Company founded in the 1970s.
Barts & Snows Ice Cream in Greenfield makes premium ice cream. Co Owners Gary Schaefer and Barbara Fingold with some of the Bart's Homemade pints . There is store brand ice cream, premium ice cream, and then there is our area-made Bart's.
Considered a super premium ice cream Bart's Homemade Ice Cream, is made in Greenfield.
It produces more than 30 flavors of ice cream as well as eight sorbets and frozen yogurt options.
Hobart D. Smith opened Bart's in downtown Northampton in 1976. The made-from- scratch ice cream became popular in New England. Barbara Fingold and Gary Schaefer, two social workers, purchased the company in 1978.
"We both wanted to try something different and after a friend told us it was for sale we figured we would give it a try and maybe do it for two or three years,"Schafer said.
The husband-an- wife team enjoy using area ingredients and developing new flavors at their factory on School Street.
"I love coming up with new flavors. I'm constantly thinking about combinations that could work. Sometimes they do, sometimes it's a disaster, but we just keep trying," Fingold said.
Indeed, Bart's Blueberry Lavender has a hint of the flower in every bite.
A fan favorite is Bart's vanilla ice cream made with Madagascar vanilla and a blend of egg custard.
White chocolate is rarely found in ice cream because it's expensive and a tough consistency to work with, it can be found in Bart's popular Deep Purple Cow, which combines black raspberry ice cream with chunks of white and dark chocolate.
Years ago the couple chose to sell the scoop shops in Northampton and Amherst. They now focuses on making and selling Bart's and their premium Snow's Ice Cream, which is less expensive.
Snow's has 12 percent butter fat and a normal amount of inclusions or mix-ins. While Bart's has 16 percent butter fat and high volume of mix-ins.
"With Snow's we have 10 gallons of ice cream mix and we will add 8 pounds of cookies, together that will yield about 21 gallons of finished ice cream, Schafer said
"With Bart's we use 10 gallons of mix and add 12 pounds of cookies and end up with 12 to 13 gallons of finished ice cream."
"I always say the most expensive ingredient in Bart's ice cream is free, it's the air we don't put into it," he said.
While some popular super premium brands might sell you a 16 oz. container you might only be getting 10-12 ounces of products, with Bart's you're getting a full pint, Fingold said.
The company uses real chocolate chunks.
"A lot of ice cream, if you read the ingredients, will say vanilla flavored or chocolate flavored chips. We use pure chocolate in both Snow's and Bart's," Fingold said.
The couple works withl farmers across Western Massachusetts to get fresh strawberries, peaches and blueberries, including Warner Farm in Sunderland, Long Plain Farm in Whately and Deerfield Farm.
They use Apex Orchard in Shelburne and Clarkdale Orchard in Deerfield for peaches as well as Wheel-View Farm in Shelburne.
For blueberries they use Burnt Hill Farm and The Benson Place in Heath and for maple syrup the Ryan Brothers in Colrain.
"It's important to us to support local growers and offer our customers the freshest, best ingredients possible," Fingold said.
The ice cream can be purchased at area Whole Foods in Hadley and in the Hartford as well as the Big Y in Wilbraham and Fresh Acres in Springfield. Fenway Golf in East Longmeadow now sells Bart's or you can visit the Bart's Cafe in Amherst.