Food as a Love Language
I always say, food is my love language. Any day someone cooks for me, it's the best day!
Royal Oak has always had so many great food spots. From the legendary long-time staples of Lily's Seafood, Royal Oak Brewery, and Tom's Oyster Bar (the original and last remaining) to the new hot spots like JINYA Ramen bar, Mesa Tacos and Tequila, Blind Owl and its live music, Fourth Street Restaurant, Bar Louie and Blue Goat—somewhere on the long list of street-food spots and sit-down-and-enjoythe-experience spots there’s something that’ll make everyone’s mouth water.
Food brings us together: our families, our friends and our communities. It's a reason to catch up, celebrate and be present. Much like music is a language, food is a language - a language of love. I don't think there is a better way to show love and bring connection more than simply sitting together to break bread and toast a glass. Nothing surpasses the goodness and joy food provides.
Finding gratitude and humility through food was a common theme in the people I have the great pleasure of showcasing in this issue. Amber Poupore of the Cacao Tree Cafe is one of the most humble and giving people I have ever met, and that love translates not only from her food, it radiates out of her to her employees, and to what she brings and puts into the community. Oh—and her food heals.
Amado Lopez of Casa Amado in Berkley has all the high-level training and education of the top chefs in the world, but without ego. He is one of the most downto-earth people you will meet…and you can taste it in his food. Read about his unplated excellence. Take a walk through the flavors and pairings of Executive Chef Jakobi Voorheis, the quiet and reserved chef of The Fed in Clarkston. I don't think you will meet a more genuine guy —and once again, you'll taste it in his food. Jing Dipiero of Plants by People shows us the result of her lifetime passion and herbal wisdom with her all-natural hydration drinks. Like her flavor aptly named Shine, Jing shines inside and out. And what's a meal without dessert? Lindsey and Jason Eddleston of Ray's Ice Cream share their approach to keeping the Ray’s legacy alive.
Cheers,
AMY GILLESPIE,
October 2025
PUBLISHER
Amy Gillespie | amy.gillespie@citylifestyle.com
MANAGING EDITOR
Marshall Zweig | marshall.zweig@citylifestyle.com
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Marshall Zweig
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
Amy Gillespie
Corporate Team
CEO Steven Schowengerdt
COO Matthew Perry
CRO Jamie Pentz
VP OF OPERATIONS Janeane Thompson
VP OF SALES Andrew Leaders
AD DESIGNER Rachel Kolich
LAYOUT DESIGNER Kirstan Lanier
QUALITY
Hannah Leimkuhler Proverbs
inside the issue
The Café That Heals
Amber
Michelin Elegance, Unplated
James Beard Award semifinalist chef Amado Lopez cooks for the people, not the elite
Flavors Without Borders
The Fed’s Jakobi Voorheis offers adventurous drinks to complement his globally inspired cuisine
Jing DiPiero
Cacao Tree Café is as nourishing as it is vibrant.
Amy Gillespie
business monthly
brownieDr has your brownie needs covered
Craving brownies or delicious treats? brownieDr offers handcrafted, gourmet brownies & blondies made with the finest ingredients. You can order from the Berkley, Michigan store for pickup or delivered to you, and you can get our brownie bars shipped anywhere in the U.S. If you’re planning an event, we cater. Make sure your upcoming holiday plans include some brownies from the brownieDr. For more information visit: browniedr.com or call 313-356-6330 today!
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Ray's Ice Cream Holiday Ice Cream Molds
Ray's Ice Cream has Ice Cream molds for every occasion! We are one of the last businesses to make traditional molded ice cream, made of 100% ice cream and edible food coloring! Please give us a minimum of 3 days to complete your order as we make every order by hand. Please call us at (248) 549-5256 to place your order! raysicecream.com
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Centennial Celebration: Harvest Festival and Food Truck Rally
The Royal Oak Farmers Market is 100! Come and celebrate with us. Enjoy an evening of food, music, and community as we honor a century of fresh produce, local vendors, and market history. Don’t miss this milestone event! October 8, 2025, 4:00 PM - 8:00 PM, 316 E 11 Mile Road, Royal Oak, MI 48067.
We have such amazing, innovative business leaders in our community who are proud to serve you, our residents, with class and quality. We’ve compiled some of our top company picks for the services that might be on your mind this month in an effort to make your lives a little easier.
Want to suggest a monthly pick?
Restaurant
Blue Goat bluegoatroyaloak.com | 313.744.9330
North End Taproom northendtaproom.com | 248.221.1925
JINYA Ramen Bar jinyaramenbar.com/locations/royal-oak | 248.955.4692
brownieDr® browniedr.com | 313.356.6330
Ray's Ice Cream raysicecream.com | 888.549.5256 Spirits
Black Rose Spirits blkrosespirits.com | 313.918.0879
Motor City Gas Whiskey motorcitygas.com | 248.599.1427
Detroit City Distillery detroitcitydistillery.com | 313.338.3760
Weiss Distilling Company thewdc.com | 929.484.3932
Traverse City Whiskey Co. tcwhiskey.com | 248.602.2122
Behind each of our 200+ City Lifestyle magazines is someone who cares deeply about their community. Someone who connects people, celebrates businesses, and shares the stories that matter most. What if that someone was you?
Or maybe it’s someone you know. If this isn’t the right time for you, but you know someone who could be the perfect fit, we’d love an introduction. Set your schedule. Make an impact. Build a life you’re proud of.
ARTICLE BY MARSHALL ZWEIG
BY
AMY GILLESPIE
AMBER POUPORE BUILT CACAO TREE CAFÉ ON THE BELIEF THAT FOOD CAN HEAL
THE CAFÉ THAT HEALS
PHOTOGRAPHY
“I
Sick and sluggish from a diet of fast food and boxed meals, 18-year-old Amber Poupore was challenged by a friend to look at what she was actually putting into her body. “She pulled a box of Rice-A-Roni out of my cabinet,” Amber recalls, laughing. “And she said, ‘Amber,
“Given where we live in Michigan, I don’t recommend a 100 percent raw diet,” she admits. “When you take out all the grounding foods—roots, grains, legumes—it’s easy to lose that balance. Cooked sweet potatoes, quinoa, roasted beets—those are medicine, too.”
CARE TOO MUCH ABOUT GIVING PEOPLE REAL FOOD TO WALK AWAY.”
read these ingredients. You can’t even pronounce half of them. This isn’t food.’ That was the start of everything. Once you know, you can’t un-know.”
That wake-up call lit a fire that’s never gone out. Amber’s 'why' has always been clear: food should be real, alive, and healing. Eating real food healed Amber, lifting her depression, transforming her health, and giving her a sense of purpose. And it became the foundation of her work as founder of Cacao Tree Café, Royal Oak’s beloved whole-food, plant-based oasis, now celebrating its fifteenth anniversary.
When Amber first opened Cacao Tree in a former smoothie bar, the tiny kitchen left little room for cooking. So she started with what the space could handle best—smoothies, juices, and raw treats—while experimenting with ways to add savory dishes that would satisfy her growing community.
Amber understands both raw food’s promise and also its pitfalls.
That balance wasn’t always her mantra. After immersing herself in the raw movement in the early 2000s—training at Gabriel Cousens’ Tree of Life Center, discovering raw cacao before it was even on the market, exploring raw fine dining in Chicago—Amber was hooked. But working at Royal Oak’s late, lamented vegan/vegetarian Inn Season Café, she also saw needs that weren’t being filled: soy-free or gluten-free options. Juices and smoothies. Raw vegan desserts.
“It wasn’t safe opening a raw, plantbased café,” Amber admits. “It might as well be a nonprofit. But I care too much about my community, about giving people real food, to walk away.”
Cacao Tree offered green juices before they were trendy. I’ve watched their almond milk being made by hand in front of me. And their menu has evolved alongside Amber’s journey, expanding to soups, bowls, and cooked dishes that bring in warmth and
comfort. “2011 Amber would have had a stroke if you told her we’d serve corn chips or vegan mayo one day,” she says, laughing. “But we adapted. It’s about sustainability, sourcing, balance. Sometimes maple syrup from Michigan makes more sense than coconut nectar flown halfway across the world.”
Her journey hasn’t been without heartbreak. Losing her second restaurant, The Clean Plate, in 2018—and with it, her dream of multiplying its model across Detroit—was, in her words, “one of the most traumatizing experiences of my life.” But she’s continued to push forward: catering, teaching, working with the Navajo Nation on food and health, even cooking for hundreds aboard vegan cruises. Today, she’s preparing to open a new venture, Herban Grounds, in St. Clair Shores.
What keeps her going? The stories. The moments when food truly changes lives. Like the woman who approached her years after a single class and said, “That night shifted everything. I walked out and changed what I put in my body, and it healed me.”
“WE
LIVE IN A HARSH WORLD—WE NEED TO BE KINDER TO OURSELVES.”
Amber smiles when she tells that story. “Those are the things that keep me going. It’s never been about the financial success; it’s about the impact. If I died tomorrow, I’d know I’ve lived a fulfilling life.”
And if you walk into Cacao Tree for the first time, what’s her advice? Don’t get trapped in labels. Just eat real food. “Sometimes that means the vegan burrito,” she says. “Sometimes that means your grandma’s apple bread. It’s about nourishment, connection, and forgiveness. We live in a harsh world—we need to be kinder to ourselves.”
That’s Amber’s why. And it’s why Cacao Tree Café, against the odds, has endured: it’s a reminder that food, real food, has the power to change everything.
Cacao Tree Café (cacaotreecafe.com ) is at 204 West Fourth Street in Royal Oak.
ARTICLE BY MARSHALL ZWEIG PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMY GILLESPIE
James Beard Award semifinalist chef Amado Lopez cooks for the people, not the elite
Michelin Elegance,
Unplated
When I interviewed James Beard semifinalist Amado Lopez for this article, I was intrigued by, and supportive of, his concept: to offer haute cuisine at an affordable price. My wife Heather and I are both obsessed with The Bear, so I took her to Amado’s Berkley taqueria, Casa Amado, for our anniversary dinner.
I called ahead: did they take reservations? No, I was told; just come on in.
As we approached the attractive façade, I had a mental picture of a quaint, chic, L.A.-style bistro. But inside, all I saw at first was a small ordering area. It felt
less like a celebratory dinner and more like…takeout. I worried about how the night would go.
Upstairs, we found the dining space: open seating, no waiters, just food runners bringing trays straight from the kitchen. While we pondered the menu, I reflected back on my conversation with Amado. What struck me most wasn’t his resume: Michelin kitchens, Charlie Trotter, Culinary Institute of America. It was his reason for leaving it all behind.
“I didn’t want to cook for the two percent,” he told me. “I wanted someone to walk in with $25 and walk out full and happy.”
Still, given the relatively humble setting, and unsure of options for me (keto diet) and Heather (vegan), we started to discuss just getting an appetizer and heading out.
But just then, Emilia Juocys, Casa Amado’s co-owner and general manager, walked over and said, “Are you Marshall?”
And that was that. We stayed.
And thank goodness we did.
Amado grew up in rural Zacatecas, on a small family farm: no fridge, no gas stove, just wood fire and generations of tradition. “It was the kind of place,” he shared, “where if someone’s car disappeared, you knew who had it by the time it reached the end of the street.”
His grandmother Sara woke every morning before dawn to boil corn over coals, carry the nixtamal to the local mill balanced on her head, and return home to hand-press tortillas on a flat comal.
The first time Amado tasted fresh cilantro, as a toddler, he said it was like “colors exploded in my brain.” That moment, he said, changed his life. It still informs how he cooks.
“Buy the best ingredients you can afford,” he shared, “and cook everything from scratch. That’s my recipe.”
“I DIDN’T WANT TO
COOK FOR THE TWO PERCENT. I WANTED SOMEONE TO WALK IN WITH $25 AND WALK OUT FULL AND HAPPY…BUY THE BEST INGREDIENTS, AND COOK EVERYTHING FROM SCRATCH.
THAT’S MY RECIPE.”
Heather ordered a vegetarian creation named after a friend of Amado’s, the Seema Taco: cactus, bell pepper slaw, pickled onions, arugula, roasted chile sauce, and griddled cheese (she held the cheese). It arrived in a cardboard boat—nothing fancy. But she started eating, and her whole face changed.
I got a three-taco combo, served shell-less to keep it keto. The steak was slow-braised. The shrimp was seared and well-spiced. And the mushrooms, smoked with chipotle and paired with arugula, were maybe the tastiest of all. Everything hit with the kind of flavor you usually only get in high-end restaurants. And yet here it was in a $12 combo, in paper boats, in a dining room that doubles as an upstairs hallway.
“This is haute cuisine for the masses,” I told Heather, who nodded as she took another bite.
Amado worked in kitchens where chefs hurl pans and insults. Heck, he used to hurl them too. But everything changed when he worked for Rick Bayless, where the culture was calm, collaborative, even tender.
“That place taught me to breathe again,” he told me.
Today, he runs Casa Amado with that same grounded ethos. No yelling. No turnover. Every cook is trained patiently, respectfully…just like he now parents his four kids.
“Being a dad helps,” he said. “Some people need directness. Others need gentleness. Either way, they need consistency and care.”
That theme—of warmth, inheritance, and making do— runs through everything Amado serves. That includes the vegan Sonoran Dog Heather ordered: a charred bun piled with pickled onion, jalapeño, and chile sauce.
Just like the rest of the dishes, there was no fancy plating. But somehow, everything about every bite tasted fancy. And fresh. So fresh.
“I’m definitely coming back. And I’m bringing Westley,” Heather said midway through her meal, talking about our son. “He’s going to love it.”
This from someone who, when we got there, had been ready to leave.
By the end of the night, Heather had finished her vegan feast, complete with homemade chips, refried beans, and guacamole, and she was glowing. I scraped every last bite of taco filling from the cardboard boats. We didn’t miss the white tablecloths. Not even for a second.
And I understood Amado’s mission even more clearly: not to be impressive, but to be real. To feed people in a way that sticks, that matters.
“Great food doesn’t need to be dressed up,” he told me. “It just needs to be made with love. That’s what people remember.”
He’s right. We’ll remember it.
Casa Amado (casaamado.com ) is at 2705 Coolidge in Berkley
flavors without borders
THE FED’S JAKOBI VOORHEIS OFFERS ADVENTUROUS DRINKS TO COMPLEMENT HIS GLOBALLY INSPIRED CUISINE
ARTICLE BY MARSHALL ZWEIG | PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMY GILLESPIE
At The Fed in Clarkston, the bold flavors come from all the places executive chef Jakobi Voorheis has called home: Puerto Rican spices from his father’s kitchen, Canadian influences from his stepfather, Mexican chilies from years spent abroad. Jakobi grew up with a passport of flavors at his table. Some of his fondest memories are family dinners that stretched into the night, gathered around a steaming pot of mussels or a backyard grill. “Big potluck style with food, stories, and dancing,” he remembers with a smile. “It always brought people together.”
That blend of comfort and adventure has become his north star at The Fed. Each menu rotates seasonally, often
guided by a region, from Mediterranean shores to Alpine peaks. And each is inspired by the global influences that shaped him. But his goal remains the same: approachable dishes elevated with vivid spices, rich colors, and bright flavors. “We want something familiar,” Jakobi explains, “but transformed into something bigger and bolder, something you can’t get at home.”
Jakobi’s personal guilty-pleasure pairing that’s not on the menu? Soppressata pizza drizzled with garlic honey and Calabrian chili, matched with a cheekily named California red blend called Sexual Chocolate. He doesn’t drink anymore, but when he did, “I drank it with everything,” he laughs. “It just works.”
Jakobi’s favorite pairings
Scallops with Sweet Pea Risotto + Rosé/Pinot Grigio
A dish Jakobi lit up talking about: scallops paired with sweet pea, mint, and cheesy risotto, lifted by the acidity of a pale rosé or pink pinot grigio. The brightness cuts the richness while letting the seafood’s delicacy shine.
Charcuterie Board + Rotating Wines
Always on the menu: three meats, three cheeses, plus pickles, nuts, and jams. The bar staff rotates pairings: white wines that cut spice, reds that play with chocolate, unexpected matches that turn a board into a journey.
Apricot & Prosciutto Pizza + House Cocktail
This quirky pizza, topped with apricot and prosciutto, shows off The Fed’s playful side. Jakobi suggests pairing it with a bourbon- or ginbased house cocktail that complements sweet-salty balance with a refreshing edge.
Seafood Pasta + Gavi
A signature pairing: mussels, scallops, and Argentinian red shrimp tossed with housemade pasta. Jakobi pairs it with Gavi, a small-production Italian white. “It’s off-the-wall and niche, but it’s beautiful. The salinity of the seafood just sings with it.”
Dry-Aged Wagyu Ribeye + Amarone or Nebbiolo
For steak lovers, Jakobi points to their 36-ounce 60-day dry-aged Wagyu. He likes it with Italian reds—bold Amarone or Nebbiolo—where the depth of the wine matches the charred, smoky richness of the beef.
Fed Burger + Pilsner
“The burger is the bomb,” Jakobi says, “and it’s our best seller. It was modeled after the Double Double from In-N-Out…I would say that’s pretty punk rock.” He pairs it with an IPA or a crisp pilsner, to cut through the burger’s richness without stealing the spotlight. The Fed Community (thefedcommunity.com) is at 15 S. Main Street in Clarkston.
WELLNESS IN A CUP
ARTICLE BY MARSHALL ZWEIG | PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMY GILLESPIE
JING DIPIERO POURED A LIFETIME OF HERBAL WISDOM INTO HER NOURISHING, FUNCTIONAL, ALL-NATURAL HYDRATION
On a bright Saturday in Royal Oak, you might catch sight of a vibrant booth: jewel-toned banners, hummingbirds and butterflies printed on colorful sachets, and a woman who seems to glow from the inside out, smiling as she pours samples of drinks.
That’s Jing DiPiero of Plants by People. Her plant-powered blends ship to kitchens across the country, bringing centuries-old herbal wisdom into modern daily life.
“I want people to see the beauty of nature,” she says. “The colors, the harmony…that’s what’s been supporting us for millennia.”
Jing’s journey began in Beijing, where her maternal grandparents, devoted home cooks, took her along to open-air food and herb markets. “They cooked based on the season and how everyone felt,” she recalls. “Cooking was the way they showed their love to us.”
At age five, Jing developed antibiotic resistance. Sick and exhausted, she became the patient of her family’s neighbor, a renowned herbalist. Around the same time, she watched this same neighbor help her grandmother recover from COPD, an illness Jing assumed would take her life. “That was a pivotal moment for me,” she says. “Seeing her health come back made me a believer.”
From then on, Jing was the herbalist’s shadow. She trailed him through stalls of dried roots and fragrant leaves, learning which herb soothed a stomach, which nourished the blood, which helped a young girl sleep.
Years later, after moving to the U.S. for graduate school, Jing’s health faltered again. A diet heavy in fast food left her with severe acne, made worse by harsh topical treatments. “It was humiliating,” she says. “I was starting my first job, ambitious, but I woke up every day with a face covered in breakouts.”
She returned to Beijing for an herbal detox. “It wasn’t quick—it took a year and a half for my skin to calm down—but it changed my
life,” she says. “This is a lifestyle. Not something you do for a week and then forget about.”
When COVID hit, Jing fell ill before vaccines were available, with a high fever that lingered for days. “We were all so vulnerable,” she says. “Medicine isn’t always the lifesaver. I wanted to create something that helps us count on our own immunity.”
From her basement, she began developing Plants by People, vetting over 100 suppliers, insisting on purity in every ingredient. She even hired a food scientist. After a year of formulation and testing, she launched her first line in August 2021.
Today, Plants by People offers five functional blends: Energy, Immunity, Digestion, Detox, and Relaxation. Each is built around a “hero herb” and paired with fruits and lemon for both flavor and synergy. “We’re down to four ingredients per blend,” Jing informs me, “with lower calories, less sugar, and the same functional benefits: you’ll hydrate and nourish at the same time.”
The Immunity blend, for instance, combines 1,000 milligrams of elderberry, long used by Native Americans to fight colds, with 640 milligrams of astragalus, a staple in Asian immune support. The Relaxation blend, which Jing says one grateful hockey dad swears by, pairs pomegranate for blood sugar balance, with rhodiola to calm the nervous system.
Jing’s ingredient rules are strict: no artificial or natural flavors, no additives, no maltodextrin. “If I can’t recognize it from nature, it doesn’t go in,” she says. Her customers range from a 70-something boutique owner in Florida who chooses blends daily based on her energy needs, to a dedicated pickleball player who uses Bloom as a pre-workout boost, to parents sending Glow in their kids’ lunch bottles. Teachers stock up before the school year. One family even packed Immunity sachets for a safe, healthy trip to the Paris Olympics.
“There’s no side effect,” Jing says. “You can have two or three a day. And it’s good for kids too.”
While the brand’s primary reach is online, Jing still connects in person at the Royal Oak Farmers Market as often as her schedule allows. “It’s like coming back to the good old days,” she says. “I grew up going to markets. It feels like home.”
Jing’s commitment to wellness extends to our community: she sponsors youth sports programs, including the Lindsay Hunter Foundation’s seventh-grade basketball team and the Daniel Cleary hockey camp.
In just a few years, Plants by People has been featured in Forbes, VegNews, CBS, and NBC. It’s a tribute to both to the quality of Jing’s products and the vision behind them: to make functional, all-natural hydration part of everyday life.
“I give a hundred percent of myself to this brand,” Jing says. “My family uses this product day in, day out. I give my customers the same love I give my family.”
To find the right Plants by People blend for you, visit plants bypeople.com
“I WANTED TO CREATE SOMETHING THAT HELPS US COUNT ON OUR OWN IMMUNITY.”
SCOOPING UP a legacy
LINDSEY AND JASON EDDLESTON ARE PRESERVING ROYAL OAK’S SWEETEST INSTITUTION
ARTICLE BY MARSHALL ZWEIG | PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMY GILLESPIE
Every year on her grandfather’s birthday, a woman lands at Detroit Metro, drives straight to Ray’s Ice Cream, orders her grandfather’s favorite milkshake, and boards a return flight home.
The ritual speaks volumes about what Ray’s means to its loyal customers. It’s more than ice cream. It’s cherished memories.
Lindsey and Jason Eddleston, the new owners of Ray’s, see themselves more as stewards. Lindsey, ironically, grew up lactose intolerant, but right when the store opened—and while pregnant with their first child, Piper—she magically regained the ability to eat dairy. “Perfect timing,” she laughs. One of their first additions: a line of dairy-free options, which customers were already asking for…and that Lindsey wishes had existed when she was a kid.
Jason’s childhood memories of ice cream are baseball helmet-filled blizzards at the local Dairy Queen with grandfather Victor. An athlete and fan of sports paraphernalia, Jason loved collecting those plastic helmets. Now he’s brought the idea back to life at Ray’s: “We’ve already sold 1,500 of them,” he says, grinning. “Kids get excited by that ‘collect them all’ feeling, just like I did.”
Jason, active on the Chamber of Commerce board, wanted to preserve a small business with real community roots. When he learned that Ray’s, a Royal Oak fixture since 1958, was at risk
of closing, the choice became clear. “So many mom-and-pop businesses are disappearing,” he says. “We felt a responsibility to keep this gathering place alive.”
The sense of stewardship shows in how they’ve balanced honoring Ray’s history with modernizing its operations. They refused to touch the iconic 1930s stools and counters, even as they brightened the space with a new floor and fresh paint. “It’s a slice of Americana,” Lindsey says. “We’d never change that.” At the same time, they’ve grown Ray’s social media following from 1.2K to more than 18K, introduced pints into grocery stores, and added promotions focused on storytelling and community engagement.
The community’s “Ray’s stories” often stop Jason and Lindsey in their tracks. Like Skip, a 91-year-old regular whose family celebrated her life at Ray’s after she passed. “These customers are part of the fabric of this place,” Jason notes. Lindsey is moved by these anecdotes: “We could fill a book with all the memories people tell us,” she says.
Girl Scouts, and even partnered with Detroit’s beloved Dutch Girl Donuts to make Jason’s dream flavor—red velvet donut ice cream—a reality.
“We sell ice cream, sure. But what we really sell is joy.”
“Every dollar we’ve made, we’ve reinvested back into the business,” Jason says. That investment isn’t just financial; for the first 18 months after taking over, Jason was at the shop nearly every day. “Our longtime customers expect the owner to scoop,” he explains. “It reassures them this is still a family-run place.” Lindsey is just as present, executing branding ideas like swapping out styrofoam cups for branded ones that double as social-media magnets, and chatting with customers while tidying up outside. Even Piper hands out sample spoons at the counter. Son Wyatt, just seven months old, is too little to pitch in, but you’ll see him at Ray’s too.
“We sell ice cream, sure,” Lindsey says. “But what we really sell is joy.” Jason adds: “Most ice cream places these days are takeout windows. At Ray’s, people slow down.”
But the couple have also made sure Ray’s delights new generations. They’ve kept the classic $3.50 kiddie scoop, while enhancing the Ray’s experience with touches like color-changing spoons and the aroma of fresh waffle cones.
They’ve launched cereal-milk flavors like Piper’s Pebbles (named after their daughter), created cookie-inspired collaborations with the
In a world that’s lost many of its human-connection touchpoints, maybe slowing down and feeling that ‘thanks for stopping by’ energy… maybe that’s the real sweetness Jason and Lindsey are keeping alive at Ray’s.
Ray’s Ice Cream (raysicecream.com ) is at 4233 Coolidge in Royal Oak. Instagram and TikTok: @raysicecreamco | Phone: (248) 549-5256
