If you are walking around Islington in North London and your thoughts are interrupted by a blast of opera coming from an amateurishly painted ice-cream van, don’t be alarmed. It’s not that Mr Whippy has come over all elitist, swapping the plink-plonk of Greensleeves for Bryn Terfel, but that Lola’s on Ice is doing the rounds.

The brainchild of restaurateur Morfudd Richards, the 30-year-old Bedford van is bringing the joys of real ice-cream to the children of the borough. For instead of 99s, Twisters and Mivvies, you’ll find fantastic concoctions such as burnt orange caramel, fresh mint or coconut and pineapple, as well as more challenging flavours such as pineapple and chilli, or tomato and basil. No additives, no artificial flavourings, no emulsified palm oil or any of the other junk that lurks in the average ice-cream van cone, just cream, eggs, milk and any fresh fruit and vegetables that come to hand.

“It all started on a whim,” says the delightfully enthusiastic Richards, who has run Lola’s on Upper Street to great acclaim for nearly ten years. “I was on eBay and happened to see an old ice-cream van for sale in Cornwall. I thought it would be lovely to pootle around in, showing people just how great home-made ice-cream can be, and to advertise the restaurant at the same time.” So, £500 later, the van was hers. “It turned out to be about £500 too much because 100 miles later the engine blew up,” she remembers. Undeterred, she joined the Bedford fan club to get a new engine, got the van up and running and set about decorating it in her idiosyncratic style – think Ben and Jerry before they got all corporate: bright colours, plastic flowers, butterflies and, for some reason, a toy peacock…

A few months ago she’d never made any ice-cream in her life. Now she makes up to 15 tubs a day. The vanilla and chocolate (made with real Bourbon vanilla pods and Valrhona chocolate) are the big-sellers, but Richards is always experimenting. “I’m definitely in favour of pushing people’s boundaries, making unexpected matches,” she says as she loads tubs of beetroot and cassis, horseradish, and tomato and basil sorbet in the van alongside the regular flavours. “People like Heston Blumenthal [he of the three Michelin stars and sardines-on-toast ice-cream fame] do it really well, and as long as you’re not being wacky for wacky’s sake, it can be really interesting. We all hear how children especially will only stick to what they know, but I’m always amazed at how adventurous they can be.”

Remembering how wedded Jamie Oliver’s schoolchildren were to their turkey sizzlers in the face of healthier alternatives, it was interesting to see how the more offbeat flavours went down that afternoon. I learnt that, in toddler world, real vanilla ice-cream with a brandy snap is no substitute for a 99; that Valhrona chocolate is nice, but not like real chocolate, and that fresh mint ice-cream would be a whole lot better if it were bright green and shaped like a foot. But I also discovered there are plenty of children like ten-year-old Halymah, who said that the beetroot and cassis sorbet was really nice, like a fruity lolly, and 12-year-old Paula, who thought tomato and basil sounded scary but gave it a try anyway and said it tasted like an icy salad and she would stick to her double whippy next time, thank you very much. We even found a taker for the horseradish, which was “creamy and buttery, and hot and cold at the same time”. Which all goes to show, there’s no accounting for taste.

Lola's on Ice is available to hire from £50 per hour, plus £2 per person (07871 797260; www.lolasonice.co.uk)

Explore Food & Drink

• Gordon Ramsay

• Heston Blumenthal

• Recipes

• Wine

• Real Food

• Drinks

• Anjum Anand

• Eating Out

• Video Recipes

Times Recommends

• Valentine Warner's summer recipes
• Jo Wood hosts a restaurant in her home
• Five ways with feta cheese