Hopkins Farm Creamery opens shop in Dewey Beach
Story Location:
1812 Coastal Highway
Dewey Beach, DE 19971
United States
Marina Cornescu said when she was a little girl growing up in Moldova, she used to dream of owning a cake shop or dessert shop.
Now, as owner/operator of the recently opened Hopkins Farm Creamery in Dewey, she gets to live out that dream and serve ice cream too.
"I love to make the cakes," she said, pulling out an example of a birthday cake from the store's lobby refrigerator.
Located in the Sea Spot Shops development on the northeast corner of Dagsworthy Avenue and Coastal Highway, the Hopkins Dairy Farm Creamery in Dewey is where Dairy Queen used to be.
In addition to Cornescu's homemade cakes, the creamery offers 21 flavors of locally sourced, handmade hard ice cream and three flavors of soft ice cream – vanilla, chocolate and swirl. There are crepes, milkshakes, sundaes, banana splits, fresh fruit smoothies and a selection of baked goods – some made by Cornescu and some made by Touch of Italy.
"Things have been going well," she said. "At night, the line can be out the door."
Cornescu is one half of the operating team – her husband, Petru, is the other half. The duo also own Pete's Steak Shop in Rehoboth, which will be celebrating five years in business July 3. She said when her husband found out Dairy Queen was leaving, he asked the folks at Hopkins Farm if they would be interested in selling their ice cream in Dewey.
"We were already selling pints of their ice cream at the Steak Shop, and they agreed to it," Cornescu said.
Cornescu said her two children, a 7-year-old girl and 4-year-old boy, were more than excited when they found out mom and dad were going to be opening an ice cream shop. Laughing, she said her son said he was going to eat all the ice cream.
"They want to come in everyday," she said, with the look of a mother recognizing the futile task. "We're trying to limit it to a couple of times a week. They want to try all the flavors."
Store hours are 9 a.m. to 11 p.m., seven days a week. Cornescu said the store will be open through Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 4, but after that, she said, it's tough to know.
"It's our first year. If it's still busy we'll stay open. If it's too slow, we'll close up shop and get ready for next spring," she said.
For more information on Cornescu's cakes go to her Facebook page at Cakes by Marina.
Chris Flood has been working for the Cape Gazette since early 2014. He currently covers Rehoboth Beach and Henlopen Acres, but has also covered Dewey Beach and the state government. He covers environmental stories, business stories and random stories on subjects he finds interesting, and he also writes a column called Choppin’ Wood that runs every other week. Additionally, Flood moonlights as the company’s circulation manager, which primarily means fixing boxes that are jammed with coins during daylight hours, but sometimes means delivering papers in the middle of the night. He’s a graduate of the University of Maine and the Landing School of Boat Building & Design.
