A miniature doughnut riding on a milkshake straw is a pretty good argument for taking dessert seriously. At Great Shakes in downtown Palm Springs, that little flourish accompanies a drink built around a much older local obsession: dates.
Follow that ingredient across Greater Palm Springs and the scenery changes with the recipe—from an Indio date garden to a neighborhood market, from a candy counter to cafés blending bananas and almond milk. Some shakes lean heavily on vanilla ice cream.
Others bring coconut, walnuts, or berries into the conversation. The fun is in the differences, especially once you stop expecting every cup to taste alike.
These ten stops make a choose-your-own trail, best spread across several outings rather than attempted in one heroic afternoon. Bring someone willing to share, leave room for lunch, and give the dates a chance to explain why they belong in your milkshake.
1. Shields Date Garden – Indio
More than a century of date growing gives a milkshake some fairly substantial credentials. Founded in 1924, this Highway 111 institution makes the connection between the fruit and the finished drink unusually tangible: you can order a shake, browse date varieties, and spend time at the garden rather than simply collect a cup and disappear.
The address is 80225 Highway 111, a useful eastern anchor for a trail that otherwise includes plenty of Palm Springs stops. Its signature recipe combines low-fat vanilla ice cream with house-made blonde date paste, and the original 1960s shake counter supplies a fitting place to start.
Order the classic before getting distracted by everything else for sale. There is plenty to investigate afterward.
The shop’s selection includes Medjool, Deglet Noor, Halawi, and other varieties, a reminder that “date” describes a whole category of fruit rather than one uniform flavor. Date Crystals also make a practical souvenir for anyone whose interest extends to recreating the drink at home.
Then there is the theater and its memorably titled film, The Romance and Sex Life of the Date, an introduction to cultivation with considerably more personality than the average agricultural presentation. Give this stop more room in the schedule than a standard ice cream shop.
The appeal is partly the shake, certainly, but also the opportunity to see how much of the business revolves around the same fruit. A carton of dates and a bag of crystals might be the sensible purchases; the cold vanilla-and-date combination is the immediate reward.
Starting here also establishes a useful reference for the rest of the trail: a straightforward date shake against which the walnut, coconut, and fruit-heavy interpretations can be compared.
2. Lappert’s – Palm Desert
Two kinds of ice cream go into the classic here, which tells you exactly where this particular shake stands on the dessert spectrum. Date Casablanca ice cream joins vanilla ice cream and date paste made fresh daily.
That puts dates into both the frozen base and the blended mixture, giving the recipe a different construction from versions that introduce fruit to vanilla alone. The two listed choices are Classic Date and Banana Date; whipped cream is available on request.
For a first order, the classic makes sense. Banana can have its turn once you have established what the date-and-vanilla combination brings to the cup.
Find the Palm Desert shop at 78206 Varner Road, Suite G, in the Sun City area. That location matters when planning the day: this is a Varner Road stop, so put the actual address into your route instead of assuming every Palm Desert dessert shop clusters around El Paseo.
Listed hours run from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and until 10 p.m.
Friday and Saturday, leaving room for a shake after dinner as well as during an afternoon drive. There is also a downtown Palm Springs branch at 130 North Palm Canyon Drive if that fits your movements better.
The menu offers a dairy-free option on request, plus extras including another scoop of ice cream or a condensed-milk “snow cap.” Those additions are best considered in relation to your appetite and how many other stops remain. With date ice cream, vanilla, and paste already involved, the standard recipe has plenty going on.
This is a good place to let the ice cream shop do what it does best and resist turning a comparison tasting into a competition for the fullest cup.
3. Monster Shakes – Cathedral City and Palm Springs
A menu featuring a cotton candy burrito and ice cream nachos might seem an unlikely place for a relatively restrained local classic. Yet among the elaborate desserts, the date shake gets a straightforward listing of its own.
The regular costs $8.95 and the large $10.95 on the current menu, while the Traditional Vegan Date Shake starts at $9.95. That vegan recipe uses Coconut Bliss, coconut milk, and fresh dates, giving this stop particular value if your group wants to compare dairy and coconut-based interpretations at the same counter.
The ingredient change is substantial enough to make that a worthwhile comparison. Coconut brings its own flavor to the fruit rather than simply standing in for milk.
The Cathedral City location sits at 68718 East Palm Canyon Drive, Suite 300; its Palm Springs sibling is at 425 South Sunrise Way, Suite H-7. Both give you access to a menu that ranges well beyond the trail’s central ingredient.
That flexibility comes in handy when one person has reached their date limit and another remains committed to the assignment. Birthday Surprise, for example, involves birthday cake ice cream, frosting, sprinkles, strawberry syrup, and a miniature cupcake.
A plain date order looks almost reserved beside it. Make the choice before the dessert names pull everyone in six directions.
For a focused trail stop, order the standard date shake or its vegan counterpart and share the experience across the table. For a family outing, let the menu accommodate different appetites.
There is room here for someone pursuing a regional specialty and someone who simply wants an extravagant ice cream creation. The date shake holds its place among all that confectionery theater without needing a cupcake balanced on top.
4. Great Shakes – Palm Springs
Look for the little doughnut first; then pay attention to what is underneath it. At 160 South Palm Canyon Drive, Suite A, the signature garnish supplies an easy conversation starter, but the shake itself has a more interesting foundation.
The business uses an ice cream recipe developed by founder Douglas Nelson, produced in small batches by a family dairy about 30 miles west of Palm Springs. Its date shake pairs that ice cream with dates from Leja Farms.
Those are useful details when several shops within the same downtown stretch offer the same drink: the base and the fruit source help distinguish one interpretation from another. The Date Walnut version is the natural next step for anyone who already knows the basic combination.
Walnuts introduce a different texture and a nutty counterpoint to the sweetness, while the dates keep the order firmly connected to the trail. There is also a Date Malted, made with Leja Farms dates, the house ice cream, and malted milk powder.
Choosing between the straightforward shake, walnuts, and malt is more useful than getting lost in the entire flavor selection. Each gives you a specific way to explore the same central ingredient.
This stop fits especially well into a downtown afternoon because you can make the shake part of a walk instead of an outing that requires its own drive. Order with enough time to enjoy it before moving on; balancing a cold dessert, shopping bags, and a phone is a less charming activity than it sounds.
If two people are sharing, the classic and Date Walnut make a sensible pair. The miniature doughnut will probably get the first photograph, but the choice between fruit alone and fruit with walnuts gives everyone something better to discuss afterward.
5. Nature’s Health Food & Cafe – Palm Springs
Long before plant-based shakes became a routine menu expectation, this Palm Springs business was building its identity around vegetarian food and a neighboring health food market. It opened in 1993, and its address—555 South Sunrise Way, Suite 301—places it away from the main Palm Canyon dessert circuit.
That makes it a useful change of setting as well as a different kind of order. The vegan date shake combines Shields Date Crystals with soy milk, soy ice cream, and banana.
The link to Shields is especially interesting: an ingredient associated with a historic date garden turns up in a café recipe with an entirely different base. Banana deserves some attention here.
It contributes body and a flavor of its own, so approach this as a date-and-banana combination rather than expecting an exact duplicate of a dairy shake. Soy ice cream keeps the preparation connected to the frozen-dessert side of the trail, even as the milk and other ingredients take it in a separate direction.
For anyone interested in how recipes work, this is one of the more useful comparisons: the dates remain, but several of their supporting ingredients change. The menu has also included a Power Date option, another indication that dates are established café ingredients here.
Build this visit around lunch or a browse through the adjacent market, particularly if the rest of the day already involves downtown Palm Springs. A dedicated stop on Sunrise Way helps spread the trail beyond its most obvious concentration of counters.
There is no need to make the shake carry a health claim or justify it as a virtuous dessert. Its interest lies in a specific recipe and the way that recipe connects two longstanding local businesses.
Dates, banana, soy milk, and soy ice cream are quite enough to talk about over a cold cup.
6. Fruit Wonders – Palm Springs
Cinnamon, coconut crème, and almond milk take the familiar date shake in a distinctly different direction at this North Palm Canyon stop. The standard recipe lists dates, banana, vanilla extract, and those three supporting ingredients, with no ice cream in the ingredient lineup.
That makes it one of the clearest departures from the classic dairy-shop formula. It is still a purposeful combination: banana and coconut crème supply body, vanilla connects the flavors to familiar shake territory, and cinnamon adds a spice note.
Anyone keeping track of recipes along the trail will have plenty to compare here before even considering the variations. The Green Date Shake adds kale and spinach to a similar foundation.
A Berry Date Shake goes another way, bringing blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, and strawberries together with banana, dates, and almond milk. Those are meaningfully different drinks, so choose according to what you want to learn—or simply what you feel like drinking.
The standard gives you the most direct introduction to the house’s date recipe. The berry version makes more sense for someone drawn to fruit combinations, while the green option puts leafy vegetables into the same conversation.
The shop is at 264 North Palm Canyon Drive, making it easy to include in a downtown walk. Its broader menu includes juices, frescas, and fruit bowls, useful when traveling with someone who would prefer a different kind of refreshment.
On a longer shake trail, this stop also changes the tasting questions. Instead of asking which vanilla ice cream works best with dates, you can consider how coconut, spice, and fresh fruit alter the balance.
Keep the first order simple enough to follow those ingredients. A cinnamon-and-date combination has its own point to make without every berry joining in.
7. Windmill Market – Desert Hot Springs
Lunch belongs in this itinerary somewhere, and a neighborhood market with sandwiches and a backyard patio is a sensible place to put it. At 17080 North Indian Canyon Drive, this stop offers groceries and produce alongside its much-discussed date shakes.
The Desert Hot Springs address also pulls the trail north, away from the cluster of downtown Palm Springs dessert counters. That change in geography is part of the appeal.
A shake becomes the reason to visit a business you might otherwise pass while concentrating on the next hotel, restaurant reservation, or stretch of highway. Make room for the market’s everyday purpose.
People come for food and groceries as well as dessert, and the menu has included sandwiches, tacos, burritos, and hot dogs. Pick something savory before settling into the shake, especially if this is the middle stop in an ambitious day.
The rear patio gives the visit a place to land; it is a concrete advantage over trying to manage lunch and a melting drink from the driver’s seat. A sandwich, a shared shake, and a table are a perfectly respectable afternoon plan.
This is also a useful place to pay attention to texture. Date shakes can differ in how completely the fruit blends into the frozen base, and noticing that difference is more revealing than immediately declaring a winner.
Take a sip, pause, and consider whether the dates read as a smooth sweetness or something more distinct. There is no official scorecard to complete.
The pleasure of including a market in the trail is that the drink arrives as part of an ordinary food stop, with lunch and shopping happening around it. That is a different experience from visiting a shop devoted almost entirely to ice cream, and it earns its own place in the route.
8. Hot Cookie – Palm Springs
Some of the most useful trail information is wonderfully uncomplicated: a 20-ounce date shake, a choice of French vanilla or dairy-free vanilla ice cream, and a downtown address. The current listed price is $11.95, and the recipe pairs the chosen ice cream with local dates.
That offers an accessible starting point for a mixed group, particularly when people want a similar style of drink with different bases. The choice happens at the foundation of the shake, so specify it when ordering rather than treating dairy-free vanilla as an afterthought.
Both options put dates into a recognizable ice cream-shop format. The Palm Springs store is at 155 South Palm Canyon Drive.
Posted hours extend to 10 p.m. Sunday through Wednesday and 11 p.m.
Thursday through Saturday, making it a practical candidate for the evening portion of the trail. That is useful when your afternoon has already included lunch and another dessert, but a walk after dinner restores your interest.
The business’s roots are in San Francisco, where it dates to 1997; its Palm Springs location adds a locally relevant shake to the cookie-shop proposition. Naturally, cookies complicate the decision.
Consider sharing the shake before adding a separate treat, especially with a 20-ounce portion involved. There is a difference between happily ordering dessert and accidentally assembling enough for the entire table.
This stop works particularly well for people who prefer their trail to unfold around other plans: dinner first, a stroll along Palm Canyon, then something cold. It also makes a straightforward comparison with the coconut-based vegan shake at Monster Shakes or the soy-based version at Nature’s.
Here, dairy-free vanilla keeps the flavor choice close to the classic structure. The experiment can be as modest as changing the ice cream and seeing what happens to the dates.
9. Palm Greens Cafe – Palm Springs
Breakfast tacos and a date shake make a convincing case for leaving the usual coffee routine alone for a morning. At 611 South Palm Canyon Drive, Suite 6, the café serves Dos Breakfast Tacos with eggs or tofu, black beans, avocado, potatoes, roasted green chile, and tomatillo salsa.
The listed price is $13, with a third taco available for another $4. That savory combination gives you something substantial to eat alongside the trail’s sweeter assignment.
It also makes this one of the easiest stops to build into a proper meal rather than squeeze between meals that have already happened. The date shake appears under Organic Smoothies at $13, with local dates, banana, almond milk, and vanilla extract.
Its short ingredient list provides a useful contrast to recipes built around ice cream, coconut crème, or multiple fruits. There is little to decode: dates supply the central sweetness, banana gives the blend body, and vanilla supplies a familiar supporting flavor.
The café also uses dates in Strawberry Summer, which combines them with strawberries, banana, oat milk, and vanilla, and in Mucho Matcha alongside greens and flax seeds. For a focused trail order, stay with the date shake and let breakfast provide the variety.
There are plenty of ways to do that. Greg’s Locomoco pairs a house-made mushroom patty with brown rice, sautéed greens, mushroom gravy, and either scrambled eggs or tofu.
It is a more substantial proposition if tacos will not quite do the job. What makes this stop useful is the way the shake fits into the menu.
It can sit beside breakfast as naturally as coffee or juice, with the rest of the meal supplying salt, spice, and texture. A trail gets easier to enjoy when every stop does not require a separate dessert appetite.
10. Palm Springs Fudge & Chocolates – Palm Springs
Mackinac Island has an unexpected supporting role in this desert dessert stop. The shop opened in 1994 as Heminger’s Fudge and Chocolates, using recipes brought from Michigan, and adopted its current name in 2004.
That history explains why a date-shake outing leads into a business so committed to old-fashioned confectionery. At 211 South Palm Canyon Drive, fudge shares the billing with chocolates, hand-stretched brittle, toffees, and truffles.
The regional specialty is one part of a much larger sweet selection, which gives the final stop a different character from a date garden or smoothie café. The shake itself stays in familiar territory, combining vanilla ice cream with dates; accounts of its preparation describe date purée blended with milk and French vanilla ice cream.
That straightforward construction makes sense after some of the trail’s more adventurous combinations. Walnuts, coconut milk, greens, and berries each change the conversation.
Here, the focus returns to dates and vanilla, a pairing that leaves relatively little room for distraction inside the cup. Outside it, of course, the candy selection presents an entirely different situation.
Browse before ordering if you want something to take away, then give the shake its own moment. Choosing a piece of fudge for later is easier than trying to appreciate fudge, truffles, and a milkshake simultaneously.
This location also fits neatly into a Palm Canyon walk, so the visit can end with a little time on foot instead of an immediate return to the car. There is something pleasing about the combination of influences gathered at this counter: Michigan fudge traditions, a Palm Springs address, and a drink centered on the valley’s best-known fruit.
The shake is for now; a small bag of brittle can wait until the ride home.
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