Tai Kim constantly churns out new ice cream flavors. Tonight he's got 18 trays to fill and he wants four of them to be vegan. Beet and pistachio? No, he's done that before. Perhaps chocolate and wasabi? He's not sure he bought enough of the Japanese root. He'll stick with bacon--you can't go wrong with bacon.

At 5 feet 6 inches tall and slightly balding, Kim is the unofficial mayor of Heliotrope Drive--a beer-soaked patch often referred to as the "bicycle district." His small tattered ice cream shop, Scoops, doubles as his personal flavor laboratory. Here he tests his frozen concoctions on radical vegans, quirky stoners and brooding hipsters who roam Heliotrope. Though he's in his mid-40s and still lives at home with his parents, Kim has undoubtedly become one of the most celebrated fusion chefs in Los Angeles. He's just not ready to move out; not quite yet.

In the span of three years, Kim has created more than a thousand flavors of ice cream, gelato and sorbet. In the past month, his ever-changing daily menu has featured such flavors as strawberry balsamic, rosemary sheep cheese, blackberry ricotta and salty chocolate. Kim's avant-garde flavor combinations and flare for foie gras are reminiscent of a Napa Valley chef extraordinaire. He likes sharp contrasts, vibrant colors and odd resonances. His combinations never feel cold, scientific or contrived. His ice cream is heartfelt, sincere and one-of-a-kind. He has a way of making avocado-apple feel like an old-time favorite.

Tai Kim and Will Stangeland sit at one of Scoops' back tables slurping tofu pho and sipping green tea. Of Kim's four employees, Stangeland has been with him the longest. The two met at an underground music club in the summer of 2006 and quickly became drinking buddies.  When things didn't work out with Stangeland's band, Kim offered him a job at Scoops. He is 5 feet 11 inches tall, has piercing blue eyes and is possibly shyer than Kim.

Stangeland taps his fingers to the pulsing electronic beats blasting from a nearby customer's PowerBook computer. "You'll have a beer with us before you leave for the night?" he asks.

"Mmmm-hmm," Kim mumbles in between bites.  "No reason not to."

Most of Kim's friends are half his age and have tattoos.  He spends his nights drinking Fat Tire beer and eating greasy chicken wings from O B Bear (a nondescript pub in L.A.'s Koreatown) before driving home to Valencia.

"I don't think I'll have anything left to do here," Kim adds. "I already wrote up tomorrow's menu for my parents and they'll start it in the morning."

At 8 a.m. every day, Kim's parents make the trip from Valencia to East Hollywood and begin prepping the ingredients from the list their son taped to the refrigerator the night before.

"My parents love helping out. They would be here all the time if they could," Kim says.

Kim normally strolls in at 11 a.m. and takes over the mixing process. By 2:30 p.m., one of his employees helps with the afternoon crowd.  Around 7 p.m. Tai makes the decision to stick around or leave the evening rush to one or two of his employees. He usually opts to stay.

"Tai's not here to make a quick buck," says Stangeland. "He made Scoops to teach others about flavors. His creativity is inspiring. He doesn't need to be here all the time, but he stays because he loves his craft."

Kim's family emigrated from Korea to Los Angeles when he was 17.  He couldn't speak English, so he expressed himself through painting. While studying fine arts at Cal State Long Beach, he decided there was already too much "bad art" in the world and searched for a new medium.  He transformed his studio into a karaoke bar. On Thursday nights, he would open his doors to friends and family eager to drink, sing and be merry. He served beef short-ribs marinated in soy, sesame and garlic, while pitchers of Kirin beer constantly flowed. There were no set prices, but Kim received plenty of tips.  It was his first venture into the food world and he somehow stumbled into success.

Kim discovered his true calling in the dark corner of a Portland, Ore., storeroom. While attending the Western Culinary Institute, he took a work-study job in a kitchen warehouse and came across an old ice cream maker.  At first, he made your average chocolate, vanilla and strawberry flavors, but quickly became bored. There were hundreds of spices and herbs, plenty of cheeses and produce at his disposal and he couldn't resist experimenting. He mixed durian and ginger and found happiness; black currant and basil was pure brilliance. Ice cream was the instant medium he had been searching for, his brushes replaced with whisks and his paints now edible.

He had to share his new flavor palette with others.

When Kim returned to Los Angeles, he drafted a business plan, asked his parents for seed money and searched for a place to open his ice cream shop. After a year of scouring the city, Kim made a wrong left turn and discovered Heliotrope. The location couldn't have been more perfect. It was located near a community college, two bike shops, a cannabis club and a vegan restaurant. He quickly signed a lease and became the proud proprietor of an East Hollywood storefront.  

At first, Kim ran the store by himself; he liked it that way. He scribbled down a menu and advertised $2 for two scoops (cash only) and painted the walls white. A "Flavors to Suggest" dry-erase board hung prominently in the corner; local artists showcased their works on the walls. His shop was simple, but his ice cream was wild. He developed a quiet following of L.A. City College students and bike messengers and catered his shop exclusively to their needs. Business was slow, but his days were more exciting.  It was the calm before the storm.

After a year of cutting coupons and borrowing money from his parents, customers began to pour in. A "Los Angeles Times" writer wrote a blurb about his shop in the food section. Word spread about the "shy Korean with the crazy ice cream." Just as everything started coming together, Kim found he couldn't deal with success. In fact, he resented it. He no longer had time for his creations. He was too busy serving brown bread (a Scoops staple based on an Old English recipe topped with Grape Nuts and caramel) to the masses. There was no time to cook, clean, or even sleep. The once blank "Flavors to Suggest" board was now covered in ideas. People wanted tofu scramble and banana nutmeg flavors. He started asking customers how they found out about his shop--and that's when he discovered Yelp.

Scoops appeared on a list of the top five eateries in Los Angeles on Yelp (http://www.yelp.com). While most business owners find that an honor, appearing on Yelp was Kim's worst nightmare. The buzz brought quite a few ice cream zombies into his shop demanding whimsical flavors they had read about on the net. The lines were too long and the new customers were too pretentious.  He didn't like being trendy; he'd rather count pennies. He contacted the site in a hopeless attempt to remove Scoops' name from contention; they refused. He was stuck.

All of a sudden Kim was part of the yogurt craze that had taken Los Angeles by storm--and he didn't even sell yogurt.  "Scoops was popular. Yogurt chains were popular. So people put one and two together - it drove him crazy," says Stangeland. Kim wanted nothing to do with the obsession that had weight-conscious Angelenos injecting "fro-yo" into their veins.  "I'm not like Pinkberry, Yogurtland, Schmoozberry, or any of those places. We're an ice cream shop," he says.     

In order to keep his business afloat, Kim was forced to accept longstanding offers from his parents and hire four employees: Mark, Will, Peter and Heneth. The new structural changes were better for business. Plus, he's now able to sleep in.

Kim and Stangeland are now sitting on the curb outside Pure Luck Restaurant.  Kim nurses his beer and eats leftover jasmine pear ice cream ("I like the pear flavors. After a long day of work, I like to cleanse my palette").

The two discuss the latest collection of gallery pieces that Kim has hung prominently in his shop. Stangeland thinks the drawings look like "stick figures on LaserJet," but Kim thinks they're brilliant. "I wouldn't want to be responsible for any more bad art," he says.

Kim tugs off his black leather mules, exposing his pristine white socks.  His eyes are tired and his hands are sore. After an hour of sipping beers with Stangeland, he decides it's time to make the 30-minute trip back to Valencia.

"Before you go, just tell me one thing," Stangeland says as he digs his spoon into Kim's pink dish of melted ice cream.  "Are you doing chocolate bacon tomorrow? I saw you eyeing the bacon grease earlier."

Kim giggles. "I don't get what guys have against bacon. It's fun."