Garside’s Ice Cream

Great location and the chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches are a plus. Plenty of parking but the menu is limited — they have the basics and nothing too exciting or featured favors of the week or month as other places may have. When visiting for Labor Day weekend the menu was very limited as they were out of multiple ice cream flavors — when asking for two scoops I received one it seems like they were rationing ice cream to last the remainder of the season. I heard the same from other groups when visiting.

Another place my aunt insisted I go to while on vacation. Huge scoop, reasonably priced, good flavor– and still super busy at 9pm. We all had coffee ice cream, sat down and people watched and enjoyed!

What’s going on Garside’s? Not as good as it used to be. A little icy. And like the reviewer below, I was also given the wrong flavor. I ordered a pint of fluffernutter (SO excited when they told me they had this special flavor – my favorite), but when I got home it was heavenly hash in the container. :(Will be back to try again later this summer. Hope things are back to normal.

Great place. Good folks. Nice trees
Had chocolate chip. Smooth, creamy delightful taste, like cookies at your grandmothers house.

Went to Garside’s for my favorite ice cream Swiss chocolate almond it was my birthday and have been waiting for this treat for a long time. When the girl brought my ice cream to me it was cream color and had no almonds in it I told her that’s not what I ordered it was not chocolate she told me if I wanted something else I could so I asked for heavenly hash. It’s supposed to be chocolate, no this was the same as the Swiss chocolate almond cream color no chocolate at all asked the girl about it she said it was heavenly hash. I am no fool I know what chocolate looks like. Sorry I will not go back. Long time customer no more!’

This is really good ice cream and it’s priced accordingly. One small cone and one small cup was close to $ 8. It was worth it, but not too frequently.

We come to Saco once a year from Texas where we know great ice cream. This place is super authentic and charming, nothing fussy or pretentious. The flavors that they make on site are great, especially the Butter Crunch. What a great variety. Something for everyone! We come with our entire family and love it! We don’t even get to the picnic tables before the treats are all gone! A MUST family tradition for us and a great simpler, back-​in-​time experience that everyone should get the chance to enjoy.

Their homemade ice cream is really high-​quality and very good. The service is good, typical teenager/​college student servers. Their Mint Chocolate Chip is amazing. We stay overnight on our boat sometimes at a marina down the road, and this place is so handy to go to. I love it

Generally we love to go to Garside’s. The ice cream is usually pretty good. This year, though, we haven’t been blown away. Service has been. .. well, it’s typical teenager service. They’re all probably really nice, but working in an ice cream stand is probably kind of dull, and you can tell they’re kind of bored.
Also, they say they’re open until 10 but were closing up early at about 9 the other night. We didn’t realize they were trying to close until after we put in our orders. Naturally we felt kind of bad — but at the same time, it was an hour earlier than their advertised hours. When I asked for an ice cream soda, the girl working the window seemed hassled because she wasn’t sure if they had enough soda for it. They did — I guess? — but the soda was flat and flavorless. Not so yummy. And then another time we both ordered M&M ice cream, which was actually peanut butter M&Ms, which the kid asked if was okay — but… it was… disappointing.
Anyway — Garside’s is generally really good, but the last couple visits have been a bit disappointing.

Best Ice Cream Anywhere!!!
Every summer I come for the ice cream! The Black Raspberry is amazing, even better with chocolate «jimmies»!! Worth traveling cross country for.

Our family favorite for 24 years now. Great home-​made ice cream!
I absolutely LOVE their Black Raspberry.
We return every time we are in the Saco area. This is not corporate ice cream served up in bulk.

Awesome homemade ice cream. I love the orange and lemon sherbet.

Garside’s Ice Cream is one of those places you have to visit in Southern Maine while enjoying the nice summer weather. Garside’s Ice Cream stand (seasonal) is located off the beaten path and has been serving great homemade ice cream for over 50 years bringing in the crowds of loyal customers. This is my favorite stop for ice cream after spending time at OOB, heading back to Route 1.
Garside’s usually have about 35 or more flavors of ice cream on hand and are always coming up with new flavors each season based on customer input. My favorite flavors are Ginger, Mocha Chip, Swiss Chocolate Almond, Pistachio, and Almond Joy (they ran out last visit). They also make sundaes. banana splits, frappes, floats, ice cream sodas, and freezes.
The ice cream is made with very high quality ingredients and has a very creamy and soft texture and the flavors are good and not too heavy. During hot weather, enjoy it fast because the ice cream begins to melt and drip quickly. The price for ice cream starts out at around $ 3 for a small one scoop cone/​dish. Pints, quarts, and half gallons of hand packed ice cream is available. Garside’s has very similar ice cream (texture & flavor) to another ice cream stand in Upstate NY called Moxie’s (
).
There’s no table seating, but there are wooden benches on the grass along each side of the unmarked paved parking lot (parking can get dicey when busy).
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