Particularly during Hanami season, pretty-in-pink cherry blossom (or sakura) soft serves are a popular choice of tourists and locals alike.

Not to be confused with black sesame ice-creams (caution: vegetarians), squid ink ice-creams have been adopted from the Korean iced treat and blended with vanilla.

For times when you can’t decide between sweet or savoury, salt vanilla soft serve is a snack that provides a little of both.

A little like a smoky caramel, charcoal ice-creams are sweeter than they sound. Though charcoal on its own isn’t a particularly strong flavour, often other ingredients will be added (and sprinkles on top).

Whitebait might seem an unlikely ice-cream flavour, but it’s not unheard of in Japan. Sometimes vanilla ice-creams are dipped into a topping of whitebait, often their flavour is infused throughout, and sometimes a splash of soy sauce is added into the mix.

Look out for sweet potato ice-creams (both golden and purple) sold on the streets of Kyoto (they’re a particular favourite in Nara). Smooth sweet, and not too overpowering, this is a combination that surprisingly works.

Miso soft serve tastes not too dissimilar to salted caramel. With many restaurants in Australia beginning to add miso to dessert menus, this one is a safe gateway into the world of Japanese savoury ice-cream.

Served in a rockmelon with a big scoopful of sweet red beans, this is a much-loved summertime treat throughout Japan. Warning: you may need two hands to manage this plateful.

It might sound painfully hot (or cold, as it were), but wasabi ice-cream is a mellowed version of this savoury ingredient. Just don’t blame us if someone gives you a particularly burny batch.

Not uncommon on the menus of Australia’s Japanese restaurants, Black Sesame ice-cream is a mild, delicious bite that’s easy to devour.

Is this the ultimate soft serve flavour? The perfume of lavender lends itself beautifully to the soft texture of soft serve – imagine eating a floral cloud, if you can.

Now this is one you can likely tick off the ‘eaten that’ list. Green tea (matcha) soft serve is a classic Japanese treat – it seems few desserts a spared an infusion of this flavour in Japan.

Now we’re hitting the savoury side of the spectrum. Soy sauce soft serve is, as you might imagine, fairly salty. If you’ve ever wondered what a vegemite soft serve would taste like, this one can give you a fairly close preview.

Similar to matcha, hojicha is a type of roasted green tea (which is where its brown hue comes from). It tastes a little more toasted than its green counterpart, but boasts a similar flavour.

Sour, sweet and refreshing, in this soft serve flavour, the citrusy zing of yuzu combines with a decent dose of salt – in balance, it works well.