Holla Mode : Thai Style Ice Cream

AHHH-​mazing. I love the ice cream here. It is creative in design and flavors. My ice cream maker, Bailey, was so sweet and helped me choose what I wanted. They combine all the ingredients, milk, flavorings, etc., and then make the ice cream on a super cold surface. I have never had anything like it.
I ordered the Thai coffee flavor and it was delicious and authentic. I will definitely be going back. There’s too many I want to try :-)

The ice cream is fine (tastes light, healthy… nothing too extraordinary but not bad) and even the long wait is okay due to the made-​to-​order nature of the business. What soured my experience at Holla Mode was how pissed off and unhappy the employees who make the ice cream looked. Scraping the ice cream looks hard so I completely understand if you’re not constantly smiling but it was pretty negative vibes in there. I felt like I was a burden for being there to buy ice cream and support a small business. Sad.
TLDR; I paid $ 6 for ice cream and some long faces.
:(

Hollaaaa (to a small cup of fancy ice cream sheets) and say goodbye to your dollaaaa$$ :(
You are paying for the experience of watching them make and scrape ice cream into rolls. I had the Sticky Mango, and it had a nice not-​too-​sweet mango flavor. The mango chunks are mushed with your ice cream and rolled up together. I wish my Sticky Mango had more toppings like mango chunks on top and maybe like coconut shavings to make it more worth for my money. For $ 6 – 7 per cup, I didn’t feel it was worth for 4 rolls of ice cream. The owner did tell me that the reason why their ice cream is pricey is because they use organic and natural ingredients, so you are paying for this experience + their ingredients. Impressive and very Austin-​like, but I still don’t think I’ll come back because I am willing to eat all ice cream haha. For you organic peoples, here you go.
It also takes about 5 minutes to prepare your cup, so be prepared to wait in line!
There is a small seating area on the truck itself which is convenient.

My advice if you want to try this style of ice cream? Head over to Central Market and buy a pint of coconut ice cream from the frozen section along with some toppings of your choice. There was really nothing special about this place. I had the Honey Bear and it was definitely not $ 6.50 good.
What really turned me off though was the service. The woman who took my order was rude and seemed irritated she had to be at work. I asked what made the ice cream unique (trying to learn about the process) and she rolled her eyes and said with an exasperated tone, «well, you can see it’s made to order…»
After reading other reviews voicing similar sentiments, I would strongly advise the owner to better train the staff because it’s clear their service skills are seriously lacking.
TL;DR — wasn’t worth the money, and I’m unlikely to return.

This is a one and done kind of place. The ice cream was good, but if there’s any sort of a line, be prepared to wait a while. Each cup of ice cream has to be specially made. It’s good, but not great enough to warrant a return visit. Parking is a pain and that might be why some jerk just pulled his truck up on the sidewalk in front of the trailer. The Novelty isn’t worth the trouble.

Cool concept, I like house they use coconut milk, so the ice cream isn’t has creamy and heavy. A little pricy and service is a little slow, but I understand since it takes a while to prepare each ice cream. I feel like it’s a try once and then go like whenever you’re friends what to go type of place. Nothing I think I would crave.

Won’t give anyone a one star unless they directly fail on food and service. I have had this place on my list bookmarked for quite some time, I have experienced this type of ice cream at several places around the states.
Unfortunately after a journey downtown to finally try this, and after waiting in line for about 10 min was informed at 10:28pm that they would not be serving anyone else tonight and to please come back. There was one person in front of me and no one behind. The sad thing is, when I want food and it’s on my list I would have gladly paid more so they could stay an extra few minutes to make some of the dark orange I have been waiting to try.
Service is impeccably the make or break for any place that serves food. I can only go on this experience, I typically give a place two chances to get a redeemable and valid rating. However when this may or may not get updates cannot say. I try to judge fairly but take care of your customers currently wanting to pay, the ones in line handle, get a sign to put up after people are in line to notify anyone else that comes up.
It’s a sat night and I’m sure everyone wanted to get out and go do whatever but is it worth a 2 star review to save 15 min?

The ice cream was pretty delicious. We had the thai coffee (with cardamon and sweetened condensed milk) and a personalized one with coconut milk, almond butter, graham crackers, toffee and caramel, topped with hot fudge and more caramel. The thai coffee was good-​nothing special but the other one was way better, especially great w the toffee/​caramel/​graham crackers which gave it that nice crunchy texture. That being said, neither of these were worth dishing 12ish bucks for.
Service: it is slow. Dont expect a quick afternoon ice-​cream-​pick-​me-​up. there was a chick and a guy. The chick spoke very quietly, forgot parts of my order– didnt apologize, fixed her hair w her gloves and then touched the graham crackers, touched other food wiped her hands on her not clean looking apron and touched some more things, touched some cash and then made more ice cream. Glove changing or washing was not part of this routine. I dont know, but i wasnt too excited about that, it seemed a bit unsanitary.
I probably wont be back unless they speed things up and/​or pay more attention to their cleanliness.

Simply put, it’s not worth it. I will first share the combo I made which actually tasted quite good: organic coconut milk, sweet cream, toffee and chocolate, coconut flakes, and honey. If you’re going, trust me and try that combo. Well, if you STILL go after what I have to say…
So you go up, order your combo, and they get to work. They make a liquid base and add your toppings into it, then throw it on the freezing plate to begin turning it into ice cream. You have to work fast and keep the liquid/​ice mixture always in motion to avoid some parts being too frozen, causing them to stick to the plate and making it difficult to scrape off (that was meant for the girl that was working the night that my friends and I were there). The goal is to get the ice cream evenly frozen to a certain point, then scrape it up into rolls to place in the cup. The owner does it right, but the girl doesn’t…and it’s obvious. Also, don’t touch the ice cream with your glove that’s on your hand that’s used to hold the scraper. We don’t know where the scraper has been.
The wait is long as there are only 1 – 2 workers each time. I applaud the owner for bringing this style of making ice cream here as it’s the first time I’ve seen it in the states. Like I said, he actually makes the ice cream as it should, but of course is not as skilled as the vendors that do it in Thailand. As someone else mentioned, you’re paying for the experience here… just, don’t take this to be what Thai-​style ice cream really is. For starters, the rolls suck. Notice how there are 3 – 4 uneven rolls in all the cups in the pictures? In Thailand they can fit 5+ is a nice and neatly shaped bundle.
Proportions are seemingly off too, for the combos at least. My friend ordered the Thai… coffee I think? It was supposed to have cardamom in it but neither of us could taste any hint of it. Balance the portioning of the toppings in accordance to the strength of the base flavor please (coffee is strong, y’all should know that.)
Speaking of flavors, the ice cream itself isn’t anything special. It’s not extremely creamy nor is it very icey. It’s quite normal ice cream actually, and the rolls and look of your ice cream totally morphs within 5 minutes anyway as the ice cream melts and it becomes… well, normal ice cream…
So in terms of price, prepare to drop 6.50−7.50 here for a cup. No, it’s not as big as you think, and I personally would rather just help myself with a nice pint of Haagen Daz or even Blue Bell.
4/​10, would not come again… unless someone was paying for me… just kidding, I’d tell them to pay for me for some other dessert ice cream truck.

Holla Mode food truck is in a heavy foot traffic area with limited parking. The pageantry of hand chopped and rolled ice cream on cold plates draws in many observers. Prepare to wait if there’s a line, and there usually is– it takes about 3 – 5 minutes for each person in line, which considering how hard the employees are working, is understandable!
There’s only one size and price, $ 5.99, with or without choppings & toppings. They don’t offer a dairy option here, but the coconut milk has a unique lighter texture and pairs particularly well with certain flavors. I adored my ‘key lime pie’ prepared by chopping in a graham cracker and a heavy squeeze of lime juice, next time I’ll ask for extra lime since I love tart stuff. My ice cream was topped with crushed graham cracker and lime zest. Getting a true citrus flavor to shine through milk is a difficult task, a neat pro for coconut milk, I will most likely build all my future desserts here around lime for that reason. The coconut milk is well suited to tropical flavors. Be mindful that the fruits are crushed in fresh, especially if you like or dislike seeds. The chocolate was a dull choice, a pass if you love high quality chocolate. The green tea base is a matcha green tea, so it’s quite concentrated in flavor. If you’re missing milky flavor, try the sweet cream and whipped cream.
It’s a pretty neat concept, the fat rolls of frozen dessert are labor intensive, artful, and fun to eat. I personally wouldn’t wait in a super long line, but it’s one of my favorite coconut milk ice creams I’ve tried and great lactose free options are always appreciated!

The ice cream was delicious and is made with coconut milk so it wasn’t too heavy. I got the bhumi bowl (coconut, banana and Nutella) and it was very good.
There was about a 15 – 20 minute wait, but it was definitely worth it because you can stand up on these little stools and watch them make your ice cream which is a really cool process.

Coconut milk ice cream?! YESSS!!!
What a neat concept to have brought this in from Thailand. Parking is terrible around this area so good luck finding spots. There is an area near the front of this trailer that can fit 2 cars.
The recommendations was the Bhumai and Thai sticky mango rice. My sister and I shared the Thai sticky mango rice. I wish the server gave us more mango pieces. It takes some time for the concoction to get into your hands but it’s big enough to share with two people unless you want one of your own. I bet the servers forearms get worked out like crazy scraping that ice cream.
We really enjoyed the sticky mango rice dessert and look forward to trying out their other flavors!

3.5÷5
I think Holla Mode definitely lives up to its hype. I’d say you’re mostly paying for the experience though since one order is quite pricey at $ 6.48 (thanks Zach for giving me the exact price!). I think it’s a bit strange how the make your own and their specialty flavors are the exact same price though.
It was pretty cool to see them make it right in front of you. However, the process to make one takes a decent amount of time, so there was a really long wait even though there was only 5 people in front of me. I got the customized one with coffee, raspberries, almonds, whipped cream, and chocolate sauce. The girl put a bunch of almonds in there which was really awesome, each bite was filled with them! I was also able to taste the raspberries over the coffee flavor too.
I tried some of my friends green tea flavored one and that was pretty good too.
What I really liked about Holla Mode is that even though it’s ice cream, it was very light. I think the portion is really big, but it’s good that they give that much considering how much it costs. I would definitely come back again!

The subtraction of a star is due to my sympathy for the employee who had to make 10 ice creams in the short span I waited in line. Everything was made from scratch by with elbow grease. Starting with coconut milk, she topped it with whatever you wanted, blended it, and then threw it all onto a cold bowl set to –15 degrees C or F (regardless of the scale, that’s cold). Then she molds, forms, reforms, and carefully rolls up the frozen masterpiece into magic.
The magic she makes is light on the processed sugars, didn’t upset my wife’s lactose intolerant stomach and didn’t make me hate myself.
Cons would be the long wait since everything is hand made. Also, it is a bit pricey for ice cream but this stuff is unique and healthy so that balances out.

Went here with 2 friends on a Monday night and we waited in line for about 60 – 75 minutes before we ordered. The line had about 15 people in front of us but the ice cream is made fresh for you after you order. It’s definitely worth the wait, but it’s not something we were expecting so make sure you have some time to spend in line. A cup was about $ 6, which I believe is a flat rate regardless of what toppings you get. It’s a little higher than most ice cream places but the process to make the ice cream seems pretty labor intensive.
The workers there were both very friendly and they made conversation with us as we were waiting for our ice cream to be made. The experience of watching the ice cream be made was worth the trip alone! I ordered the s’mores flavor off the menu but you can customize your order as well and they have a long list of options. The ice cream itself isn’t heavy or too rich, but there was more to eat than I had originally realized.
Overall, it’s a fun experience and good ice cream as long as you don’t mind the wait and slightly higher price point.

You basically pay for the experience here. Unless you have a sweet tooth, its one of those places where you go once just to experience it and most likely wouldn’t come back. I prefer a richer/​creamier ice cream. Thai style seems to be a bit more watered down, and if thats your preference maybe this place is for you!
My friend and I shared the Thai coffee ice cream and customized a green tea ice cream. The Thai coffee was really strong and maybe because of that, I didn’t enjoy it as much. Even though ingredients are for the most part natural, it still tasted pretty artificial to me. We customized our green tea ice cream with strawberries and blueberries and added condensed milk and pocky sticks as our topping. The green tea one had a strong matcha flavor but the added in fruits made it taste so fresh.
Wait is going to be long, but thats because it takes a lot of time to make these Thai style ice cream. There were two ladies working and it would’ve been nice if they were a bit more friendly. Polite, yes, but it wouldn’t hurt to smile or say thanks every once in a while! :)

Suns out, guns out, me and the fam took a trip down to barton springs to try Holla Mode. There was a long wait, the time it takes to make one cup is about 7 – 10 minutes. Ice cream is made to order, I got a coffee base with banana and coconut. I finished it without worrying about the consequences since it’s lactose free. The texture isn’t smooth and creamy but that didn’t matter, we all enjoyed our ice cream.
I didn’t have an issue with the pricing given some of the ingredients are organic and how timing consuming /​laborious the process is. I got lucky with parking, there’s two spots right in front, my friend parked in the lot for the other neighboring food trailers, not sure if that’s okay. Staff was friendly, overall a great experience.

Am I in love? No. Is it a cool place to go? Yes.
My friend sent me the link to this place last night and because there’s an option for no cow milk (yay for coconut milk) she knew I would be interested. We stopped by the truck today after a trip visiting cats at Austin Pets Alive!
Sheesh, this ice cream is labor intensive. I honestly felt bad for the workers behind the counter, even though they never complained and were smiling and talking to customers — I hurt for them. All the toppings have to be crushed up to be blended in the ice cream or the fruit has to be cut up by the order. Yes it’s fresh but nothing wrong with pre-​cut or pre-​smashed toppings. Because it’s labor intensive, it’s not a fast process. I have no idea how long my friend and I were there before we got our ice cream, I was too busy being amazed watching them make it.
Complaint time:
Even if I wanted JUST green tea ice cream, no toppings, no crushings, no nothing — it COST THE SAME as getting green tea ice cream +2 toppings +2 crush-​ins. What sense does that make? $ 5.99 for plain ice cream and $ 5.99 for ice cream with tons of stuff on top. I would be willing to give this place 5 stars if they would offer a lower price to represent the amount of «stuff» in the ice cream. I ended up adding fruit to my green tea ice cream (no complaints) because it would have been the same price with or without toppings. that’s just strange to me.
Cool experience and yum interesting ice cream. Plenty to chose from!

This is my favorite ice cream in Austin! Made with coconut milk which scared me at first, but it is so creamy, light and refreshing. They custom make each order so you can choose whatever your little heart desires to put in your ice cream and they chop it all up, smooth it out, and roll it up to make this delicious concoction! It’s so cool!
Holla Mode is a very fun experience, great presentation, fun music, plenty of seating to sit out on their patio and heaters if it’s chilly outside, or keep on walking and eat in the park! Once you try it you’ll be hooked!

This ice cream is more about the experience. As such, the price and waiting time is commensurate with that of an experience. This is not the place for a cheap or quick frozen dessert.
The either milk– or coconut-​based liquid ice cream base is scooped onto an anti-​griddle type contraption and then molded and shaped for you in an almost performance-​art-​type of show. Each serving of ice cream takes quite a few minutes (and some serious muscle) to make, so be prepare to wait, particularly if are people in line. Fortunately, it seems like the workers are very friendly and extroverted, and they clearly put a lot of care into their craft. A single serving of ice cream can easily creep up to $ 10 with tip depending on level of customization.
I tried the Thai coffee ice cream, and it was actually quite refreshing and light although still quite flavorful and with Instagram-​worthy presentation.