Hokey Pokey Ice Cream Is A Tasty Treat That You Can Try When You Visit New Zealand

New Zealanders are known for their love of ice cream. Deemed one of the top consumers of ice cream in the world, it's estimated each person living in the country eats around six gallons of ice cream every year (via RNZ). While they might not be the country that invented ice cream, they definitely know how to make it taste delicious. Case in point: hokey pokey ice cream. This super tasty frozen dessert has nothing to do with the 1950s dance craze most Americans think of when they hear "hokey pokey." In fact, in New Zealand, hokey pokey is a popular (if not the most popular) ice cream flavor, consisting of vanilla ice cream with a particular kind of toffee mixed throughout. Popular makers of hokey pokey ice cream sold in New Zealand stores include Tip Top and Much Moore, both of which have won awards for their frozen treats.

To understand hokey pokey ice cream, you have to understand what hokey pokey candy is. Hokey pokey is actually a regional name in New Zealand for honeycomb candy, a type of toffee with a sponge-like texture. It's relatively simple to make with just three ingredients — golden syrup, sugar, and baking soda which creates air pockets that give it a honeycomb appearance. In Australia, it's more often referred to as honeycomb, while in the United States, you might hear it called seafoam candy, sponge candy, or in the Midwest (Wisconsin, specifically), fairy food.

The phrase hokey pokey once referred to "hokey-pokey men" or street vendors who sold ice cream in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some say the name is derived from "hocus pocus," possibly a reference to the mystery surrounding the ingredients of the frozen treats sold by the street vendors. According to Old Line Plate, a London tourist in 1879 recounted a hokey pokey vendor "taking from an ice cream freezer a little square of something that looked like a slice of white castile soap." Additionally, in 1889, the Hampshire Telegraph in England wrote that "it is difficult to say, nowadays, what is 'hokey-pokey' and what it is not."   

In the late 19th century, for an undetermined reason, New Zealanders started referring to honeycomb candy as hokey pokey. As far as the origin of hokey pokey ice cream, it's believed to have been invented in 1953 by Brian Simon while employed at his father's ice cream business (via Momentum Life). According to the legend, Simon sprinkled some bits of a Crunchie candy bar on his vanilla ice cream and hence, hokey pokey ice cream was born. Crunchie is a brand of candy bar consisting of honeycomb toffee dipped in chocolate. It's mainly sold in the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa. Unfortunately, it's not widely available in the United States, but if you have an ice cream maker, why not make your own hokey pokey ice cream with homemade ice cream and homemade hokey pokey?