Mr. Cohen, whose bearded photograph appears on each container next to Mr. Greenfield's, owns 50 percent of the stock. Mr. Greenfield, who owns 10 percent, has since moved to Arizona, but remains as a consultant and appears in the company's 10-second late-night television commercials in the New York area.

The Battle

Those commercials, Mr. Cohen said, mirror the company's spirit: ''We say, 'We might not be able to afford a 30-second commercial but we sure make good ice cream.' '' And their battle with H"aagen-Dazs, he added, shows that ''we can stand up to the big guys.''

The fight started last spring, when Ben & Jerry's brought its product into stores throughout New England and New York. Citing conflict of interest, H"aagen-Dazs tried to keep two of its distributors from carrying the new competitor, which is another ''superpremium'' brand selling for about $2 a pint.

Ben & Jerry's countered with an antitrust suit that has just been settled out of court, and a grass-roots style campaign that centered on the slogan ''What's the doughboy afraid of,'' referring to the Pillsbury trademark.

Under the terms of the settlement, Ben & Jerry's will end that campaign and H"aagen-Dazs will not try to prevent their distributors from carrying the Ben & Jerry's label.

Neither Ben & Jerry's nor H"aagen- Dazs admitted fault in the matter, and Carl Hevener, an attorney in the evaluation office of the Federal Trade Commission, said: ''Antitrust litigation can be long and almost prohibitively expensive. Sometimes it's just cheaper to settle.''

Set against the Green Mountains and Lake Champlain, Ben & Jerry's tiny, makeshift factory and offices on the outskirts of town hardly look like a challenge to the larger ice cream maker, whose revenues last year were about $140 million.