【一食一客】旧金山 | Robyn S. Fisher, Smitten Ice Cream

湾区有这样一家冰淇淋店：坐落于集装箱内，出售的冰淇淋只有4-6种口味，还会随季节变换——就连最稀松平常的草莓味也只有夏季才有。可这家冰淇淋的口感却是史无前例地惊艳，让人不禁好奇这破破的集装箱到底施了什么魔法。于是，小分队就来到了这家Smitten Ice Cream，向创始人Robyn讨教秘诀。头顶Williams College + Stanford的光环，Robyn却为了冰淇淋事业放弃咨询公司的“大好前程”，从沿街叫卖开始，筑起这个关于丝滑甜蜜和完美主义的梦想。

时间：11.09.2015

受访者：Robyn S. Fisher，Smitten冰淇淋店创始人。

采访者@Chihuo：Ethan & Marie

图片：Smitten

翻译@Chihuo：汪排骨是喵星人

Ethan：Smitten已经开业8年了，您当初是怎么想到要开Smitten这家店的呢？为什么第一个想到的是卖冰淇淋？这8年来过得怎么样？

Robyn：决定开冰淇淋店是因为我想做自己热爱的事，并把这件事做得更好。冰淇淋于我而言，总是与人生中特别的时刻相伴。我小时候妈妈就告诉我，其实我有两个胃：有一个只用来装冰淇淋。我现在还是这么认为，那个时候我们全家吃完饭后都会一起吃冰淇淋，这是我家特殊的时刻。所以我不仅仅爱冰淇淋的味道，也爱大家聚在一起分享冰淇淋的这种感觉。

大学毕业后，我曾经在大公司工作了了四年半左右。我觉得这种工作不太适合我。我真的很想和其他人有实实在在的交流，而不是像当时那样，每天坐在电脑前，互相之间都不讲话。卖冰淇淋就可以接触到很多人，给他们带来欢乐，把人与人之间联系起来。这件事的强大力量让我奋不顾身地想要投入进去。这也就是我选择卖冰淇淋的原因。对于我这样的成年人来说，每天卖冰淇淋很开心、很有趣。整个过程很漫长，但我现在每天醒来时依然充满激情。

（Robyn曾经供职于知名咨询公司Monitor Group）

Ethan: How you started Smitten and why you choose ice cream as your first food business? It’s been 8 eight years since you started Smitten. How has it been?

Robyn: So the reason I decided to go into ice cream is that I decided to go after something I love and make it better. Ice cream to me has always been a very special moment of my life. From when I was a little kid, my mom used to tell me that I have two stomachs. One was only for ice cream. I still believe that, and it was a time in my family when we all have ice cream after dinner. It is a special moment of my family. It is always something I love for the taste and the feeling of being together.

I worked in a corporate world for about four and a half years after college. I didn’t feel it really fit me very well. I really wanted to have a tangible human connection with people. And I feel like a lot of what I do is sitting in front of computer and not talking to each other. So I felt that going into ice cream you are touching so many people and really what you do is you bring joy and build human connections. It is such a powerful thing to be a part of. And so that is the reason that I am in ice cream. It’s giving joy everyday and it’s fun thing to do as an adult. That’s how I got here. It’s been a very long process to get here. But I still wake up excited everyday.

(Robyn worked in management consulting at Monitor Group, which is one of the top consulting firms)

Ethan：过去做管理咨询师的时候，您的思维模式是偏向商业角度的。但是自己做小生意这个决定，可以说完全偏离了管理咨询的职业发展道路。您曾经遇到过何种挑战，又是如何应对的呢？

Robyn：每天都会遇到挑战。大多数情况下我都不知道自己在干嘛。所以我会请一些导师和我非常敬重的智者们一起研究讨论。我试图找到一种平衡。我知道自己擅长的方面，也知道自己不擅长的方面。对于不擅长的领域，我就会倚重这些领域的专家来为我作出重要的决策。我关注的是文化、调研、发展和品牌维护这几方面，都是我最擅长的。我请来了金融、营销、采购和运营方面的专家，他们能弥补我欠缺之处。

每天都是一次挑战，这就让我的生活也很刺激。我从未感到乏味。挺好的。之前在大公司的时候我就知道自己讨厌千篇一律的常规事项，而且我肯定做不来。我也不喜欢被过多的规矩限制住。我厌恶写字楼。所以还是那句话，我真的不适合在大公司工作。我喜欢在不太明确的地方慢慢摸索、成长，自己去探索如何让事情变得清晰、实在。这就是我们每天正在做的事情。我们试图在一些看起来众所周知的东西上发掘常人看不到的一个新层面，并想办法使之为我们所用。所以说这是种非常有趣的世界观。

Ethan: As a management consultant, you are used to business thinking. However, making a decision jumping into a small business is very different than a typical management consultant career. What type of challenges did you encounter and how did you handle them?

Robyn: It’s been a challenge every single day. I have no idea what I am doing a lot of time. So a lot of it is just relying on mentors and other smart people who are I am honored to have in a room with me to figure things out. And I really just trying to balance things out, I know what I am good at and I know what I am not good at. So I just try to find experts in fields that I am not good at so that I can really defer to them on things that are really important to business that I am not an expert in. So the things that I am focused on are culture, research and development and branding. Those are the areas that I think I am the best at. And then I have experts in finance, marketing, sourcing and operations who even out my flaws.

I think it’s a challenge everyday and it’s what makes life exciting. And I am never bored. That’s nice. And I also learned in corporate world that I hate routines, I hate it and I am not good at it. I really also don’t like too much structure. I feel getting confined. I hate office buildings. And so again, I don’t really fit in the corporate world. I like to thrive in the gray area and figure out how to clear out the gray and make it more tangible. That’s kind of what we are doing everyday. We are trying to take something that seems to be really well understood, and turn it on it’s head and say no no no there is another layer here that no one else sees, then try to figure out how to make it ours. So it is a fun way of looking at the world.

Marie：你们的集装箱就是这么来的吗？

Robyn：这个集装箱非常特别。最早我是用小拖车在路边卖冰淇淋，在此之前我们用两年的时间在地下室里打造冰淇淋的原型产品。所以这三年真的是超级混乱，完全靠自己一点点努力。不过学习如何利用极少的资金来启动一家公司这个过程，让我感觉很棒。在商学院里我们学到的是先融A轮，融个两百万美金什么的，然后去买买买。搁我们这儿完全行不通，当时经济不景气，没法考虑融资。所以我就说，让我们来看看如何用艰难、但更实际的办法来做这件事。

那个时候我采用了与众不同而又比较零碎的思维方式，也非常赞赏新复古风格这个想法。Smitten完全融入了新复古风格：我们让冰淇淋再次纯净起来，不添加任何不应该出现在冰淇淋里的成分。大批量生产的冰淇淋品牌都含有很多用来保质、稳定的添加剂，而我们Smitten的目标就是去掉所有这些添加剂，让冰淇淋变得像很早以前那样纯净。我们冰淇淋里的原料只为了好吃这一个目的而存在。

冰淇淋是古法制作的，但我们用时尚时尚最时尚的方式来经营。集装箱是新复古风格的一个实例。我们拿来了一个废弃的集装箱，让它获得新生。我很喜欢新与旧的结合。改造的集装箱体现了我们品牌初创时的那种街头文化：从大街上捡个东西回来做成我们的店面，这就是独一无二的冰淇淋店。很像以前的冰淇淋外卖档口。旧物改造成新品，我们全面贯彻这个思路。我希望将来能用集装箱再开几个店。

开店的过程让我学到，跟土地规划部门打交道有多困难。办手续、走程序足足花了两年的时间。之前这块地是别人在开发，更改土地使用类型的手续是非常麻烦的。然后通电通水、基础设施什么的，需要获得周围所有邻居、商户还有环保部门的批准。所以我们也跟地产经纪说，如果看到了合适的地盘我们就赶紧拿下，直接找个建好的商铺要简单不少。我们其他店都开在商铺里，但如果遇到了合适的地，我还是想做集装箱店面。

Marie: Is it how you like the food container?

Robyn: The container is very special. When I started the company I was selling ice cream on the street out of a wagon. That was after two years of building a prototype in a basement. And so it was basically three years of being super scrappy and bootstrapping. And learning how company could get started on a very slim amount of money, I felt really good. In business school I learned that you raise series A. Raise 2 million dollar, then you go buy everything. I was like, that didn’t work. It was the recession. It was not even an option. So I was like, let’s figure out how to do this the hard way, the way that is more real.

So what really got ground into me at that point was the thinking differently and the scrappy mindset. I also really appreciated the idea of new old fashion. Smitten really embraces new old-fashion. We are making ice cream pure again by not including any ingredient that shouldn’t be in ice cream. So all of the mass distributed ice cream flavor and brands all have a lot of extra ingredient to hold it stable. My goal at Smitten is to take all of that out and make it pure again. We make ice cream that just have the ingredient that it should have for taste and taste alone.

We are doing old-fashion ice cream and we are doing it in an uber-fashion way. The idea of shipping container was an example of new old-fashion. We were taking a recycled shipping container that was being thrown out and make it new again. So I really like that combination of new and old. I really thought that embodied the brand and the street culture that we started it. We started on the street. So let’s really take something on the street and turn it into our shop and make look like the ice cream that no one has ever seen. It’s like an old fashion walk up ice cream counter. Making something old new again. That really embraces us well. I hoped to open other shops in shipping containers.

What I learned is that it’s really hard to do with all the land zoning. It took us two years to get the shop open with all the permitting and all the processes of getting it through. And they the developers were working on that years before. So it’s a really hard process to get someone to zone land in a way to use it for that type of zone. And also you have to get all the electric bring all the plumbing all the infrastructure to the land. For that, you have to get all these different neighbors approval and merchants approval and environmental approval. So we have still told all of our brokers if you see a spot we can do that let’s go for it. But it’s been much easier to find really cool brick and mortar locations. And we find ones that we love and we do that instead. So all of our other shops are brick and mortar but I would love to do more shipping containers if the right land shows up.

Ethan：所以这家店是最早的那家？

Robyn：是最早的那家。

Ethan: So this shop is the original shop?

Robyn: It is the original shop.

Ethan：您提到之前在大马路上卖冰淇淋。我想Smitten能走到今天这一步，肯定是经历了巨大的成功。Smitten成为一家独领风骚的街头商户，有什么秘诀吗？

Robyn：Smitten的街头小贩生涯非常令我着迷。这段经历让我们找到了这家公司的定位。我还记得我们的小拖车曾经在Yelp上排到了第一位，甚至超过了三藩名厨Gary Danko的同名餐厅。我特意截了图。有这么几件事成就了我们。最明显的一点是制作过程：我站在街边做冰淇淋的时候，周身云雾缭绕，人们会好奇“你这到底是弄啥嘞？”立刻就吸引了注意力。然后就是产品本身：我每天会和甜品师一起工作，讨论今天要做什么口味，可以配哪种酒。我们一定要选出最好的那一个选项。如果只能选一个，那必须是全世界最好的。

以前，如果有30个人排队等我们的冰淇淋，我们就会感到又惊又喜。在街头要花5分钟才能完成一个冰淇淋，所以顾客可能要等一小时。但大家都在等，我想是因为他们看到了队伍尽头那些快乐的笑脸。产品本身必须有说服力，我们也一直仰仗着我们的产品。只要尝过我们的冰淇淋，顾客就会知道这是全世界最棒的。吃过之后再吃别的冰淇淋，尤其是感受到质地上的差别以后，你绝对再也无法接受普通冰淇淋。

Ethan: You mentioned that you had been selling ice cream on the street. I would imagine it needs to be a critical success to lead to the Smitten business today. So what is the secret that makes Smitten stand out among all the other street food vendors?

Robyn: So the street carting, we called “wagoneering” stage of Smitten was amazing for me. And I think it really helped to chart the path of who we are as a company. It was one time I remember, we, out of our wagon, ranked above all restaurants on yelp and Gary Danko. I have a screenshot of that day. But I think a couple things made us stand out. One is obviously the process. So I was on the street, with the big fog, cloud above me making ice cream, making people think “what on earth were you doing.” That immediately caught attention. And then also, the product itself. So I would work with our pastry chef everyday like we still do. And figure out what is the one flavor that we are going to do today. What is the wine pairing that we are going to maybe add to it? I had got only one option, and it had to be crazy good. So if you got only this one thing, it’s got to be out of this world.

We would have blow our minds and thirty people deep in the street waiting for the product. It takes about 5 minutes to make one person’s ice cream on the street. So people were waiting for like an hour for their ice cream. But yeah I think they waited because they saw the happy smile at the end of the line. The product needs to speak for itself, always. We always defer to it. Because we really think that once people taste the ice cream they would know that it’s the best in the world. Once you taste another ice cream after ours, especially with the texture, you can’t go back.

Ethan：您可以简单介绍一下Smitten冰淇淋最独特的地方吗？

Robyn：当然。主要是两点。一是我们的“Brrr”冰淇淋机，是能够制造出最小的冰晶的专利产品。最小的冰晶意味着超级无敌柔滑的冰淇淋。我们冰淇淋的质地如此顺滑，就是因为我们尽最大可能把冰晶做到最小，小到你看不见，舌头也感觉不到。大颗粒冰晶说明被冻坏了，有点恶心。常规的冰淇淋是在较高的温度冻起来的，冰晶还有机会变大。如果温度保持得很低，冰晶就会保持小颗粒状态。我们的机器就是把这个过程做到完美。它可以感应到冰淇淋的厚度，智能调节控制，所以不会冻过了头或者没完全冻住，确实是非常微妙的冷冻技术。

第二点是我们有专业烹饪人才。我们的甜品师曾经供职于一家高端餐厅，她负责设计菜谱和调味。绝妙的原料，对品味和食物的理解，以及科技，这三者的结合，造就了非同寻常的Smitten。有了技术却没有好原料，或者有个好主厨但店里科技水平不够，都无法达到Smitten的境界。

Ethan: Can you briefly describe what makes Smitten ice cream so special and the unique thing that makes it stands out?

Robyn: Sure. There are two elements. One is our “Brrr” machine. It’s patented to make the smallest ice crystals possible. And smallest ice crystal means super duper smooth ice cream. So the texture of our ice cream is so smooth because the ice crystals are as tiny as possible. The small ice crystals mean that you can’t see them and you can’t feel them on your tongue. Large ice crystals mean freezer burn. It’s kind of gross. Normal ice cream is frozen at a higher temperature so the ice crystals have a chance to grow. And when it’s so cold it stays small. And our machine basically perfects that process. The machine actually senses the thickness of the ice cream and knows when to stop turning. So it doesn’t over freeze the ice cream or under freeze it, which is a really nuanced freezing technique.

And then secondly, we have a very strong culinary side to our business. So we have a pastry chef who designs all of our recipes, all of our flavors around the taste profiles from her high-end restaurant background. And that combination of amazing ingredients and understanding of taste and food plus the technology is what makes Smitten so special. You can have the technology and put bad ingredients in it, or you can have a chef without the technology and neither of them could be as good as Smitten.

Ethan：能跟我们讲讲“最纯净的原料”这方面吗？

Robyn：当然。我们团队里有个全职职位叫做“狩猎采集者”，职责就是寻找最好的食材。我们的重心放在本地市场上，所以牛奶和奶油都来自本地有机乳制品供应商。农产品也尽量在加州范围内进货。如果还是在品质和数量上达不到要求，就在西海岸找。这样（减少运输成本）对环境比较好，而且运输距离短也能保持新鲜美味。我们的冰淇淋不添加乳化剂、稳定剂或防腐剂，正应了我们返璞归真的宗旨。

专注于原材料的品质，让我们不再问自己“冰淇淋能保存多久”，而只在意“冰淇淋能做到多好吃”。包装好的冰淇淋为了适应分销物流，在很多方面作出了让步。我们则不会向保质期妥协。比如我们会问，如果在冰淇淋做好后两分钟之内吃掉，我们能做成什么水准？这对于甜品师来说是很有意思的任务。我们在创作上的自由是大多数冰淇淋商家所无法拥有的。

Ethan: About the fact that Smitten uses the purest ingredients. Can you talk about that too?

Robyn: Sure. We have a full time position on our team as the hunter and gatherer. Her job is to go find the best food. We focus locally so we work with local organic dairies to get our milk and cream. And then we try to find the best tasting organic produce ideally in California. If we cannot find the right taste and quantity, then we try to stay at the west coast. Just so that it is good for the environment. It also tastes better if it doesn’t have to travel so far. We don’t use any emulsifier, stabilizer or preservatives in our ice cream. So that is illuminating our vows of make it pure again.

By focusing on the quality of the ingredient that we do have, it is a really fun thing to say how can we make this, not like how can we make this last, but how good can we make this. It’s a twist on ice cream. Packaged ice cream has a lot of compromises in it. Because they have to figure out how to make it last through distribution chain. And we throw all of those compromises out of window. Say if it eaten in two minutes after it’s frozen, how good can we make it? It’s a really fun thing for a pastry chef to work on. So we have a lot of liberties that other ice cream companies don’t have.

Ethan：你们是如何想出、并测试新口味的？

Robyn：创作新口味时，我们会让甜品师自由探索。我们的产品是按季节来的，比如说我们只有在草莓上市的时候才提供草莓味，秋天就做南瓜味。这样对于本地供货商和季节都是合理的。我们会想办法。于是我们从柠檬姜饼配血橙开心果曲奇，到草莓、油桃脆，再到冬季菜单。本地的果蔬简直就是一道美丽的彩虹。不过还是由甜品师向我提出备选口味。

准备一些传统口味总是好的，比如巧克力配新鲜薄荷、海盐焦糖。人们很容易辨认这些口味，而且基本款总是眼花缭乱时的备选项。所以我们很努力地将基本款也变得很独特。比如巧克力味的做法就和别人不一样。大多数人用巧克力粉，便宜又方便。我们的甜品师则说：“我要做甘纳许（ganache）。”这是一种浓稠的巧克力酱（译者：参见美国超市里的那种布丁），有时候直接就做成蛋糕。于是她就做了这种巧克力甘纳许，再加入奶油。可谓是巧克力最堕落放纵的吃法。我们的做法和别人完全不同，尽管口味的名称听起来很常规，却是我们甜品师的独家配方。她会大开脑洞、自己先做些试验，一旦有了些眉目就会叫我一起试吃。我经常是一大早就拿冰淇淋做早饭。正式推出新口味之前，我们还会再反复推敲。

Ethan: How do you guys come up with new flavors and how do you guys test out new flavors?

Robyn: So in terms of the process of flavor creation, we really give our pastry chef a lot freedom to explore. We go by the seasons, so we only serve strawberry ice creams in strawberry season. Right now we are doing pumpkin. We do things that make sense for locally and the season. We work our way through. So we go from a lemon ginger snap in a blood orange with pistachio cookies and we go strawberry then we go to a nectarine crisp then we work into winter months. It’s definitely a beautiful rainbow of fruit that we can get locally. But it’s up to the chef to propose flavors to me.

It’s always good to have traditional flavors for people, like the chocolate with fresh mint and salted caramel. It’s something that people can always identify with and fall back on if they just need to have the basics. So we work really hard to make those unique to us. We don’t just do chocolate like everyone else does it. We actually take chocolate and we do it in a really unique way. For instance, most people make chocolate ice cream with cocoa powder because it’s cheap and easy. How our chef designed it was she actually said “I am going to make a ganache” which is like a thick chocolate pudding that sometimes get turn into a cake. So she makes this melted chocolate ganache and we add cream to it. It is the thickest and most decadent chocolate. We don’t do it the way everyone else does it. So even if the flavors that seem like a standard name, it’s still our chef’s way of approaching it. The chef goes off and does some tests on her own. Then once she feels like there is something that is getting close then she and I test a bunch of things together. IT’s usually in the morning so I usually eat ice cream for breakfast. And we would have a couple more iterations before we are ready to reveal the flavor.

Ethan：很赞！可以再给我们讲个有趣的故事吗？

Bobyn：我们开张第一年，每周换两个口味。我当时很天真，根本不知道实现起来多困难。我们从中学到了很多。其中最有趣的部分就是出了一些非常棒的口味，但大多数人其实并不喜欢。我们发现如果只卖四种口味的话，要选四种销量差不多的。（第一家Smitten门店有四种口味，其他店有六种。）这样顾客就不用等太久。有些已经不再出售的味道真的很有意思，比如月桂叶、春草。我们在烹饪方面挺“左派”的。现在有伯爵茶口味，虽然有趣但也不算奇葩。我们学到了很多关于顾客偏好的事情。虽然我们喜欢某些口味，但卖不出去。算是边试边学。试过上百种口味才知道哪些口味在“别致”和“还能接受”的范围中恰到好处。

Ethan: That sounds cool. Can you tell us an interesting story?

Robyn: During the first year we were open, we change two flavors every week. I was naïve. I had no idea how hard that would be. We learned so much. What was really interesting is there were some flavors that were so good. But they didn’t appeal to a lot of people. So we learned that when you only have four flavors you really need to have four that sell evenly. (There are four flavors at the first Smitten shop. All the others have 6 flavors.) So that people don’t wait too long. But some of the flavors we no longer do were really interesting. We did a bay leaf. We did a spring herb. We are pretty “left wing” in culinary. So now we have an earl grey. That’s an interesting flavor but not so out there. We learned a lot about what people like. Even though we liked some flavor, it is not enough for the business to work. It was kind of learning through trying. So we tried like hundreds of flavors to learn what is the sweet spot between being special but still approachable.

Ethan：您有最喜欢的口味吗？

Robyn：有，我最喜欢Tcho巧克力味。我这个人其实一直都不选巧克力味，但开发这款口味时就逐渐喜欢上了。后来我过生日的那个月，推出了血橙配开心果曲奇口味。我也喜欢浇了莓子酱的油桃脆口味，很像油桃莓子脆，太好吃了。

Ethan: Is there one or two flavors that is your favorite?

Robyn: Yes, my favorite flavor is the Tcho chocolate. Like I have never been a person who likes to order chocolate flavor. But it became my favorite because of the way we make it. And then during my birthday month, we have the blood orange with pistachio cookies. I also like the nectarine crisp with berry sauce on top. It’s like nectarine berry crisp. So good.

Ethan：那蛋筒呢？我听说蛋筒也很不一般。

Robyn：我们做东西都是从零开始的。蛋筒也是我们厨师自己的配方。面糊是早上现做的。大多是时候蛋筒还是温热的，因为它们刚刚出炉。我们对待所有事情都很认真。和冰淇淋有关的一切都经过了深思熟虑，都是我们亲手精心烹调的。我们从源头上把控。只有曲奇饼干不是我们自己做的，因为没有烤箱。

Ethan: How about the cones? I heard there is something special about them as well.

Robyn: We make everything from scratch. That’s our chef’s recipe for the cones. The batters are made from scratch in the morning. A lot of times the cones are still a little warm because we just made them. We take everything seriously. Everything that is included with the ice cream is really well thought out and procured in house. We are responsible from the sauces. The only thing we don’t make in our little shop is the cookies because we don’t have an oven.

Ethan：关于冰淇淋店的这些故事都太有意思了。感谢您与我们分享这一切！

Robyn：谢谢。

Ethan: That was a very interesting story to build an ice cream shop. Thank you for your time and kindness in sharing your story with us.

Robyn: Thank you.

~Smitten门店地址和营业时间~

San Francisco (Hayes Valley) – 432 Octavia Street, Suite 1A
Monday – Tuesday: 12pm – 10pm
Wednesday: 12pm – 10:30pm
Thursday – Friday: 12pm – 11pm
Saturday – 11:30am – 11pm
Sunday – 11:30am – 10pm

San Francisco (Pacific Heights) – 2404 California Street
Monday – Thursday: 12pm – 10:30pm
Friday – 12pm – 11pm
Saturday – 11:30am – 11pm
Sunday – 11:30am – 10:30pm

Oakland – 5800 College Avenue
Sunday – Thursday: 12pm – 10:30pm
Friday – Saturday : 12pm – 11pm

Lafayette – 3545 Mt. Diablo Boulevard
Sunday – Thursday: 12pm – 9:30pm
Friday – Saturday : 12pm – 10:30pm

Los Altos – 4800 El Camino Real
Monday – Friday: 12pm – 10:30pm
Saturday – Sunday: 11:30am – 10;30pm

The Point, El Segundo – 850 S. Sepulveda Blvd, Suite K100, El Segundo
Monday – Thursday: 12 – 10pm
Friday: 12 – 11pm
Saturday: 11am – 11pm
Sunday: 11am – 10pm

~LA也要开新店~

Silverlake – 3100 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles
Opening summer 2016