Cool Customers and Full Hearts in Since 1939
Before Hansen's Sno-Bliz became a bustling Uptown sno-ball stand with a line of people wrapped around the corner, it was a small business started by a friendly, warm-hearted Italian grandmother. She made homemade sno-balls for her family, adored children, and believed food was love.
"My great grandma had a fruit stand," Ashley Hansen, owner of Hansen's Sno-Bliz, recalled. "My grandma grew up in the Irish Channel and learned from her mother to give the best quality. She made her syrups fresh daily and we still do that today."
Ashley's grandmother, Mary Gemelli Hansen, transferred her talents from working at her mother's fruit stand to making fruit-based syrups for sno-balls using sugar, spring water, and fruit juice. Her signature frozen concoctions led to the birth of Hansen's Sno-Bliz in 1939.
While the sno-ball stand was undeniably Mary's idea and business, she didn't do it alone. Behind every powerhouse woman is a supportive partner helping her get across the finish line. Oprah has Stedmund, Beyoncé has Jay-Z, and Mary had her master machinist husband Ernest. Ernest was a Danish immigrant with a knack for problem-solving. When he noticed the sno-balls his son was getting from a street vendor were being hand shaved by the vendor's dirty hands, he designed the Sno-Bliz, what his granddaughter Ashley Hansen believes is the first mechanized electric ice shaver, in 1934.
Mary thought her husband's invention was too good just to be used by the family and neighborhood children. She believed the block ice shaving machine and her homemade syrups needed to be shared with the city. Ernest retired at 65 and joined his wife serving the community at the sno-ball stand. Fast forward 85 years later and Hansen's inventions and legacy live on.
"There's no happier place than this stand to me," Ashley said. "There's this feeling of cherished memories."
Ernest and Mary lived until their mid-90s and died in 2005 and 2006. Hurricane Katrina had just washed over the city, and as businesses slowly reopened and life returned to the Big Easy, Ashley couldn't imagine her hometown without her beloved home base. In spring 2006, she reopened the doors of Hansen's Sno-Bliz, this time as the owner.
The 50-year-old New Orleans native grew up in the snug, nostalgic, grandma-chic sno-ball stand. She has albums full of vintage photos to prove it. Amongst the collage of images plastered on the walls inside Hansen's Sno-Bliz is a baby photo of Ashley and her twin sister, Allison, sitting in empty sno-ball buckets. This dessert spot has been her family's happy place for generations. Even Ashely's children have baby photos crawling on the shop's hard floors.
After spending her summers working at the sno-ball stand and helping her grandparents since she was 15, she is honored to treat the city by using the same recipes her grandmother created and the same machines her grandfather built many years ago.
Today, Hansen's Sno-Bliz carries over 40 flavors to pour atop mounds of fluffy, delicately shaved, below-freezing ice. The flavor options are like a wine list. Depending on the notes and flavor profile you're looking for, you may lean toward their classic flavors including wild cherry, coconut, root beer or chocolate. If you want to go outside the box and try something not sold at every sno-ball stand, their "fancy flavors" include fragrant and layered tastes such as hibiscus, honey lavender, Thai tea, fresh watermelon, ginger, and fresh coconut milk. Speaking of milk, the creamy flavors are just as worthy of praise as the others. Try multiple cream flavors at once in the "creambow" sno-ball. This colorful and milky treat is made with cream of strawberry, cream of blueberry, and cream of ice cream.
Most people order their sno-balls in one of the sno-ball stand's reusable plastic cups, but if you're having a party (or just love sno-balls that much), you can order enough flavored ice to fill a three-gallon bucket. Don't worry about hoarding all of the shop's ice. During their peak seasons (spring and summer), the sno-ball stand goes through more than two tons of ice weekly.
The cups are like collectibles for locals, right up there next to Mardi Gras cup throws. Ashley partners with local women artists to design her cups. This year, they were created by local artist Margie Tillman Ayres to commemorate 85 years of business. The design features the smiling sno-ball matriarch Mary cranking out a mountain of ice for a pair of joyous children and an alligator eating rainbow-colored sno-balls. The children are inspired by real regular customers Wes and Kaitlyn.
"The sno-ball stand is such a backdrop to New Orleans," Ashley said. And she is right. Sno-balls have been a part of New Orleans culture for decades. They are more than a sweet frozen treat enjoyed during the summer. Sno-ball stands are like small sanctuaries. Amidst the city's history of deadly hurricanes, high crime rates, and poverty, sno-balls create a moment of pause and the opportunity to savor a cup of sweet relief until it melts. In addition to crawfish, daiquiris, and oysters, they are the one of many signature Louisiana food staples guaranteed to bring people together.
Mary and Ernest Hansen may not have realized it then, but their little shop on the corner of Tchoupitoulas and Bordeaux streets would not only provide air conditioning for people's tummies (as Ernest Hansen liked to say) but also warm the hearts and nourish the souls of everyone who has walked through their doors.
