Last summer, I was staying in downtown Napa, Calif., for a work project when a client told me about a Japanese restaurant called Miminashi that makes out-of-this-world soft serve. Soft serve? I murmured, visualizing a nostalgic-but-not-necessarily-out-of-this-world curl-capped cone. She raved about the unexpected flavors, like lemon verbena, Thai tea and matcha, adding that it's all served from a dedicated walk-up window. [more...]