Ideally, Opening Day for a warm-weather attraction is sunny and balmy. While it only made it into the mid-40s or thereabouts today, the Miceli family isn’t exactly complaining. When they opened the 62-year old tradition of the Dairy Korner in St. Joseph in this month last year, it was barely 35 degrees and several inches of snow had fallen on everything within eyesight.
In fact, somebody snapped a cellphone picture of the “Opening Day” sign in front of a red and white striped building covered in snow last year. Anthony & Denise Miceli were happy they didn’t have to plow their parking lot or shovel the sidewalk to swing open the doors onto the 62nd consecutive year of a Dairy Korner presence at 1605 Lakeview Avenue, at the intersection with Lake Shore Drive today.
Today is opening day for the popular and iconic independent ice cream shop and burger stand. For now the Korner is open 7-days a week from 11am until 8pm. They’ll stretch that to a 9pm closing as the weather improves, especially on Friday and Saturday nights and once school gets out the hours will run from 11am until 10pm all week long.
Tony says with last year being their first year in the business it was a real education. He tells me, “It was a huge learning curve, and we’re doing things smarter and better now with new offerings.” He notes, “We got the opportunity to see what customers wanted, and what they were looking for, so we tweaked the menu, based on our feedback from the customers.”
As a result of that year long customer research process, the Miceli’s are now offering more to the public, including a different variety of items, concentrating more on food, which Tony says, “Is something we want to be recognized for, for sandwiches as well as the ice cream.”
For 62 years…dating back to 1956…the legacy at that corner has been one of a locally owned, locally operated independent ice cream shop.
Denise admits that they were surprised that they didn’t sell as much pizza as they had anticipated. She tells me that as a result, “We’ve reworked the pizza a little bit, we thought maybe we’d sell more pizzas than we did, so we’re upgrading the crusts to see if that helps,” rather than arbitrarily casting it aside and off the menu board.
The top seller in the food line last year was hands down the classic burgers, and for the cold treats, “Plain old vanilla ice cream is the standby although lots of folks like vanilla as a base and load in other things like Oreo cookies, and such.” Another refinement made in the shop is the new use of edible-scooped cookie dough rather than cookie dough chunks as in the past. They’re using the new process as the base for a new sundae called the Cookie Dough Bomb Sundae. It’s a sundae with a cookie dough surprise on the inside, like chocolate chip or monster. Those are the two flavors currently available.
The Dairy Korner is also adding Gelato to the lineup this year, as well. Denis says that Limoncello is currently available and Hazelnut, but they’re working on getting Pistachio Gelato in soon, as well as a Banana Flambe flavor coming soon.
Based on overwhelmingly positive sales last year, Tony promises Dole Whip “Is never going away!” They have pineapple flavored Dole Whip on the menu right now, but here is a new lime flavor from Dole to that they are working to acquire as well.
For decades the Dairy Korner has been an excellent summer job opportunity for many local high school students and that will be the case again this year with a staff of twenty high school kids working there through the summer season.
The Miceli’s hope you’ll stop by and enjoy their offerings soon. As Tony says, “We’re the un-franchise. Everything we do is from the heart, and homemade, made with care and actually made to order.” He adds, “We’re just a mom & pop, family business, competing with some of the big franchises and trying our best to take care of everyone, and we appreciate and are very grateful to our customers for helping us keep alive the 62-year old tradition. We love to see the kids coming in and it’s exciting.”
The Dairy Korner has been ensconced at 1605 Lakeview Avenue in St. Joseph just off of Lake Shore Drive across from Rooster’s Party Store since 1956, and their prime features are the soft serve ice cream and custards as well as a diner-style menu of hot dogs, hamburgers, pizza, chicken and more. There are 7 or 8 stools at the front counter, a couple of picnic tables out front and a side canopy has seating for 36 additional patrons. They’re ready with a little slice of summer whenever you are.
