Soft Swerve recently expanded to Long Island City, offering Asian-inspired flavors like Ube (pictured), matcha, Thai tea, black sesame, and more. Photo credit: Soft Swerve.
May 20, 2025 By Jessica Militello
The unofficial start of summer just got a little sweeter—and cooler—with the grand opening of Soft Swerve in Long Island City.
The popular New York-based, Asian-inspired ice cream brand officially opened its doors on Friday, May 16, inside the JACX&CO food hall, located at 24-17 Jackson Ave.
To celebrate, Soft Swerve handed out free samples of their signature soft serve and hosted merchandise giveaways, including tote bags, stickers, and keychains featuring original artwork by Dhensel Doodles, created exclusively for the brand.
Delicious soft serve from Soft Swerve, which just opened in JACX and CO. Food Hall in LIC. Photo credit: Soft Swerve.
“We’ve wanted to be a part of the culturally rich community of Long Island City for some time now and we couldn’t have asked for a better fit for our brand than in the beautiful space located inside JACX&CO food hall,” said Michael Tsang, one of the co-founders of Soft Swerve. “We look forward to serving the neighborhood.”
Tsang and his close friend and co-founder, Jason Liu, were both born and raised in Chinatown, where they noticed a void in the area for tasty and unique Asian-inspired ice cream flavors, which inspired them to open their first location on Allen St. in 2017.
The ice cream shop became widely popular in soft serve and hard scoop for flavors like matcha, Thai tea, black sesame, and ube, made daily with purple yams, to name just a few of their frozen tasty treats. Since then, the business partners have expanded to add locations in the Lower East Side, Kips Bay, Downtown Brooklyn, and Flushing, before expanding to another Queens neighborhood with their newest shop in Western Queens.
The new space is a welcome addition to the popular food hall, which features an array of diverse cuisine, including Alidoro, Sushi Nikko, Mexology, and Le Thai, to name a few of the delicious restaurants and dining choices available at the space.
Photo credit: Soft Swerve.
“We are delighted to welcome Soft Swerve to the innovative lineup of food and beverage purveyors we have assembled at JACX&CO,” said Reed Zukerman, Tishman Speyer’s senior director, the company that owns the food hall. “The culinary experiences we’ve curated at JACX&CO have positioned it as Long Island City’s most exciting dining, bar, and events destination.”
JACX and CO. Food Hall is home to an array of diverse and delicious cuisine. Photo courtesy of Tishman Speyer.
The ice cream shop features options for hard or soft serve in cups or cones, milkshakes, soft serve floats, and sundaes, as well as fun toppings, like fruity pebbles, chocolate, and rainbow sprinkles, strawberries, Lucky Charms marshmallows, and more.
The shop also has happy hour Monday through Friday from 2-3 p.m., featuring 15% off any order. The newest venue offers visitors the option to dine in for a fun ice cream meet-up, delivery, or take it to go, making it the perfect treat to enjoy on any day.
The new ice cream shop offers soft serve and hard scoop in a variety of Asian-inspired flavors. Photo credit: Soft Swerve.
The shop is presently open during the food hall’s regular opening hours from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Sunday through Thursday, and 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. With so many fun flavors and delicious treats, the space is a welcome addition to the neighborhood.
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