A new ice cream shop is opening in downtown Raleigh. Cereal milk rules the menu
A pair of ice cream shops specializing in frozen cereal milk will open in North Carolina this year, with the first planned for downtown Raleigh.
The shops are named Milk & Sin, nodding to the ice cream base and future plans to spike the sweet treats with booze.
Milk & Sin is owned by married couple Kerveins and Nicole Garnier, life-long New Yorkers and former corrections officers in Rikers Island who recently relocated to North Carolina.
“We moved to North Carolina, we’re getting two storefronts, we’re fully committed,” Kerveins Garnier said in a phone interview. “It’s not just like a passion we have, it’s something we believe in.”
Milk & Sin is eyeing an opening at its Raleigh location this fall, building on the ground floor of the downtown Skyhouse building at 124 E. Martin St. The Raleigh location is about to begin construction.
The Garniers initially started working on a boozy version of Milk & Sin in New York, but ran into regulatory issues mixing ice cream and alcohol. A trip helping move Nicole’s mother from Florida to Johnston County put the couple on a new path. This is the first restaurant for the couple, who have called North Carolina home for only a few months.
“We fell in love with the area and knew we were moving here,” Garnier said. “When you’re making a career change, you make it going full speed ahead. ... We wanted to do something a little brighter. Here we want to bring a little joy to people.”
What is cereal milk ice cream?
Cereal milk ice cream rose to prominence more than a decade ago, emerging on menus from New York’s Milk Bar sweet shop and spreading around the country.
The method makes ice creams from salted and seasoned milks steeped with cereal.
The Milk & Sin menu will include 16 different ice creams made from milk steeped with popular cereals, like Cinnamon Toast Crunch. There will be nearly a dozen different toppings, five drizzles and eight in-house invented cereals.
“My favorite starts with Cinnamon Toast Crunch and has toasted marshmallows and a strawberry drizzle,” Garnier said.
Milk & Sin: NC locations
The second Milk & Sin will open at 1427 Military Cutoff Road in Wilmington, close to Wrightsville Beach. That location, Garnier said, is looking at a November opening.
“We’re really grateful to the people in North Carolina for being so welcoming, it’s a complete 180 for us,” Garnier said. “It’s been a major change of pace, we’ve slowed down. In New York you feel like you’re always at a 10. It’s a much nicer pace here.”
This story was originally published August 22, 2023 at 11:16 AM with the headline "A new ice cream shop is opening in downtown Raleigh. Cereal milk rules the menu."
