Big Dipper Ice Cream Parlour makes and serves their homemade, small batch ice cream out of an unremarkable 1,350-square foot shop in a tiny town. But their award-winning ice cream reaches fans throughout the state, including all the way north through Hartford County and elsewhere. Paul Brault, who’s reopening Bart’s Drive-in in Windsor has said he’ll carry Big Dipper ice cream, because it’s his favorite.
Big Dipper is carried in numerous stores and sold at public and private events via an ice cream vehicle. “I think, live and breathe ice cream,” said owner Harry Rowe, who works seven days a week. “If you love what you do, it doesn’t seem like you’re working.
” Prospect Mayor Bob Chatfield , remembers the early days of Big Dipper and how Harry Rowe’s dad, Big Dipper founder Harry Rowe Jr. won ice cream competitions in the midwest, beating out places that had their own farms. Chatfield said people find out where Prospect is, “because they want to find Big Dipper because that’s what friends have talked about.
“The key is they make their own ice cream and invent all these flavors you’ve never heard of,” said Chatfield, who fancies the maple walnut. Harry Rowe took over with his mother, Barbara Rowe, about 18 years ago after the elder Rowe passed. But not much has changed, except that business has grown.
Their No. 1 business approach, Rowe said, has been to carry on his dad’s traditions, such as his process for making ice cream and his commitment t.