All in the family Stepping out for a cool treat? We hope you meet these sweet Holly Springs families dishing up a cold dose of happiness like it’s their job. Because it is.
Written by Emily Uhland Photographed by Jonathan Fredin 24 June/JULY 2022
The Belt Family JT’s Creamery
The homemade ice cream at JT’s Creamery is a labor of love, one the Belt family wants to share with all the residents of Southern Wake. Tom and Wendy Belt taste tested the top local scoop shops before opening their ice cream parlor in Holly Springs’ Village District last November. “We use all-natural ingredients and real fruit; the dyes come from vegetables,” says Wendy Belt. “It is an all-natural, premium ice cream.” “When we lived in Chicago, we went to an ice cream parlor every Friday night. We’d walk up and down Main Street. A lot of memories came from that,” says Wendy. “We wanted our (ice cream parlor) to be like that, a destination, where you would not just grab a cone, but sit back and relax and enjoy it with family and friends.” The location at The Block on Main was a perfect fit, adjacent to the amphitheater, with plenty of room for cornhole,
HOMEMADE, ALL-NATURAL ICE CREAM IS CRAFTED WITH PREMIUM INGREDIENTS FROM ITALY AND FRESH FRUIT.
Connect 4, and chalk drawing, plus an ideal way to start or finish a stroll through the other shops and restaurants filling up the flourishing downtown district. “We are a family-owned business amongst family-owned businesses,” says Tom Belt. Three generations of Belts live in Holly Springs now, and Ben Belt, eldest son of Tom and Wendy, calls that “a big I told you so.” Ben and his wife Hannah moved to Holly Springs eight years ago on a whim. Next came Ben’s sister Brittany and her husband Jon, who moved to the area when Brittany attended graduate school at Duke University. Wendy and Tom followed two and a half years ago, relocating from New York to be closer to their two oldest children and three grandchildren. When the pair decided to open the creamery, they asked their youngest son Josh to join them as a partner, effectively relocating the last of the
