(by Shannon Becker - December 29, 2005) - This holiday season, visions of a spicy ice cream empire are dancing around in the heads of two longtime friends. The two men — Jeffrey Russitano and James Wishneski — began experimenting with their Hotscream ice cream concoction about 10 years ago during a particularly festive Monday Night Football game.
“We’ve been friends for 25 years and we were always entering chili and hot wing contests and on the look out for the best and hottest foods. Then, we discovered this together one Monday night,” Wishneski said.
The spicy ice cream, dubbed J&J’s Hotscream, is fast becoming a local favorite, and now the two men are working to secure financing and broker lucrative deals with distribution companies, hoping to finally start production on a full-time basis.
“I’m not sure when it will actually happen,” Russitano said. “Right now we are taking it one step at a time. But it’s our dream to get our spicy ice cream on the menu of every Mexican restaurant we can find.”
The Hotscream treat has become a favorite ending among the clientele at Aunt Chilada’s in Hamden, and Russitano has little doubt that other aficionados of the habanero will be lining up for a taste when the dessert hits menus at other venues. “The taste is really addicting,” Russitano said.
“Once we get the ice cream business built up, we plan to branch out to barbecue and other hot sauces.” “There’s really no limit as to how far we can go with this because we have developed such a strong base product. We’re not afraid to experiment and we’ve put it into frozen drinks, vinaigrettes and all kinds of sauces,” said Wishneski, a chef at Portabello Mediterranean Grill in Huntington.
“We both have full-time jobs, but the Hotscream is such a passion for us, there are really no limits as to where we could go with this.” Sitting at his dining room table, Russitano shared the story of how the Hotscream ice cream came to be. “It was a Monday night game, and we were watching the Steelers play the Bills,” Russitano said.
A few beers mixed with a boatload of very hot wings eventually sent the men in search of ice cream. “After scooping two huge bowls of ice cream we both looked at the remaining wing sauce, then at the ice cream and back to the wing sauce,” Russitano said. “We mixed the two flavors and that’s how we first came up with the concept for our spicy ice cream.” Life then intervened, temporarily putting their ice cream dreams on hold. Russitano got married and moved to Georgia, and the duo shelved their idea to distribute a unique and spicy dessert treat. “When I moved back we resurrected our concoction and started spending hours in the kitchen,” Russitano said. “Jim’s a chef, and we experimented with flavors, trying to pick the best chilis and trying to come up with a way to incorporate the chilis to have heat without the skin or seeds.” “People thought we were crazy,” Wishneski said.
“When we first made it, it was so hot we were the only ones who could eat it. It was pretty weird to be eating ice cream and sweating.” Russitano said the two friends made gallons of inedible sauce before finally coming up with just the right pepper — a habanero —to blend with the cool, sweet vanilla base. They mixed in some strawberry flavoring and out came J&J’s Hotscream.
But be warned. Hotscream ice cream is not for the faint of heart. It’s a subtle, building to bold flavor that grabs you in the taste buds and makes you want to take another bite to try and identify all the flavors dancing around in your mouth. “It’s spicy but still enjoyable,” Wishneski said.
“We wanted to make sure our products were palatable so we used quality ice cream and real fruit, but the mixture still carries some heat with it.” When not at work, the duo are out marketing their product, attending food shows and garnering both local and national recognition. “It’s a passion for us and we want to share what we’ve made with other people. I think it’s just a matter of time before people all over the country are eating Hotscream,” Wishneski said.
In 2002, J&J’s Hotscream debuted its original flavor during the summer of 2002 at WPLR’s “Buried at the Beach” with Smith & Barber’s morning show. In 2003, Hotscream won “Best of Dessert” category at the International Restaurant and Food Service Show in New York City.
Also in 2003, Hotscream introduced its new chocolate sauce at the Mystic Chamber of Commerce “Chocolate Affair” held at the Mohegan Sun Resort and Casino. The dessert showcased as one of the Top 5 New and Spicy Treats on the Food Network, and it first aired in May of 2004. The show, Top 5: Spicy Treats, is scheduled to air again on Friday, Jan. 27, 2006, at 11 a.m. I
n 2005, the duo have been fine tuning their treats, marketing their spicy cool treats to various Mexican restaurants and it has become a menu favorite at Aunt Chilada’s in Hamden. “We’ve won awards, and I know it’s good. Everyone who tries it likes the concept,” Russitano said. “About 98 percent of them like it and the other 2 percent appreciate it but just aren’t spicy food people.” The problem is finding a way to get it out to more people. Russitano said the men have developed the ice cream, ice cream sandwiches, fried ice cream and something called a Hotscream taco (filled with ice cream of course.)
The ice cream sandwich is a big hit — a cookie at each end adds texture to the creamy smooth vanilla and sweet strawberry flavors. Seconds after swallowing the bite, you get a warming sensation and a slow burn hits you in the back of the throat. There’s no burning in the mouth or on the lips, and the taste makes you want to take another bite. After 30 or 40 trials and errors, Russitano and Wishneski have come up with a total of five flavors added to their vanilla base — strawberry swirl, chocolate swirl, raspberry, blueberry and ginger.
“I’m very excited about our product line, and I think it’s going to be a big thing,” Russitano said. He’s spent countless hours on the Internet doing market research and running the numbers. The next step is to get financing and start marketing the product to the larger chains so that more people can get a taste of the Hotscream. “We want to hit all the TexMex restaurants, maybe Taco Bell even, and get a following of loyal customers. Our goal is to have people come in these places and ask for our products,” Russitano said. Once that happens, Russitano said there is no limit to what they can do with their basic recipe — from ice cream and sauces we could move on to salad dressing and butter. “There’s really no limit to what we can do with these flavors,” Russitano said.