What do you do when your cows produce a surplus of cream?

If you’re Shatto Milk Co. (shattomilk.com), you churn some super-premium ice cream at the farm, then head to the city for some good cookies.

Matt Shatto didn’t want a facsimile of the commercial ice cream sandwich: a rectangular slice of vanilla ice cream between two tasteless and gummy chocolate wafers. Instead he decided to brainstorm with Erin Reynolds Brown, owner of Dolce Baking Co. in Prairie Village. Together they created a gourmet treat they call Ice Cream Sammich.

Shatto’s and Brown’s taste-testing yielded four flavor combinations: sugar cookie and strawberry, oatmeal-raisin and caramel sea salt, chocolate brownie and vanilla, chocolate chip cookie and vanilla ice cream. But that was the easy stuff. Their research and development phase took into consideration the ratio of ice cream to cookie to avoid unattractive “squish” from the sides and the optimum recommended thawing time before eating to obtain maximum flavor.

Shatto relied on Kansas City’s Sullivan Higdon & Sink to hash out packaging and design issues. The individually packaged sammiches will get a look that is in keeping with the existing line of award-winning logos found on Shatto’s bottled milk, butter, ice cream and cheese curds. But since this is a product that screams fun, the copywriter decided to yuk it up a bit by adding stories about rainbows, mimes and half-men with horns.

Look for the sammiches at Whole Foods, Hy-Vee, Cosentino’s Market, Hen House and Price Chopper stores the first week in April. Suggested retail price: $3.69-$3.89.