I must confess that my very first thoughts on hearing or seeing the word "scoop" all involve ice cream. I love ice cream in ways that can't really be described in words. If I thought I could work out every other available minute, I would eat ice cream for lunch and/or dinner probably every day.
My favorites, of course, depend on the season.
Early summer calls for root beer floats, filled with much more than just one scoop of ice cream.
late summer/early fall is when I turn to the mackinac island fudge ice cream with caramel and hot fudge topping, no whipped cream and no nuts, extra cherries.
the instant it's "holiday" enough time for the grocery stores, I scoop up peppermint candy ice cream, which I think may be my favorite but is only available in November and December. (OMG yum)
midwinter is when Girl Scout Thin Mint Cookie Ice Cream becomes available (briefly)...also yum.
spring makes me want sorbet. Maybe because there hasn't been anything resembling fruit (or any kind of real fresh food) in my part of the country for so long by that point that the acidic fruity nature of sorbet is something my palate craves.
And, of course, the Turtle Blitz from the Freeze is lovely and wonderful anytime the Freeze is open (May-October). They use pecans that are both salty and slightly glazed...maybe they add salt to the caramel as they're glazing? I don't know, but OMG it's so good.
When it was available, I also loved the Breyers Overload "Fried Ice Cream"...with a little warm caramel sauce added, it tasted JUST.LIKE. fried ice cream from my favorite mexican restaurant back in Yak. (I don't think they're making this anymore--I looked for it the other day to no avail.)
If I'm looking for a grocery-store available ice cream that won't tempt me to eat the entire half gallon tonight, I like to pick up Ben and Jerry's "Everything But The..." It has heath bar pieces in it, which are so ridiculously good in ice cream it's a little embarrassing. (the lack of half-gallon temptation is due to the size Ben and Jerry's comes in...I have accidentally eaten the entire pint before....)
When I was little, during the time I lived at my grandparents' house, I remember eating ice cream with my grandpa many nights. His favorite is rocky road, I think--chocolate ice cream with marshmallows and I think chocolate covered peanuts? That's not my favorite, but it's certainly pretty to look at! We would get our bowls of ice cream and, if we had a special night, we might get out a bag of pretzels and use the pretzels as spoons. Salty-sweet, creamy-crunchy, cold-roomtemp...it was so so good, and such a wonderful memory to have. So wonderful, in fact, that tonight I might just eat some ice cream with pretzels....
What is it about ice cream that makes it the first thing to pop to mind on seeing "scoop"--right before thinking about singers who scoop their notes and before thinking about gossip/news?
I have no idea.
I do know that it's one of those things that makes my mouth happy, and it must release some kind of endorphins because ice cream just feels so...relaxing, luxurious, soothing. I eat ice cream even when it's cold outside and everyone else is saying "you seriously want to eat ice cream TODAY? really? it's too cold for ice cream."
It's never too cold for ice cream.
Nope - never too cold!
ReplyDeleteOh yes, ice cream. Anything with bits of chocolate and caramel and nuts. Or coffee. I love coffee flavored ice creams. I found that they’ve started stocking little individual serving containers of some of the top brands. That may be the only way to prevent me from eating a pint at one sitting. The other day I picked up a little container of coffee ice cream, put it in the workroom freezer and ate it after lunch. Sigh. At Costco you can get a chocolate-dipped ice cream bar rolled in chopped nuts. And they don’t stint on the nuts.
ReplyDeleteI love Breyer's Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream and am quite dismayed that it is not carried on a regular basis at either of the grocery stores I frequent. When I do happen to find it, I buy every gallon there, which has at times resulted in my having as many as 4 gallons of mint choc chip at one time as well as other flavors.
ReplyDeleteWhat a brilliant and evocative post! I love ice cream, too. Far too much!
ReplyDeleteyeah! it was one of my words and somehow i knew you would post about ice cream. no idea why...
ReplyDeletenever too cold for ice cream!
ReplyDeletewe used to have Godiva chocolate ice creams at the grocer in KC. i don't know if Godiva stopped making it or they stopped carrying it. it was by far my favorite chocolate ice cream.
the summer is dangerous for me as ice cream is always on sale and i love it entirely too much.
thanks for a fun and delightful post! Hagaan Daaz's (sp?) dulce de leche is my current favorite.