The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

Earlier this week I was at Target with my mom. I'm bumming around my parents' house right now until I move to Iowa City. Unless Madeline or I are around my parents don't have ice cream in the freezer. So while we were at Target, I put on my best two-year-old-who-wants-a-candy-bar-while-at-the-store voice and was like "Mahhmmmm will you buy me ice cream?" Not actually. It basically went down like this. Mom: "Do you want to grab some ice cream while we are here?" Me: "Yes" Thought I will say, I am not afraid to pull out my whiny two year old voice if I feel I might not get ice cream. Not sure if it would still work on my parents 21 years after it was relevant, but you gotta do what you gotta do. In reality, Target doesn't have too many ice cream brands and I wanted to try something New and Different. So I decided to try Target's Archer Farms brand. They make super tasty trail mix, so what the heck, they might make good ice cream, too

Being somewhat of a completionist, it is my goal to try every Talenti flavor ever.  And every Ben and Jerry's flavor.  And every Haagen-Dazs flavor.  And every Graeter's flavor. And ever flavor of ice cream in the world ever.  I have a spreadsheet and I check off flavors after I try them. The thought that I won't be able to try every flavor ever keeps me up at night. Because of this compulsion, I keep a mental list of what I like to call 'Unicorn flavors.'  Specifically, these are flavors in the permanent line-up of a decently well-known and widely available brand that I just never, ever, ever see in stores.  Some of them, like Talenti Simply Strawberry, make no sense.  I mean, strawberry is a pretty standard flavor, it should be available everywhere Talenti is sold.  Others like Haagen-Dazs Green Tea (although this seems to be making a surge lately), make a little more sense.  Green Tea is not a super popular or well-known flavor among the general American popul

Growing up, arctic was one of those words I had a lot of trouble spelling when I was growing up. Mostly because nobody actually pronounces the first "c." Writing this blog post is going to be a spelling struggle. It was my last day in Syracuse and my grandmother and I realized we had only been to one ice cream shop my whole visit. Luckily, my flight wasn't until the afternoon, so there was time to visit one more. Arctic Island is not too far down the road from Gannon's. And in internet ice cream world (aka people commenting on a list of the best ice cream shops in the area) there is much debate about which is better, Gannon's or Arctic Island. My cousins Jack and Ben, used to like Arctic Island more than Gannon's, but as of late the tides have turned. Given the amount of ice cream my cousin, Jack, eats (he had three times the amount of ice cream I did when we were at Gannon's), I think their opinions are trustworthy. The big deal at Arctic Is

When I picked up Pirate's Bounty (I just cannot keep from calling it Pirate's Booty in my head) I also picked up another pint of Cedar Crest, Raspberry Fudge Chunk.  This is Raspberry ribbon and fudge pieces blended in vanilla ice cream. Simple and sweet, with a description to match.  Let me start with something negative about this pint that also holds for all Cedar Crest flavors with vanilla base.  The base ice cream is so, so, so unnaturally white.  Whyyyyyy? Howwwww? It's seriously so much whiter than it looks in this photo.  My shiny, white table makes the ice cream look somewhat normal.  It is not. That bit of weirdness aside, this was a pretty solid pint of ice cream. The raspberry ribbon had a very strong, intense raspberry flavor.  It leaned more toward sweet than tart, which was good because such a strong tart flavor would have been overwhelming and would have overpowered the other flavors in the pint. The fudge chunks came in all different shapes

My summer of ice cream adventures continues and I get to put another state on the list of state's from which I have tried ice cream. Right now, I am visiting my mother's family in the Syracuse, New York area. Two days ago we visited Gannon's Isle Ice Cream. The place was pretty overwhelming. First, it was busy, granted not anything Ted Drewes level. Second, there menu was overwhelming. Most ice cream shops take only one of a couple different approaches. A place like Ted Drewes has limited base flavors but lots of toppings, candies, and combinations to make great concoctions. Another approach, a place like Izzy's, has LOTS OF FLAVORS, and if they even offer any toppings or sundaes, who cares and they aren't important menu offerings. Another approach I have encountered recently is like Clementine's. They rotate through a lot of flavors, but only have a few available at a time, they are super classy and have some super classy sundae toppings. Gannon's, on the

Lizzy's been killing the review game lately, while this has been sitting in my drafts folder for a month.  I'm still alive guys, and here's a review to prove it! Cedar Crest is a Wisconsin-based dairy, that recently started selling pints of their ice cream (as opposed to larger containers).  It's in the middle of the pint price range.  It's not super-premium ice cream, but it's still pretty good and they have some fun flavors. On a recent trip to the grocery store I picked up a pint of Pirate's Bounty because, I thought it was called 'Pirate's Booty' and I'm mature.  This ice cream is M&Ms chocolate candies and chocolate sandwich cookies in caramel flavored ice cream. One thing that's interesting about this ice cream is they sprung enough money to Mars to use actual M&Ms, which is not super common. This is kind of your generic, fun, throw lots of mix-ins in party flavor, but the caramel base sets it apart from its

When I was waiting in the Denver airport to go back to St. Louis after my trip, my flight got delayed 2 hours. Luckily there is a Ben & Jerry's in the Denver airport, so I had something to do to pass the time. Frequently, airport Ben & Jerry's don't have the most incredible flavor selection. The Denver airport Ben & Jerry's is no exception. However, they did have an SNL flavor I hadn't tried yet: Wayne'Swirled. This ice cream is described as Dark caramel & vanilla ice creams with fudge & caramel swirls.  I am slowly becoming a fan of Ben & Jerry's dark caramel base flavor. Although it is called dark caramel, the flavor is light. However, it isn't overly sweet or cloying and thank goodness it isn't salty. It's more of a grown up caramel base. It is also possible the vanilla base mixing with the dark caramel base is why the dark caramel base tasted light to me. There was more dark caramel base than vanilla base, and wh

You heard about before backpacking ice cream, you heard about during backpacking ice cream, and now it is time for after. Our last day of the trip we only had two hike 2 miles. We decided to get up on the early side so we could make it into town and have a nice brunch. There was an ice cream and candy shop right next door to where we got brunch. Although no one else got ice cream, Brett and I did. I must be converting him to my lifestyle. At Grand Lake Chocolates, there were quite a few flavor offerings; probably around twenty. However, none of them were too outrageous. I decided to get a small Espresso Chip. The base of this ice cream was a pretty standard coffee flavor. Not too strong, sweet, and creamy. As in any ice cream and candy shop combo, the chips in the flavor were quite tasty. They were small, but frequent. They were dark chocolate, but not overly bitter. They were softer and chewy, not brittle. Last, the texture of this ice cream was airy and light. I w

Alert! Weirdest ice cream blog post you have ever read ahead! If any of you thought that I could actually survive five days without ice cream while backpacking, ha! Wrong. That's why there is freeze dried ice cream, also know as astronaut ice cream. Two of my friends I was backpacking with and I bought ourselves some freeze dried ice cream to bring along on our trip for a treat one night. Each packet of freeze dried ice cream is a single serving. We had a couple of different flavors, and I opted for the neapolitan flavor, a childhood favorite of mine, over mint chocolate chip. Before this instance I had never eaten freeze dried ice cream, which other members of our backpacking group thought was strange. Apparently, astronaut ice cream sandwiches had a moment back when we were kids and I totally missed out on the trend. I guess I was too busy eating real ice cream or something. Thus, opening the package, I had no idea what to expect. I was greeted with a little square of

If you read my last blog post you might think I died from hunger while on my recent backpacking trip. You might think, Lizzy! You backpacked for 5 days and only prepared with 2 day of ice cream, are you okay?! Don't worry friends. In addition to going to Scrumptious Ice Cream in Arvada two days in a row, Brett and I ate at Little Man Ice Cream in Denver two days in a row, as well. The first day we were there we, honest to goodness, had no intentions of getting ice cream. We were planning on seeing a Rockies game. But then it was raining a lot as the game would be started, and we were not invested enough in a Rockies vs. Braves game to sit in the rain for hours. Obviously, the next best option would be to get ice cream, because rain should have no impact on ice cream eating, right? Well only if the ice cream you are planning on eating is indoors. Little Man, however, only has outdoor seating. Oh, the lengths I will go to in order to get ice cream. A year ago, I think, my fri

Sometimes ice cream bloggers disappear into the wilderness aka go on backpacking trips. And like a bear preparing for hibernation, said ice cream bloggers eat a lot of ice cream in preparation. However, then they are left in a lurch with a lot of ice cream to review and no way to write the reviews. So prepare yourselves for an onslaught of reviews in the next couple of days. Unfortunately I was not able to visit my grandparents when Madeline and my dad did. I got multiple text messages about the delicious sounding ice cream they were eating and I was quite jealous. However, my turn to get ice cream at Scrumptious came, and obviously I had to out do Madeline. So I got ice cream from Scrumptious twice in two days. Ha. The first day I was hoping for the blueberry pancake flavor Madeline reviewed because maple syrup. However, it was not on the menu. Sad day. However, a flavor I've never seen another ice cream shop or company attempt before was on the menu, Tootsie Roll. The firs

Alright Fenton friends, it is time for a trip down memory lane, back to when none of us had anything better to do than go to The Malt Shop. It is hard to believe Madeline and I have been writing this blog for over a year now and neither of us has made our way over to The Malt Shop. For those of you lucky enough to grow up outside of Fenton, thus unlucky enough to probably not have gone to The Malt Shop, I'll give you a quick description of the shop itself before I review the ice cream I got there.  The Malt Shop is the old fashioned ice cream and burger place with only a window to order from and a bit of outdoor seating. Despite its lack of amenities, it is the best of places, mostly because they give you a lot of tasty ice cream for not much money. And man, I bet they make a killing. The Malt Shop is often pretty crowded and I don't know anybody who grew up in Fenton who doesn't have about a dozen fond memories of eating ice cream at The Malt Shop. An obsession I o

Graeter's has, hands down, the best chocolate chips in the game right now. They're so good that I don't even feel the need to review their Double Chocolate Chip flavor.  I mean, you know it's going to be good.  But, dear reader, I'll review it anyway.  For you. I'll take the description from their website, because it's epic: What's better than chocolate? That's right, more chocolate! Graeter's Double Chocolate Chip Ice Cream is a decadent duet of of Belgian milk chocolate and behemoth bittersweet dark chocolate chips that will have chocolate lovers everywhere saying, "Bravo!" not once, but twice. Handcrafted, french pot ice cream that is irresistibly good! "Decadent duet."  "Behemoth." Epic.Word.Choices. They got rid of their cuted, pin-stripe containers. Sad day Normally I'm a dark chocolate fan, partially because milk chocolate is not done right most of the time.  This was not the case her

My first experience with Three Twins was with the flavor Butterscotch Pecan.  It was good, but I was severely disappointed by the lack of butterscotch flavor.  I love butterscotch, so when and ice cream promised me butterscotch and failed to deliver, I was disappointed. Lizzy convinced me to give the brand another try, so recently I picked up Lemon Cookie.  This ice cream is Lemon ice cream with vanilla sandwich cream cookies. Crooked lid! As Lizzy mentioned before  in her review of this flavor, it's as if our father owned this ice cream company.  Seriously, I cannot comprehend the depths with which that man loves vanilla sandwich cookies.  I mean, they're good, but wow.  All Three Twins needs now is a Circus Animal Cookie flavor and my dad's life would be complete! The lemon base was divine.  It was tart but not sour, with enough sweetness to balance everything out.  It tasted like the creamiest lemon bars you've ever tasted. The cookies were amazi

I finally visited  Grand Ole Creamery , a St. Paul ice cream institution!  It's 30 years old and was the first ice cream parlor in St. Paul to serve super-premium ice cream!  I haven't heard much about Grand Ole Creamery, so I didn't really know what to expect. Kyle and I drove over to the St. Paul location on Monday night.  We parked a few blocks away and walked over to the shop. They have a giant ice cream cone for a sign, so there was no missing it, but the door was set back from the sidewalk so I almost walked right by.  The ice cream freezer/display was to the right immediately as you walked in the door.  There was only one other family in line with us, but because the line was so close to the door it felt suuuuuper crowded.  There wasn't a lot of room to wander the counter to look at all the flavors.  I felt too rushed and like I was taking up too much space as I asked to sample a couple flavors.  I could see how this could become an issue on days the shop gets