Molly Moon’s is the Salumi of ice cream parlors. We’ve lost count of the restaurants that eagerly namecheck the establishment on their dessert menus, and Molly Moon Neitzel has become something of a celeb chef. Both branches have queues out the door nearly all the time, even in winter.

The contributing cows to this ice cream are hormone-free, and flavors change seasonally to make the most of the fruits, vegetables (there’s a beet sorbet, for example), and seasonings of the Pacific Northwest and northern California. Flavors never get too crazy—honey lavender, cardamom, balsamic strawberry—but that’s just fine. Molly Moon’s strength is that flavors are generally pitch-perfect. Except in the too-sweet sorbets, the sugar content doesn’t overpower those special ingredients: you can detect, for example, the slight chalkiness of Theo’s premium dark chocolates. There is usually a seasonal coconut milk selection to placate vegans and the lactose intolerant. (In fact, the best thing we’ve had here was a coconut-milk ice cream lightly infused with espresso from local roaster Vivace.)

All that said, the fervent adoration that Molly Moon’s inspires and sustains is a little puzzling. Perhaps people go not just for the ice cream, but also for the experience of standing in line with excited patrons, watching those awesome waffle cones come off the griddle while choosing flavors off a chalkboard.