The owners of Cashew Cow, Tucson's first cashew ice cream parlor, hope everyone -  not just vegans - go nuts for their dairy-free product. By Gillian Drummond and Joan Calcagno. Cover photo by Danni Valdez/Shutter2ThinkPhotography.

Photo by Danni Valdez

When the temperatures are reaching 100ºC and more during Tucson's summers, those brave enough to stick around here have their choice of cooling desserts.

There's ice cream - a food category enlivened lately with the opening of Hub and its offbeat home-made flavors. There's gelato (thank you Frost, Allegro and more). There's the Mexican delicacy of raspado - shaved ice with flavored syrups. And there's the home-grown chain of Eegee's restaurants, whose frozen fruit drinks are a local summer staple.

Photo by Danni Valdez

This summer, another frozen dessert is entering the fray. Cashew Cow, a dessert parlor opening in historic Broadway Village, will sell ice cream made of cashews. And while cashew-based ice cream has been a sweet treat for vegans for some time, the two partners behind this new venture want to draw in more than the non-dairy crowd.

One of their slogans will be 'We all scream'. Make that vegans, non-vegans, those concerned with their cholesterol, and those who just like eating ice cream, however it's made.

Jennifer Newman is one of the latter. But this gourmand has high standards. She holds up brand leader Häagen-Dazs as her favorite ice cream. So when Jennifer and her picky palate were drawn in to the cashew ice cream her friend Jeremy Shockley was experimenting with, she knew he was onto something.

Jeremy had tried almond and coconut versions of ice cream. "They were OK but they never matched the traditional indulgence," he says. A visit to Pure Food and Wine, a raw food restaurant in Manhattan, changed everything. "They make a fresh young Thai coconut meat cashew coconut oil ice cream. It's very indulgent. I thought 'Even my nephew would eat that. I could get into this'." A look at their recipe - published online - proved it was a laborious dish. "You're hand cracking coconuts on a daily basis," he says.

He thought non-dairy ice creams that were being marketed as health food products or to niche consumer markets were "missing the point" - the point being that ice cream is an indulgence. Then, on a dog walk one day and daydreaming of his own future cash cow, he came up with the name Cashew Cow.

Photo by Danni Valdez

Jeremy, a recording engineer and technical supervisor whose work had taken him to Los Angeles and Connecticut, threw himself into two and a half years of intense study of dairy science and chemistry. Jennifer, meanwhile, with a background in restaurants and a Masters in nutrition, was the ideal business partner.

An obscure cultural reference brought them together at a Tucson dog park. She was wearing a T-shirt from the annual Coney Island Mermaid Parade - something Jeremy recognized from his time back east - and the two got talking. Both had lived in Tucson (Jeremy during high school, Jennifer until she was 11), both had spent time in New York City, and both had returned to what they consider their home town. Added to that, they had mutual Tucson friends.

Photo by Danni Valdez

With Jeremy's love of branding and advertising (he formerly did branding and marketing for Maya Tea Company), and Jennifer's in nutrition (from cheese department manager in New York, to nutrition counseling and non-profit work), they say they balance each other out. And each of them was at a similar point in their lives and careers, a now-or-never moment. Says Jennifer: 'The random jobs I had in New York, some of them never made sense to me. It was always like 'I need to find the career'. This is something I'd been looking for for a long time."

The Cashew Cow product uses whole cashews, a low glycemic mineral-rich sweetener (he won't say which), and a touch of coconut. There are no flavor syrups; flavoring comes naturally, from whole food ingredients. Meanwhile, the cashews bring vitamins, minerals, fiber and heart-friendly monounsaturated fat.

Photo courtesy of Cashew Cow

Photo courtesy of Cashew Cow

The pair have been testing their product at farmers' markets and events around Tucson, quietly wowing exactly the demographic they want - that is, everyone. "I want vegetarians standing shoulder to shoulder with the guy with barbecue sauce on his shirt," says Jeremy. Adds Jennifer: "Everyone wants ice cream." And if that ice cream happens to serve beneficial fats by way of whole cashew nuts, all the better.

"We wanted to make a nutritionally dense food rather than a reduced indulgence product," says Jeremy. "It’s ice cream. Ice cream is frozen emotion.  You come to it because you want to celebrate something or to feel good. So you have to formulate based on indulgence.

"Our dream customer is someone who knows nothing about nutrition but they can come in and grab our product and whether they know it or not they are eating healthy. They’re getting whole-food nutrition and they have no idea.” His aim for his product is that it's delicious, and fun, while at the same time doing customers some good.

The space they have taken up in the burgeoning Broadway Village was designed by Repp + McClain. This will be the architecture and construction company's fifth project here; they have outfitted Session Yoga yoga studio, Italian restaurant Falora, the new bar, Sidecar, and Sugar Sweet Bakery, which is next door to Cashew Cow.

At less than 1000 sq ft, the space  brought challenges. Repp + McClain partners Rick McLain and Page Repp say it was important to accommodate everyone, from the grab-and-go customers, to those who want to sit, to kids hanging out at the cashew-shaped kiddie table.

The parlor's cone-shaped stools and tables. Photo by Danni Valdez

Photo by Danni Valdez

Jennifer and Jeremy have had fun with the decor and the branding. There are cone-shaped bar stools and side tables, the nut-shaped kids' table and hanging pendant lights above the counter that change color via remote control. The wooden-topped benches along one wall are modular; they can be taken off the wall and arranged into different seating configurations. The walls have strips of steel so they can attach art with magnets and change it up frequently. Jeremy credits friend and furniture maker/contractor Matthew Williams of Sticks & Stones with the design and build of the furniture.

They're calling their mascot - which appears on their logo as a cow with a cashew-shaped body - Johnny Cashew Cow. The flavors - and there will only be six to start with - include names like Sacred Cacao Chocolate, Bean Me Up Coffee and Cream of the Cropsicle (orange and vanilla). At around $4 a scoop, they are choosing a price point similar to the likes of Hub.

Their years of getting the business off the ground have included a lot of hurdles and some steep learning curves. Jennifer says she had to Google 'business plan' at the beginning, only to find that heading up the business side of of the project "came naturally". Jeremy has been his own personal chemist, creating the product and its flavored varieties from scratch. Vanilla was his toughest. The synthetic version, vanillin, is a single molecule, whereas vanilla beans have several hundred flavor compounds.

Photo by Danni Valdez

There have been problems with the concrete floor, with plumbing and with the cooler. There have also been two dog deaths, with each of them having to put down their dog months apart from one another. Jeremy has slept in guest rooms and on sofas, and in seven different houses in three years. But they believe in their product, and the spin-off products they say are in the pipeline. Friends and family members - who make up the private investors backing the business - believe in it too.

And now, says Jeremy, who's hoping to open the doors within the next few weeks, it's time to have fun.

* Cashew Cow, located just south of Broadway Boulevard on S. Eastbourne Avenue, is due to open at the end of July. You can keep tabs on progress on their Facebook page and their website.

Hair color is great while it lasts... except it doesn't. Enter Liora Dudar and Maegan Scarlett and a line of color maintenance products they cooked up in a kitchen. By Mari Herreras. Cover photo courtesy of oVertone.co

Photo courtesy of oVertone.co

The images Liora K Dudar produces generate healthy double takes and national praise, earning the Tucson photographer - widely known as Liora K - a reputation of being feminist fierce.

Which could make Liora's latest endeavor surprising to some. That is unless, of course, you ever noticed the touch of color that often tops her brunette tresses. Today the color is red, a flame of red hair that beautifully frames Liora's face.

Sitting beside her inside Café Passe on Tucson's Fourth Avenue is Maegan Scarlett - a friend that shares Liora's feminist ideals and values. What's equally obvious is that Maegan shares her love of color too. Her hair is a gorgeous shade of orange in all-over color down to her shoulders.

Liora (left) and Maegan. Photo courtesy of oVertone.co

Together, the friends recently launched oVertone, a line of color-depositing conditioners that can be used weekly and daily in different color intensities to keep those fantasy colors from fading as fast, and leaving hair well-conditioned at the same time.

What's referred to as "fantasy color" are colors like pink and other pastels, as well as more intense shades of blue, green, red and purple. On the café table sit some of the offerings: tubs of weekly deep conditioner in purple, red and a teal green. They're creamy and have a light, natural-smelling fragrance -  nothing like the usual ammonia smell of many hair coloring products.

Liora says they came up with the business idea over their mutual love for fantasy color - something she suggests people choose in an effort to be their more authentic selves. When Liora first met Maegan they recognized they shared many values and interests, and over coffee they'd lament that their color faded too fast, forcing them to go back to their hair stylists a little more than they desired - every two weeks rather than every six weeks. With oVertone, application can be weekly or daily, depending on a person's wants or needs. If someone has a blonded streak, according to Liora, it can take the salon out of the picture altogether.

Katy Gierlach modeling Extreme Pink. Photo courtesy of oVertone.co

Once the start-up idea hatched, the women ran with it. And it feels like they have no intention of stopping. "We're the sort of people who jump head first into good ideas, I suppose," says Maegan. "'We're going to do it and we're ordering lab supplies right now' is pretty much how it started."

There was no market analysis nor 20-page business plan, just what Liora and Maegan describe as passion -  the kind of passion that fuels projects with what sometimes seems like the energy of 20 women, not just two.

"A business plan is just not our style. From my personal experience, I find that people who are successful jump face first into things and don't look back," says Maegan. "If something comes up and we need a business plan, well then we'll write it. But we don't want to waste the time. I'd rather focus on marketing and creating a brand and great product."

Laura Dinardo shows Vibrant Teal peeking out from under her brown locks. Photo courtesy of oVertone.co

Liora says when they agreed on the business idea, she had to go to a friend's wedding the next day. She found herself looking at her phone, going over 20 different emails from Maegan, who in a short time set up a website URL, did research on Shopify to set up online sales, and began identifying ingredients and bottle vendors.

The line they've created - 54 different products, to be exact - formally kicked off online on June 21 at oVertone.co. They've also been busy researching retail and wholesale markets, and they have interest in Australia. So part of their challenge now is making sure they have the labels legally required for the down-under market.

Why the interest? Liora and Maegan say it's because their research shows there are no other products like theirs out on the market - no coloring conditioner specifically for fantasy colors. Theirs allows freedom, they say - the ability for consumers to take hot showers and do heat styling without having to worry about damaging their color. "We're still looking for who else does what we do and we can't find it," says Liora.

Rambo Reza mixing it up with Extreme Teal and Extreme Blue. Photo courtesy of oVertone.co

If they do find anything similar on the market, what may set oVertone apart from the rest is a specific set of values important to Liora and Maegan. For example, they are using as many organic ingredients and recyclable materials as possible. "These go-deep weekly treatments are 70 percent organic and the daily are 30 percent organic. What's great is that we created these ourselves to make sure we know what's in them," says Maegan.

On their company blog and in all of their marketing they want to have as many different ethnicities, genders and body types represented as possible - not surprising, given Liora's strong support of the body positive movement. They also created a give-back program that allows customers to round up the cost of their online purchase and designate that dollar or more to one of four non-profits: American Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, Nurse Family Partnership and Best Friends Animal Society. "This gives our customers a voice," says Liora, adding that over time the charities will change.

There's also a trust factor they are counting on, the fact that they personally came up with the formula, mixing those early batches on tarps laid out in Maegan's Los Angeles kitchen and dining room. With the lab supplies purchased, Liora took the Amtrak train from Tucson to L.A. and once she arrived they started experimenting. Liora says some of Maegan's college bio-chemistry knowledge was a help, as well as their own experience with fantasy color.

Maegan shows off the effects of Extreme Orange. Photo courtesy of overtone.co

Says Liora: "We knew a decent amount about hair color and how it works and how pigments are structured. We took a lot of time researching and navigating the Internet to find the basic raw materials of what hair dye is made of, took that and reformulated it for our hair conditioner. It was sometimes a steep learning curve with the pigments." She adds that those early mixing days included a few phone calls to Tucson friend, stylist and colorist Amber Zabaleta of Imagen Salon.

"We'd give her call and say, 'Why are these not working?,' and we'd figure out if it was x, y or z. So we had some guidance. But Maegan's background in chemistry helped and I think both of us think similarly on a business level," Liora explains.

So together that day in Maegan's L.A. home they figured out the building blocks of hair dye. It helped, says Maegan, that there was a cupcake bakery and wine store down the street from her house. They also put the final touches to their business venture: the website, setting up social media, and researching the vendors who sold the ingredients. Plus, they were all able to successfully answer the first question women asked when they called: "Are your products cruelty free?"

Photo courtesy of overtone.co

Literally home-grown, the business still operates largely from Maegan's living room, where the pair recently mixed 180 ounces of conditioners for pre-orders. They are looking into contracting out the mixing, but first they need orders.

Maegan says the work involved in creating oVertone appealed to her Jane-of-all-trades attitude. While living in Tucson she worked for a health care IT firm while going to college, and continues to work in that field from her home in L.A. The fantasy color business is a creative outlet that she needs, she says, a home for her passion to create something and be part of something she loves. And while it would seem Liora gets enough creative expression through her commercial and personal photography projects, she says the facets of business development allow her to use her creativity in different ways that are equally rewarding.

Santana Nez in Pastel Orange ombre. Photo courtesy of overtone.co

While the partnership between Liora and Maegan is very collaborative, each brings their individual skills, which reflects the titles on their business cards: Chief Operating Officer for Maegan and Chief Design Officer for Liora. And while both say their friendship bonds over their individual entrepreneurial spirit, Maegan is the one with some specific start-up experiences that have provided her with a few lessons one might not expect.

"I've been trying to start a business since I've exited the womb," quips Maegan. "Early on I sold candy to my peers behind my teachers' backs in grade school." At 19 she was working several jobs to pay for college. She became a certified personal trainer and brought other trainers together to create an online consulting business, along with a fitness and women's empowerment blog. But it proved difficult to monetize and she moved on.

Austin Puca in Vibrant Red. Photo courtesy of overtone.co

"There have been other tries here and there and other industries, and every time you fail you learn a lot," says Maegan. "But the favorite advice someone shared with me along the way is if you wait to start until you're ready you'll probably never start. If you're comfortable when you do start, you may have waited too long."

What's evident to those lucky enough to observe Liora's projects - her collaboration with body acceptance activist and blogger Jes 'The Militant' Baker, for example - is the partnerships she creates. "It's a good way to live and very empowering," says Liora, agreeing. "Every partnership, I've always known was going to work out."

Maegan looks back at the beginning of oVertone and the intense energy each of them initially brought to the table. "Those first 48 hours we had done so much because we're really excited about it. I've been involved in a number of start-ups and I'm involved with the executive team in my day job - but I find that when the passion is lacking, it drains you.

"With this, we can stay up at all hours of the night and work for days. That's what keeps you pumped. That's what still keeps us inspired."

* To find out more about oVertone and to place an order, visit the website.

The Mercado District west of Tucson's downtown is finally flourishing and the village everyone hoped for is taking shape. By Gillian Drummond. Cover photo courtesy of Tom Wuelpern.

The Mercado district: creating village life in the middle of a city. Photo by Tom Wuelpern

When Tucson's long-awaited streetcar launches late in July, the last stop will be a little west of downtown, at a district known as the Mercado.

But while it might be on the edge of the streetcar map, it's far from an outpost for the city. If anything, the Mercado district, just off West Congress Street, is becoming one of Tucson's most significant hubs. In the last year, the retail space known as Mercado San Agustin has flourished, luring MAST, Transit Cycles, celebrated bartender Ciaran Wiese and top chef Ryan Clark. Agustín Kitchen, where Ciaran and Ryan both work (Ryan is a partner) is now firmly on Tucson's gastronomic map.

Some of PureBuild's Mercado homes. Photo by Gillian Drummond

But the buzz isn't just around the retail. A short walk away from the market, a village is being created. It's one of row houses, some single family homes, concrete arches and plazas that look like they've been airlifted and dropped from Italy or Mexico or Greece.

Tom Wuelpern, whose company PureBuild has erected 18 homes in the area and is constructing a half dozen more, says he is meeting with prospective buyers almost weekly. When the project was at its lowest ebb, he was lucky to have one such meeting a year.

Fellow builder Paolo DeLorenzo says: "I don't even think I got that." He built three houses and then, when the economy tanked, he stopped. In 2010 he bought two more lots, and another four in 2012. Now he, like Tom, is getting one or two emails or phone calls a week. Paolo, owner of Innovative Living, says he can date the uptick in interest to the laying of the first streetcar tracks.

Paolo DeLorenzo. Photo by Susan Denis.

Tom Wuelpern. Photo courtesy of Tom Wuelpern

Tom and Paolo are two of the original gang of six builders who were in on the project at or close to its birth in 2006, when the Mercado district, part of the Menlo Park neighborhood, was being hailed as an anchor in Tucson's downtown revitalization plans. After years of stop-start development and construction, hopes raised and dashed, a deep recession and a long, lingering question mark over whether that revitalization would ever happen, Tom and Paolo are finally seeing the fruits of both their labor and their patience.

Tom admits that were it not for his other work - custom builds and a specialty in rammed earth construction - he may have walked. Others did, namely builder James Gray, who turned to working in northwest Tucson, and Michael Keith, whose career took a different path (he is now chief executive officer of the Downtown Tucson Partnership). The other two builders involved were Barry Coleman and Dante Archangeli.

The entry to the Mercado's walking street. Photo courtesy of Tom Wuelpern

Tom credits developer Jerry Dixon, a partner in Rio Development Company and The Gadsden Company, with the fact that the Mercado district is still here. "There were moments when I felt, 'Is this going to stagnate?'" says Tom, who runs PureBuild with co-owner Jeff Scheffman. "We were riding it out, waiting for the business to come back. But it was Jerry Dixon who continued to forge forward with the Mercado because he believed in the project, that's what ultimately carried it through." Paolo agrees: "Jerry has been completely optimistic and motivational in difficult times."

Jerry Dixon remembers well the day in August 8th, 2008 when his company closed on the property deal for the 14-acre site. A few weeks later, Lehman Brothers ceased to exist. "We were perfectly timed to get our noses punched," he says. Construction stopped, money dried up. "I remember calling one bank and they said 'My God, we wouldn't even lend money to Warren Buffet right now'."

Still, Jerry and his family (son Justin Dixon, daughter Kira Dixon-Weinstein and son-in-law Adam Weinstein all work with him) waited it out, and kept believing in their project. They also proved it, by moving in. Justin lived in the first home built there (he now lives in California), and Adam and Kira and her sister Ashlyn Dumais now also live there.

Paolo bought there too, despite the fact that he says he could practically see the tumbleweed crossing the streets outside his house. Meanwhile his business fixing up and flipping houses (he owns properties across the city and in South Tucson) kept him going while things at the Mercado were, in his words, "dire".

Paolo DeLorenzo's Mercado homes are designed with lots of light, oak floors and white walls. Photo by Liam Frederick

The builders, developers and planner involved in the Mercado all have something important in common, says Tom: they have each done a lot of traveling, through Mexico, Spain, Greece and more. Some of them lived in Europe. Paolo is from the tiny mountain village of Lorenzago di Cadore, 75 miles north of Venice. Planner and architect Stefanos Polyzoides, based in Pasadena, is from Greece.

They brought that worldliness to creating a community that is opposite to suburban America, one where the car is ditched in favor of a walk, where row, or terraced, houses encourage neighborly interaction, and where residents meet - in plazas, around the communal mailbox, and in the Mercado San Agustin market.

Stella, the local cafe located within the Mercado San Agustin. Photo by Tom Wuelpern

The farmer's market at the Mercado San Agustin. Photo by Tom Wuelpern

The land they built on is some of the oldest in Tucson. When they started digging, they discovered the roofs of 3000-year-old houses, and canals that ran even deeper. That set the stage for winding streets that follow the old canal route.

PureBuild has built on 18 of the 90 lots at the Mercado, and favors a look that combines Mexican colonial with southern European: row houses, with wrought iron balconies and heavy wooden doors. After all, says Tom: "If history was different this would probably be part of Mexico."

Paolo's aesthetic is centuries away from Tom's - a modern European look that's heavily influenced by his Danish wife, Anne Ranek, who has had a hand in some of his interiors. "In Denmark it's built into their DNA. They have design incorporated into their life," he says. Paolo favors grey concrete floors, walls of glass, oak floors and white walls, while his exteriors blend Mediterranean with the southwest.

Latticed adobe bricks bring modern-yet-traditional detail to one of Paolo's homes at the Mercado. Photo by Liam Frederick

The homes at the Mercado - all masonry construction - are being built to last, says Paolo. "I want to build homes that people will want to live in for 100 years." And while it means you won't see any frame and stucco, it also means the properties don't come cheap. One of Tom's homes is currently on the market for $579,000.

Paolo's own home at the Mercado. Photo by Omer Kreso Photography

Paolo's Mercado home. Photo by Omer Kreso Photography

But to the skeptics who label Mercado as another upscale gated community - just without the gate - the developers and builders say no, that the point was always to attract not just the high spenders, but people of all income levels and life stages. There are already low-income apartments nearby, and low-income senior housing development Sentinel Plaza sits on one of The Gadsden Company's original parcels of land. Jerry Dixon plans 160 more low-income units, named West End Station, for completion next year, and the mid-priced Monier Brick Yard apartments soon after.

Also in 2015 he plans an upscale apartment building, Downtown Abbey, adjacent to the Mercado. And just this week Jerry dried the ink on a deal, under Mission District Partners LLC, to develop another 14 acres just east of the Mercado San Agustin for upscale retail and a hotel.

The Mercado San Agustin market. Photo by Tom Wuelpern

The tide has changed economically, says Jerry, but the building of the streetcar "is a game changer of magnificent proportions".

For the Mercado's newest residents, Jim and Chris Dauber, the streetcar stop sealed the deal for them buying there. These transplants from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania moved in to one of Paolo's two-story homes just two weeks ago. The retired couple are walkers, cyclists and lovers of city life and University events. "We go up to the University and riding a streetcar is a lot nicer a prospect than driving a car," says Jim.

The community hasn't just grown, says Paolo, it's grown tight. And now "my kids wouldn't want to live anywhere else." He and Tom want to milk that community spirit. Together they have plans for a cantina with beer garden on one of the Mercado's 'walking streets'. Also in the planning are a wine store, a Bed and Breakfast, and a restaurant.

Says Tom: "People are craving that interaction and human connection. I think people like to see people."

* Find the Mercado Tucson and Mercado San Agustin at South Avenida Convento at Congress Street, west of Interstate 10. 

* Find Tom Wuelpern and Jeff Scheffman at PureBuild Homes. Paolo DeLorenzo can be found at Innovative Living.