's off to Ashton Dubell, production manager, standing to the right, with Ashley, middle, and Pepper Raper, public relations manager, on the left.)

Last year, Clumpies sold nearly 12,000 pints and another 12,000 single-serve cups.

In its three stores, Clumpies hand-scooped nearly 349,000 scoops.

"That's enough to cross the Walnut Street Bridge 30 times," said Ashley.

Following its first Frazier Ave. store - fun fact: Chef Erik Niel worked there briefly - Clumpies opened its Market Street and St. Elmo spots.

Rock City bought Clumpies in 2013, opening the current production kitchen in 2017.

On the day we visited, they were making Coffee Toffee ice cream, using whole beans from Velo Coffee Roasters which had steeped for 48 hours prior.

On the cold side, the big pasteurizer was swirling, an enormous belly of a machine, holding a lactose-intolerant nightmare: 200 gallons of milk (85 gallons), cream (65 gallons), egg yolks (21.4 pounds), sugar (238 pounds), dried milk solids (58 pounds) and stabilizers (3.4 pounds).

The pasteurizer heats up to 155 degrees, and is held there for 30 minutes, then, cools.

After pasteurization, the liquid is siphoned to separate containers, aged overnight and then poured into one of the most important machines in the Chattanooga food scene.

It freezes the liquid, making ice cream.

Originally, an Emery Thompson was the OG machine Clumpies used for more than two decades. Put out to pasture last year, it now rests next to a newer, jazzier model from Italy.

"Every bit of ice cream you make comes through this machine?" Sarah asked.

"Yes," said Ashley.

Cylinder scraper blades spin and swirl, freezing the ice cream, which is then poured out into 3-gallon containers. Air content is measured - it's called the over-run - which affects taste. More air, less thickness and quality.

"A higher over-run feels like whipped cream," she said. "You could put five gallons in and get 10 gallons out."

That 5-becomes-10 gallon would equate to a 100% over-run. (Clumpies aims for 65 percent.)

The Italian job freezes the pasteurized liquid for eight minutes, then other ingredients - toffee, cornflakes, cookie dough - are added.  

"Our ice cream sits around 16% butter fat content," said Ashley.

The gallons are carried into a North Pole cooler, kept near 20 degrees below zero, where shelves are stocked with gallons and single scoop containers.

"By Friday, they will be empty," Ashley said.

You must have a large team of drivers and a fleet of trucks?

"There's our fleet," she said, as Danielle Jimenez walked by. "She does all our deliveries."

Clumpies has three stores - or "scoop-shops" - and is sold in Pruett's Market on Signal Mountain and other area businesses. Thanks to dry-ice-technology, Clumpies can also be shipped anywhere in the US.

With plans to become fully compostable in Clumpies stores - spoons, cups, napkins, gallon containers - by 2026, Clumpies has partnered with New Terra Compost - and already diverted some 15,000 pounds of landfill waste, Clumpies says - making it one of the region's most sustainable operations. Plus, Clumpies recycles its plastic gloves - 3,500 pounds worth.

Did you know all this? The pasteurizing, brownie-sheet-cake-all-ingedient-making, composting-glove-recycling Clumpies? All made a few miles away from where it's scooped?

"It's funny," Ashley said. "People know that it's good. People have really fond memories with Clumpies.

"But true Chattanoogans know it is made here. And made down the street. In the land of Mayfield, we make it a few miles down the road. At most, three miles down the road."

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This story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.

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