Jawnville Treasure: Rose’s Water Ice

This weekend, I was in need of a refreshing cold treat after a long walk with the pooch so I hopped in the car and made the trek to Roxborough for water I believe is the best water ice in Philadelphia–Rose’s.

As a kid in the neighborhood of Juniata Park, we were lucky enough to have a handful of mobile vendors making their way through our streets. We had the horse-drawn huckster with Jersey tomatoes and a ton of fresh produce. We Mr. Softee, like most other kids. And, then, we had the bell-ringing, yellow half golfcart-looking vehicle of Rose’s Water Ice. They eventually upgraded to a custom Jeep.

They always had the staples of lemon, cherry, chocolate, but I always thought the top shelf flavors were the pineapple, orange, and tangerine. And, it was never a problem to mix flavors. Pineapple-orange was always a personal fave.

This was before Rita’s took over the Philly landscape, but not quite as old as John’s in South Philly. For me, John’s is a close second to Rose’s.

The thing for me about Rose’s is the refreshing factor. It’s the perfect hybrid between a drink and a frozen treat. I love the fact that you don’t need a spoon, you can practically drink it. The ice is always perfectly sized, tiny chunks. Chunks is probably the wrong word because they’re too small to be chunks. They’re slightly larger than shaved ice.

These days, Rose’s does food, too. People on Yelp rave about their breakfast sandwiches. I haven’t tried them and have no interest. For me Rose’s is all about the water ice and they’re doing it as perfect as they did thirty years ago. I grabbed a pineapple-orange and my friend grabbed a chocolate. This jawn is legit. They even have some outdoor seating.

The only room for improvement after decades is probably the soft pretzels. They could use some Center City pretzels. The pretzels we had were subpar.

We here at Jville don’t know Rose’s owners and aren’t receiving anything for this. We just think it’s a Philly treasure that should be widely tried and accepted.

Make a trip up to Roxborough Ave and Pechin Street in Roxborough and try for yourself. You ain’t gonna be disappointed.

Take a look at some pics.

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