Thursday, May 23, 2013

Ice cream is a favorite.  Mine, of course, and of most everyone elses (except the lactose intolerant-Sorry Sarah).   I have mentioned my mother’s preference for imitation ice milk, and how we ate it as if we had good sense.  We had a friend who was a milk-man.  On his truck he carried a variety of real ice creams and one day he had several half-gallons that were melty and he couldn’t sell them, so he gave them to us.  I thought I was in heaven.  My underdeveloped palate didn’t know what it had been missing.  I would sometimes go to the ice cream counter in the Skaggs drug store where they served ice cream cones and buy a triple scoop (two side-by-side and one on top) of marble fudge or chocolate.  Occasionally in the summer, we would make home-made ice cream in the hand crank White-Mountain freezer.  The ice cream was good but wasn’t creamy, probably because Mom made it with milk and didn’t put much cream in it.  On my Costa Rica sojourn as an 18 year old, I found a little shop that had chocolate ice cream that made me weak in the knees, and that really became my standard.  If I couldn’t walk after eating, either I was sick or the ice cream was really good.  After Beverly and I married, we bought an electric 6-quart White Mountain ice cream freezer and we started experimenting to find the best concoctions we could put together.  We made Triple-Coronary-Bypass Chocolate that you literally could only eat a cup of because it was so rich and so chocolaty.  We made Custard Vanilla that was so golden-creamy that each spoonful had to dissolve on your tongue because it was too good to swallow.  We made a cherry that was a delight to eat because the little cherry bits were the perfect fruity sweet burst in every bite.   I started making a Honey Vanilla that probably became the most requested flavor because it was creamy and sweet, but the honey added another semi-spicy aromatic taste that was hard to say no to.  I have always enjoyed shakes at Dairy Queen, and my favorite became a Butterscotch Pecan with extra butterscotch, or even better,  a Snickers Blizzard with extra butterscotch syrup or, lacking that, caramel syrup.  In Fairbanks there was an ice cream shop called Hot Licks that made a variety of delicious home-made ice creams with their own home-made syrups.  It was located in an intimate storefront with comfortable chairs and tables in conversations pits, more like you might find in a living room than a restaurant.  They served their trademark ice creams (different every day) at a counter in the front along with hot chocolates and other ice cream compatible goodies.  I made it a point to visit on my every-3-week trips for a year or so.  And because it was so good, they closed the business and reopened in a different location with an outdoor order window you had to wait in line on the sidewalk for and eat at a plastic table cemented into the ground.  The ice cream was good, but the charm factor was nil, and I don’t think they survived.  Nowadays, Robert has become the ice cream adventurer, and Carolyn and Tyson make their contributions.  Beverly and I don’t make much unless there is a big family gathering because if I make ice cream, I gain 5 pounds.  We don’t even buy ice cream very often for the same reason.  On my way home tonight, however, I stopped at McDonalds and ordered a large chocolate shake, heavy on the chocolate.  Now maybe it is just that I am ice cream-deprived, but I thought that was the best chocolate shake I have ever had in my life.  I almost went back and got another one, but you know what they say about discretion and self-control.