Happy Goat, happy families

Pure Joy Ice Cream created for good cause

By Ashley Batchelor

[email protected]

Go & Do

Pure Joy Ice Cream Scoops

Friday and Saturday — Frisco Festival in Rogers

Aug. 28-31 — Fayetteville Roots Festival

Sept. 6 — 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Slaughter Pen Jam Music Festival in Bentonville

Information: purejoyicecream.com

At A Glance

The Titus Task is a nonprofit organization that gives grants to Northwest Arkansas families who are adopting children and is also expanding its orphan care and orphan prevention efforts in Haiti. The nonprofit was founded by Lori and Noel Tugwell after their son Titus, whom they were in the process of adopting from Haiti, died from malnutrition. For information about giving to the nonprofit or to inquire about becoming a grant recipient, contact Lori Tugwell at [email protected] or visit Facebook.com/thetit….

People are often scared of the Happy Goat.

Then they discover it's not only good ice cream, it supports a good cause.

"It's really fun to see people fall in love with flavors that they're hesitant about at first," says Matt Feyerabend, co-founder of Pure Joy Ice Cream. Happy Goat, his wife Meghan tells customers, tastes like cheesecake. It's made from local goat cheese from White River Creamery in Elkins and honey from a local farm -- and yes, almost every person who tastes it likes it.

What the Happy Goat's fans may not know is that Pure Joy Ice Cream started in 2011 as a fundraiser for the Feyerabends' friends Lori and Noel Tugwell, who were adopting daughter Esther Joy from China. It is now "a for profit business that gives away its profits," Matt explains. Pure Joy's chosen beneficiary is The Titus Task, a nonprofit organization started by the Tugwells to help Northwest Arkansas families who are adopting children.

Esther Joy, now 5, was the fourth child the Tugwells adopted, Lori says. First was daughter Lily, who came from China in 2003. During the process of adopting two boys named Titus and Silas from Haiti, Titus passed away from malnutrition, she says. The Tugwells created The Titus Task in 2007.

"We really just desired to have a way to remember him and make his life count for more than the number of days he lived," Tugwell said via phone Aug. 4, the evening before her family traveled back to their home in Haiti after a three-week trip to Northwest Arkansas.

The family moved from Siloam Springs to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, a year ago, and they plan to visit Northwest Arkansas for a few weeks every summer. Lily is now 11, and Silas is 8. The Tugwells also adopted an 11-year-old named Louis from Haiti in 2010, and he is now 15. In Haiti, the Tugwells partner with others doing orphan care and also are expanding their own efforts toward orphan care and orphan prevention.

"We pursue a future for orphans," Tugwell says.

"This family, they just approach things with no fear. Total faith, total trust that they're supposed to be doing what they're doing," Matt Feyerabend says.

Tugwell notes that the first adoption grant was given in 2009, and more than 35 Northwest Arkansas families have received some funding from The Titus Task over the last five years. She says even though they now live in Haiti, their hearts are in Northwest Arkansas.

"We really believe that when you pour back into your own community in that way, then that really helps people come alongside the issue of orphan care by making a difference in your own community," Tugwell says.

Tugwell adds that she loves how Matt and Meghan have built a "kingdom-minded business that started with helping a family, and now it's turned into a great business and fabulous ice cream."

The Feyerabends' primary businesses are in photography and framing, and Pure Joy Ice Cream is a part-time venture for them. Matt says they decided early on that they wanted Pure Joy Ice Cream "to have a purpose and a passion greater than just us making a living." He says they continue to give to The Titus Task because they are passionate about adoption and helping others overcome the financial obstacles to be able to adopt.

"We plan to grow our family through adoption," he says.

However, Pure Joy Ice Cream is also about supporting local farmers and food producers and building relationships with those people, Feyerabend adds. Pure Joy Ice Cream almost always uses the original source of an ingredient, going back to "the purest form," he says. The company also tries to purchase local as much as possible, and what can't be found locally, the Feyerabends get direct trade, fair trade or from organic producers, he says.

Scream for ice cream

Meghan Feyerabend is lactose intolerant, but that doesn't stop her from trying all the flavors offered by Pure Joy Ice Cream's mobile cart business, she says. She enjoys all the sorbets they make, such as strawberry rhubarb, but she also eats the ice cream.

"I just can't eat very much of it," she says.

One of her favorite ice cream flavors is called Cookie No Dough.

"It kind of tastes like eating frozen cookie dough," she says.

Matt's favorites are the first two flavors he came up with on his own. Happy Goat and Garden Mint Chip were two recipes he created that were inspired by an ice cream shop in Kansas City, Mo. He says his favorite flavor of ice cream has always been mint chocolate chip, but he never really liked the "green mint ice cream." This ice cream shop featured mint leaves in the recipe, not a mint syrup or flavor, but he noted that he didn't see any mint leaves in the ice cream. He was told the leaves were put in the milk and then taken out once the flavor transferred to the liquid. Matt then returned home and started playing around with creating a recipe using real mint leaves.

Matt says he first started making ice cream for fun from home after he got an ice cream machine for Christmas a few years ago. He spent about a year and a half "messing around with flavors" and creating recipes. The Feyerabends then began talking with friends about raising money for the Tugwells to help with adoption fees. Matt said he could do an ice cream fundraiser. They sold 200 pre-order pints, and Meghan says the next two weeks were crazy making all of the orders.

The couple knew if they wanted to continue making ice cream on a larger scale, they would need a commercial ice cream machine and kitchen. These seemed like insurmountable obstacles, Matt recalls, but they "kept getting met by wonderful people who believed in what we were doing and liked the ice cream."

In 2011, Matt says they asked the owners of 28 Springs in Siloam Springs if they could make ice cream in the kitchen, and the owners agreed. The couple also bought a used commercial ice cream machine in Fayetteville, which was then installed at 28 Springs.

The Feyerabends use the kitchen at 28 Springs on Sundays and sometimes overnight for ice cream emergencies. A few weeks ago, they needed more ice cream for a Friday evening event, so Matt worked an overnight shift on Thursday making ice cream, returning to his house to lie down when the sun was coming up.

The photography and framing businesses take up the majority of the couple's time, and Pure Joy Ice Cream takes up the rest, Matt says.

"At this point, I'm not sure where we're finding time," Meghan jokes.

After running a Pint of the Month Club for a short time, the couple found that people seemed to want "the experience of eating it right then and there." The Feyerabends decided to start scooping at events, attending the Fayetteville Roots Festival in 2012 and a few First Thursdays in Fayetteville last year. Throughout this year, the couple also have brought their ice cream to First Fridays in Bentonville, local breweries and farmers markets. Pure Joy Ice Cream will be scooping Friday and Saturday at Frisco Festival in Rogers and Aug. 28-31 at the Fayetteville Roots Festival.

Going forward, the couple would like to purchase a food truck and be mobile around Northwest Arkansas, taking their ice cream to wherever people are gathered, Matt says.

Cup O' Joe, Midnight Mocha

Flavor creation is a highlight of making ice cream, Meghan says. Five or six flavors are featured at the mobile cart at each event, and favorite flavors are often part of the menu. Garden Mint Chip and Happy Goat are typically sold, and the couple rotate between Cup O' Joe and Meghan's Latte. Cup O' Joe is like drinking coffee, Meghan says. Matt says that coffee beans are brewed directly into the milk, and Cup O' Joe is made with a single-origin coffee bean, which means all the beans are from one farm in a certain country. Customers can ask what coffee bean is currently used in Cup O' Joe, since it could be from locations such as Brazil, Guatemala or Ethiopia, he says. Meghan's Latte is a lighter flavor than Cup O' Joe and features honey, vanilla, nutmeg and cinnamon.

"It's cold, but it's warming," she says. "It's modeled after what I like to put in my lattes."

Their chocolate flavor is called Midnight Mocha. It has a hint of coffee, but it's 99 percent chocolate, he says.

"We put as much chocolate as we could in there without making it freeze up solid," he says.

Another popular flavor is Salty Caramel, which includes caramel Matt makes himself. This flavor is Tugwell's favorite. She says her kids love all of the ice cream flavors. Even her picky eater daughter Lily found one she likes: Happy Goat.

NAN Our Town on 08/21/2014

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