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July Partner: Made By Marcus

July Community Partner Made By Marcus

July Community Partner: Made By Marcus

JULY 5, 2019

July Community Partner: Made By Marcus

This Marcus guy has figured something pretty amazing out, and serves up some fantastic ice cream. It’s like he knows the secret to delicious. Curious how it got so good? We had the chance to find out where it began and how they do what they do to let us savor some unreal flavor combinations.


How did Made by Marcus come to be?

Marcus himself has Bachelor in food science and a Masters in nutrition which launched him into the world of restaurants and cooking. He was able to work in Vancouver and New York where he was thrown new culinary adventures that pushed his understanding of food and flavours to new heights.

After many years of working with great cooks and pastry chefs Marcus started the company by making only macarons. We have always brought in local ingredients starting with the local eggs needed for these delightful treats. He would separate them and use the whites for the cookies, but needed a use for all the extra egg yolks, which just so happen to be one of the key ingredients in ice cream. Now making small batches of ice cream to use up these yolks the creativity really took off. He was able to translate any flavour combination he wanted into ice cream and adventurous customers were buying these unusual flavours.

Marcus operated at this small scale for a long time and it has taken many years for the company to grow into who we are today. We have been able to bring in new approaches every year to make our ice cream better and better while still staying local and true to Marcus’s core values. Made by Marcus is what it is today because of Marcus’s understanding of the value of hard work. We also owe a lot to our dedicated customers, especially over the last few years. Those that love our ice cream seek it out through long lines in the summer, and even cold blizzards in the winter. Our customers know that when they go for a scoop or pint of our ice cream they are getting something new, fresh, and unique. To us Made by Marcus is a company of culture made equal by the care that goes into the ice cream and the customers that get so much joy out of it.

The science background is such an asset to making ice cream. There is a definite formula to it. Can you share a little about the process.

To make ice cream as good as ours it takes three full days (72 hours) to make one batch from start to finish.
• Like every good recipe we always have to start with great ingredients. We use local organic milk from Vital Greens Fram and organic cane sugar for all of our ice creams.
• Many of our flavours start with steeping the milk at the beginning of the process. Taking freshly ground coffee from Monogram in Calgary and steeping it into hot milk for a few hours is how we get that strong delicious coffee into our Monogram Espresso Churro ice cream.
• From there we have to blend the dairy, eggs, sugar and various natural ingredients to create our wildly creative flavours.
• Pasteurization is a huge step in the process as it heats all those key ingredients together in order to develop the flavours to their full potential.
• Next we Homogenize the base. Blending it at high speeds to emulsify the fat for a creamier, smoother ice cream.
• We then have to mature the flavours overnight. This adds complexity and body to our flavours.
• The next morning it’s time to churn. The base is quickly frozen and whipped to incorporate just the right amount of air for the perfect texture.
• Once churning is done and the ice cream is packaged it has to harden at -40˚ for several hours.
• After that it can be taken home to be eaten out of the pint, or scooped up at one into one of our fresh waffle cone ready for you to eat!

Beyond the time put in to create the ice cream, there is some time put in to experiment and gift us with some unique and delicious flavours

Because of Marcus’s unique background when he comes up with an idea for a flavour it’s usually right on the money. Even some of the wildest flavours like Thai Peanut and Fish Sauce Caramel worked perfectly bringing together the sweetness of the peanut and caramel, spiciness of the Thai chillies and the saltiness of the fish sauce. Marcus himself will take in to account the season, the local ingredients we can get our hands on to create all of our seasonal flavours from there.

This being said we have had a few flavours not make it past the testing phase. Marcus once had a dream to make avocado toast ice cream, but after a few trials that were not up to snuff we decided it was a flavour battle for another day.

With a background in food science and a thesis focused on dairy Marcus understands a great deal about milk. He seems to understand a great deal about how to make a vegan ice cream too. What brought vegan ice cream aboard? And thank you for bringing it to us!

Our development of Vegan ice cream came about when we saw more and more people coming in with either allergies or other dietary restriction. It became clear that there are not a lot of options out there when it comes to great ice cream alternatives. Being such a small operation (with limited space for scooping flavours) we had to find an option those with all kinds of restrictions could have.

Our first vegan test batches taught us a lot. Milk fat and eggs in traditional ice cream will bind together without the need of stabilizers, but in vegan ice cream the homogenized mixture is harder to achieve. We were not prepared to throw all sorts of unpronounceable stabilizers and chemicals into our vegan flavours to get the desired consistency, so we started to make our own cashew milk. Cashews have their own stabilizing property when you soak and blend them. This was a serious game changer when making vegan ice creams, and now our vegan chocolate fudge brown is one of our most popular flavours!

After a yoga class ice cream pick?

For me (Cat) it would have to be Sweet Cream! It really highlights the quality of the dairy we receive from Vital Greens, and its so creamy smooth and mellow. Just what I need after my favourite yoga class warm hips and hamstrings!

Our Operations manager Brittany said she prefers a sweet refreshing sorbet after yoga. Our current Guava and Prickly Pear Mule June seasonal is the perfect refresher after a great yoga class.

Anytime pick?

My (Cat) anytime pick is our most savoury flavours! The toasted oak and pickled strawberry, the blue cheese and caramelized pear, and the Douglas Fir and Pine Nut Brittle are some of my all time favourites (just to name a few) Otherwise, the sea salt and goats milk caramel signature of ours always has me coming back for more!

Marcus’s favourite anytime pick in the Passionfruit Basil. This year we were able to put a twist on his old favourite by partnering with PARK distillery.


For Santosha members:
Visit Made by Marcus, show them your MB receipt and receive 10% off.

Free Yoga: Bring in your receipt from Made By Marcus and receive one free class at Yoga Santosha in Mission or Kensington from July 1 – 31*

Stay up-to-date with Made By Marcus info and updates by following them online:
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*One free class per member per month.