Behind the Scenes with King of Pops
Earlier this summer, I chatted with the team behind King of Pops here in Richmond and we kicked around some ideas for a pop flavor with a vegetable twist. They’d been pondering a berry + rhubarb combination, and the wheels started turning!
Last week I had a chance to go behind the scenes and see how these new pop flavors get made! As you can imagine, there was quite a bit of taste testing along the way. No complaints here!
First off, if you’re not in Richmond, you can also find King of Pops up in Nashville, Atlanta, Athens, Savannah, Charleston, Greenville, & Charlotte. (So if you’re taking a trip around the east coast, you might spot one of their rainbow umbrellas!) I’ve been a fan of their chocolate sea salt pops for years, but King of Pops does more than just dream up delicious flavors of desserts. They’re spreading happiness across their local communities. Part of that is working with local farms to source ingredients but the other part is just getting involved in their cities. King of Pops here in Richmond hosts a free weekly yoga class in the park. How cool is that?! Their self-proclaimed purpose is “to create Unexpected Moments of Happiness.” Now that’s a mission I can get behind!
Most of their pops are made with just a few simple ingredients. This particular batch was blackberries (from Agriberry Farms, a local farm not far from Richmond!) rhubarb, sugar, lime, and salt. Simple, but such a delicious combination!
When I arrived at the shop, they’d prepped the rhubarb by cooking it down with a little sugar and lemon juice. A quick spin with the largest immersion blender I’ve ever seen whipped the rhubarb into velvety perfection. We then blended up the blackberries with a little sugar, and started the process of adding rhubarb, tasting, and repeating.
To bring out a little more of the fruity flavors, we added a few pinches of salt and a little lime juice to make the flavors pop.
Tasting after tasting until we discovered the perfect flavor balance!
Once we settled on the final combination, we poured the liquid into frozen molds, added in the sticks, and within about 30 minutes, the first batch was ready to go!
The flavor combination of the blackberry and rhubarb was awesome and you can’t beat that gorgeous color! I even got to help slip this first batch into the bags!
If you’re around Richmond, keep an eye out for this flavor! And if you’re at King of Pop’s yoga on Tuesday evening, come find me! I’ll be there on my purple yoga mat!
If you don’t have a King of Pops nearby but you’re craving some frozen treats, you can try this simple frozen pop hack or this 2 ingredient mango fro-yo. But if you have a King of Pops near by, you should swing by and try out their newest flavors!
What an amazing flavour. It must have been such fun to be a part of the tasting!
Berry rhubarb! What a great flavor combo. I always make strawberry rhubarb jam and pineapple rhubarb jam each summer. I bet those would both be excellent popsicle flavors, too! 🙂
Oh my word! How fun! I totally only thought King of Pops was in Atlanta/Athens! Also, this flavor looks and sounds amazing.
Blackberry rhubarb sounds amazing! My brother’s family lives not too far from Richmond. Will need to let them know about this!
That sounds like so much fun. I will try to take the kids there soon. They love frozen treats.
They look so pretty and yummy! Thanks for sharing:)
irinathayer.com
I love king of pops and so jealous you go to do this!!
xo
@reeses_hardwear
I’ve never heard of King of Pops. I love the way they make their pops…so fresh! I love tropical flavors, so I think I’d like mangosteen if it were available.
How fun! Popsicles are the definition of summer!
Real ingredients are always great – simple is better