Dorp Creamery, the custard-based ice cream brand that built a following slinging flavors like Vietnamese coffee and Thai sticky mango rice out of a food truck, is opening its first permanent shop at 1515 N. St. Mary's St. in San Antonio. The brand is targeting a December or January opening, and the storefront sits directly across from the future site of Jones Ave., the massive mixed-use development McCombs Enterprises is building on the block.
The shop's arrival marks a big shift for founder Mike Chue, a New York transplant who launched Dorp Creamery in 2024 after noticing what he saw as a lack of Asian-inspired ice cream in San Antonio, according to CultureMap San Antonio. Before starting the creamery, Chue had worked in real estate after moving to San Antonio, and he named the business after New Dorp, the Staten Island neighborhood where he grew up, as reported by MySA. The neighborhood's own name traces back centuries, derived from “Nieuw Dorp,” Dutch for “New Village,” established on Staten Island's East Shore in 1671 under the New Netherland colony, per CityNeighborhoods.NYC.
From a Shipping-Container Food Truck to a Full Storefront
Dorp Creamery has spent time operating a food truck in front of the Museum Reach building starting in 2025, and the brand currently serves its rotating flavors at SA Yacht Club, the report notes. That venue at 310 W. Grayson St. is a 6,200-square-foot micro-retail park built from four double-stacked salvaged shipping containers arranged around a central courtyard, according to Beaty Palmer Architects, which designed the space; the project, completed in 2023, won a small-scale award from AIA San Antonio in 2024. It's unclear whether Dorp will keep operating out of the food truck once its storefront opens.
The new shop's custard base is aged 12 hours before churning, and the lineup includes flavors like chocolate made with Japanese hojicha tea alongside the Vietnamese coffee and Thai sticky mango rice options. The brand also offers ice cream flights that let customers sample multiple rotating flavors in one sitting, plus non-dairy options such as coconut yuzu matcha cake, according to CultureMap San Antonio. Those flights are designed to showcase a range of East Asian flavor profiles, including ube and hojicha.
Wholesale Roots at Pearl and Beyond
Before committing to a storefront, Dorp built its brand through wholesale partnerships across San Antonio's food scene. The creamery currently supplies pints to Pearl's Pullman Market, the 40,000-square-foot specialty grocer and food hall that Emmer & Rye Hospitality Group opened in April 2024 inside the historic Samuels Glass building, considered the largest culinary market in the American Southwest. Dorp also supplies custom ice cream sandwiches, including black sesame and strawberry lychee varieties, to Best Quality Daughter, the acclaimed Asian-American restaurant at 602 Avenue A in Pearl founded by chef Jennifer Hwa Dobbertin inside the historic Mueller House, per MySA.
Dobbertin, a James Beard-nominated chef, announced plans in January 2025 for Jue Let, a new bar-restaurant named after the historical Chinese chef credited with inspiring James Beard, MySA reported at the time. Dorp has previously hosted one-night pop-up collaborations at Jue Let, placing the creamery within a broader surge of Asian and Asian-American food concepts expanding across the city.
A Storefront Still Looking for a Roommate
Dorp Creamery is still looking for another tenant to help fill out its large shop space, though no co-tenant has been identified yet. The brand's growing popularity was underscored this year when San Antonio Current named Dorp Creamery a runner-up for Best Ice Cream in its 2026 Best of San Antonio reader poll, finishing just behind long-running local brand Lick Honest Ice Creams, which originally opened in Austin in 2011 before expanding to San Antonio's Pearl.
The new shop's location puts it squarely in the path of major redevelopment. Directly across the street, McCombs Enterprises began demolition this month on a 6-acre site to build Jones Ave., a planned eight-building, 1-million-square-foot mixed-use complex, according to CultureMap San Antonio. The developer acquired the land from utility provider CPS Energy in 2023 for $29.5 million. The block also sits along the Museum Reach extension of the San Antonio River Walk, which opened in 2010 and transformed the corridor between River North and Pearl into a walkable pathway anchored by the San Antonio Museum of Art, catalyzing years of surrounding apartment and commercial construction, per the San Antonio Report.
