Araku filter coffee ice cream: from the hills near Vizag to your freezer

In South India, filter coffee isn't a drink. It's a ritual. Steel tumbler, steel davara, a long pour from a height to build the froth. We wanted to capture that in a popsicle, and there was only one coffee we wanted to use.

The Araku Valley

The Araku Valley sits high in the Eastern Ghats of Andhra Pradesh, a few hours' drive inland from Visakhapatnam. The hills are cool, misty and green, and coffee has been grown there for generations, much of it by tribal farming communities working small plots under shade trees. Araku coffee has earned recognition well beyond India, and it has a Geographical Indication tag that protects its name.

Why coffee works as a popsicle

Cold coffee is a summer favourite for a reason. Freezing it with milk softens its bitterness and brings out the roasted, caramel notes. Think of our pop as a frozen filter coffee: milky, smooth and just sweet enough.

Steel tumbler in the morning. Araku pop in the afternoon.

How we make it

Our Araku Filter Coffee pop is brewed the South Indian way, then blended with milk. No coffee flavouring, no syrup. It's one of our specials, and one of the flavours people are most surprised by.

A local story, especially in Vizag

With House of Pops now in Visakhapatnam, the Araku pop has come almost full circle. The coffee comes from the hills just outside the city and ends up back in town, on a stick.

A note on caffeine: it's real coffee, so it contains caffeine. We'd suggest it for grown-ups rather than little ones.

Coffee ice cream, the South Indian way

If you've ever searched for coffee ice cream in Hyderabad or Vizag, you'll know most of it tastes like instant coffee and sugar. Our pop is built on filter coffee instead: brewed strong, mixed with milk the way it's served in a steel tumbler, then frozen. The result tastes less like dessert and more like your favourite coffee, just cold enough to hold on a stick.

Why the origin matters

Coffee, like fruit, tastes of where it's grown. Beans from the cool, misty Araku hills tend to be smooth and gently sweet, with less harshness than many commercial blends. That smoothness matters in a frozen dessert, where bitterness becomes more noticeable as it melts. It's the reason we didn't want just any coffee.

When to have one

Our customers tend to split into two camps: those who have an Araku pop as an afternoon pick-me-up, and those who save it for after dinner. Both are correct. It's also a surprisingly popular choice at office parties, where it disappears faster than the tea.

More flavour stories: Alphonso Mango, Sitaphal and Kala Jamun.