Vida Dulce: Living the 'sweet life' in Cary's ice-cream heaven

CARY, N.C. (WTVD) -- You can get everything from homemade ice cream and juice bars to fruit with chili at Vida Dulce in Cary.

Cousins Eric Torres and Carlos Torres opened their business in May of 2018.

"This is a Hispanic ice cream shop," Eric Torres said. "We're from Guadalajara, Mexico. Everything that you find in an ice cream shop there, you find here."

They have 60 flavors of popsicles, 28 types of ice cream and six kinds of "aguas frescas" or flavored water. There are also numerous unique dishes.

"We had this idea of a banana split but we call it a churro split," Torres said. "Instead of bananas, we put churros on it."

USA Today recently named Vida Dulce, which means "Sweet Life" in Spanish, the best ice cream parlor in North Carolina.

USA Today

Eric Torres spent a week at his grandfather's ice cream shop in Guadalajara, learning how to make the delicious desserts.

The expansive menu includes nachos, corn and pork rinds with chili.

"Always the reaction to someone that's not familiar to this concept is when you walk in, 'Wow, why is there street corn and then you're selling ice cream?" Torres said. "Why are these together? But it's really more like back home. It's a comforting place. You have a snack. You have a dessert. You have it all in one place."

Torres' parents immigrated to North Carolina from Mexico in the 1980s and started a chain of successful Mexican restaurants in the Triangle, including El Rodeo.

"I've been around customer service, hospitality since I was a little kid," he said.

The 27-year-old, born in Durham, is bringing that hospitality to Cary.

"We try to welcome people here, walk you through the whole process, how we do things, how we operate-samples, things like that," Torres said.

Want to try it? Vida Dulce is at 836 E. Chatham St. Suite 104 in Cary.