Fix-It and Forget-It

The Turkey Hill Giant Cow in the picture above is a common site in Lancaster County, and along the Eastern seaboard, too. Turkey Hill is a local dairy with a wide reach, and this cow travels to many major events.

My dad worked at the dairy his whole adult life and, among his responsibilities, was helping to choose the ice cream flavors. So we always had ice cream around when I was growing up. Dad would try out the flavors on us.

Maybe that’s why I’m an ice cream nut. If it’s in the house, I eat it. When I know it’s there, I can’t go to bed without some. So I try not to buy it.

Merle, who basically doesn’t snack, sometimes has a little break in his resolve and shows up with two or three boxes of ice cream. He buys flavors I’m not interested in—usually vanilla and black raspberry.

Vanilla is too bland, even if it has little black flecks in it, trying to convince me it’s the real stuff. And while I love black raspberry pie (because the fruit sings), but black raspberry ice cream just doesn’t measure up. The sugar barges out ahead of the fruit flavor and I’m reminded that I’m eating something artificial.

Give me chocolate ice cream, chocolate peanut butter, or chocolate with nuts or cookies in it.

Now and then I get desperate for ice cream at bedtime, so I help myself to whatever flavor of Merle’s is sticking around. I dish it into a mug (an effort to control the amount I’m gonna eat) and then pour some leftover coffee over it. That helps improve the flavor (if it’s vanilla), or masks it (when it’s black raspberry). I put the mug in the freezer for about 45 minutes so the coffee and ice cream can freeze together. Then, with a few strong stabs of my spoon to blend things, I’ve got myself a frappuccino.

Depending on what else I’ve got in the cupboards, I’ll swirl in cookie crumbles or spoonfuls of peanut butter.

Here’s a link to more ways to improve ice cream when you’re faced with some that doesn’t quite measure up to what you had hoped for!