The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

I am continually surprised while writing this blog. Mostly by how much we suck. Like what are we doing with our lives? We have had an ice cream blog for almost a year and a half now and we have not made it over to Cold Stone. One of my goals for graduate school, other than trying every flavor at Heyn's, is to go to every frozen dairy shop in Iowa City. (lol who has academic goals during graduate school.) Yotopia and Cold Stone are the only frozen dairy shops in down town Iowa City. I've already hit up Yotopia, and loved it, so I figured it is about time I hit up Cold Stone. I also had a weird, hectic day and I needed twenty minutes to sit and eat ice cream in peace. Part of my weird, hectic day involved leaving my phone in my car. So I have no pictures of my treat. Sorry. But not sorry. So this treat was seasonal for the summer. Yes summer is over, I know. However, there is still more than enough time in fall to try their fall treats, but I'm guessing the days are numbe...

Pear Riesling Sorbet is the second pint I picked up at the recent Sweet Science tasting.  If I took a poll and asked people which fruit is most underutilized for desserts, I bet pears would be among the top answers.  Pear is a very delicate flavor, and I think it is very easy to lose it amidst spices or creaminess.  It's easier to avoid pear altogether than it is to experiment and find something that works.  Thank goodness Sweet Science didn't take the easy route!  I mean, do I even have to write a rewiew? This was top notch. The texture was perfection.  It was dense, smooth, and soft, but distinctly icy.  Ok, analogy time.  This sorbet is to shaved ice as shaved ice is to crushed ice. This sorbet tasted exactly like pears.  Maybe not like a plain pear, but more like a really lightly poached pear in a light, sweet syrup.  Also, maybe not like Bradford pears, but more like Bosc pears, which have a slightly denser, more savory...

It is hard to believe it has taken me this long to get around to reviewing two of my all-time favorite Haagen-Dazs flavors. Way back in the day, aka my freshman and sophomore years of college, the little grocery store, Paws-n-go, in the main Wash U dining hall, sold the faux-pints of Haagen-Dazs. (In case you have forgotten, because I don't think Madeline and I remind you enough, Haagen-Dazs containers that look like pints are actually 14ozs). Splitting a Haagen-Dazs with someone was pretty standard for after a tough exam, or a even a long day. During this time of my life, I discovered Haagen-Dazs White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle and Caramel Cone. I probably ate these flavors so frequently those two years that it has taken me a while to get excited about them again.  After purchasing White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle not long ago, my relationship with these Haagen-Dazs classics was rekindled. So now for a review of Caramel Cone. This flavor is described as A crea...

After thoroughly enjoying Edy's Salted Caramel Pretzel Frozen Custard, I thought I would give this relatively new line a third shot. So far I have had one bad experience, with the Chocolate Malt flavor, and one good one. This flavor can serve as the tie breaker! I want to start by telling you there is no description of this flavor anywhere on the container. However, on the Edy's website, the description reads A rich and creamy blend of sweet cream frozen custard with plenty of chocolate cookie pieces and peanut butter swirls in every bite . When I first ate this flavor, I assumed the base was vanilla. It is odd that vanilla is considered our default neutral base, when vanilla is a flavored ice cream, as opposed to sweet cream. As I was eating this flavor, there was something different about it compared to what I was expecting it to taste like. Something I couldn't quite put my finger on. When I looked on the Edy's website for the description, and found thi...

I've been seeing the Sweet Corn Blueberry ice cream pop up on Sweet Science's social media over the past few months.  I went to Tim and Tom's Market a few times in hopes that they would have this flavor stocked.  They never had it when I went, so I decided it was high time to head to one of Sweet Science's monthly free tasting events. (MONTHLY! YOU CAN TASTE ICE CREAM FOR FREE ONCE EVERY MONTH!) This particular tasting was held at LynLake Brewery in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis.  Not only can you eat free ice cream, you can drink a beer while you wait to have free ice cream and then another one after you eat free ice cream.  I didn't do this, but I totally will next time I go to a tasting. The tasting was awesome, and I just want to say thanks to Sweet Science for throwing these events and the employees and volunteers who make the event run smoothly. There were 12 flavors to sample, some of them seasonal and some of them of them in the core line. ...

I feel like I have been aware of the existence of a wide range of Haagen-Dazs ice cream or gelato bar products, but I hardly see them in stores. I finally used the last of the Haagen-Dazs coupons Madeline gave to me when I was at Target and stumbled upon these guys, and I snatched them up! The description of these bars is Golden caramel ribbons in creamy vanilla gelato, enrobed in rich milk chocolate and pizzelle cookie pieces. So basically these bars are the gelato bar version of Caramel Cone. I don't think I have ever seen the word "enrobed" used in an ice cream description. I think this word is pushing it a bit too far with the flowery language being used in ice cream descriptions. I get ice cream companies want to make their descriptions sound luscious and decadent, but this is ice cream, not a gown. Now, I did not know what a pizzelle cookie was until writing this review. According to my favorite source of information for desserts, Wikipedia, a pi...

The last few Culinary Circle flavors I tried were stellar, so I was excited to try their take on cookie dough ice cream.  This flavor is Vanilla ice cream with cookie dough pieces and chocolaty chunks. This flavor was ok, but not phenomenal.  I should have expected this because the flavor has a vanilla base.  There are very few vanilla bases out there that are truly amazing.  The first thing I experienced here was the distinct, brash and harsh flavor of vanilla extract.  Womp womp.  The ice cream also had an unnaturally bleached white color. The chocolate chunks were neither here nor there; passable, but standard.  They were small, crunchy and frequent enough to get some in each bite. The real standout was the cookie dough.  This was on par with some of the best cookie dough mix-ins I've ever had.  The chunks were monstrous: spherical with diameter about the diameter of a quarter.  They were quite soft and chewy and gooey, b...

After the popularity of my last review of a Haagen-Dazs sorbet, I decided to review another. I also keep getting more and more Haagen-Dazs coupons from HyVee, so I keep buying more and more Haagen-Dazs. (Next time I go grocery shopping I'm going to a different store. I can no longer tolerate these coupons boxing in my ice cream choices). I'm bummed out my HyVee didn't carry the mango flavor, which was recommended to me by a friend. This sorbet is described as Juicy, sun-ripened lemons are selected to create this refreshingly tart yet sweet sorbet . As I opened the container, my first thought was "This looks like a lemon slushy." And I do think the color and appearance of the texture resemble lemon slushies or frozen lemonades. Flavor-wise, this sorbet tasted like a slightly more tart version of a lemon a frozen lemonade. Like I'm thinking of the Minute Maid frozen lemonades you can get at ballparks or fairs? In my opinion, those products don'...

For me, this is THE ice cream flavor. I don't necessarily think this is the best ice cream flavor of all time. However, this ice cream flavor sort of opened my eyes to ice cream being more than Moose Tracks, cookie dough, mint, chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry. This flavor showed me ice cream was something you could have a lot of opinions about; you could be passionate about it. This might be the first flavor I was ever truly passionate about. So it is about damn time I review it. The description reads White chocolate ice cream swirled with tangy raspberry ribbons and satisfying chunks of chocolate fudge truffles . I'm going to enter into my review with the word tangy . I don't know if I can describe to you the difference between tangy and tart. Possibly tart is more sour, while tangy has more of a kick? I'm not sure, but this swirl is definitely tart and tangy. More so than actual raspberries. However, this swirl also tasted like real raspberries and wa...

Alert! Alert! Alert! I have the first pumpkin flavor of the season! It's only half-way through September! Summer is not officially over! What is wrong with the world! I feel like summer and I have a kind of 'Rose and Jack from Titanic' thing going on right now: Summer/Rose: Don't worry, I'll never let you go! Me/Jack: Oh, thank fuck! Summer/Rose: JK, bitches! Me/Jack.  Dammit.  I am now frozen to death. I mean, Kate Winslet, what a bitch.   Was anyone else obsessed with Leo when they were in 4th grade when Titanic came out? Although I'm currently having an "oh my god summer cannot possibly be over and school cannot possibly have started and fall products cannot possibly be on shelves" crisis/panic, my sadness is slightly mitigated because I love pumpkin-flavored things.  I just wish fall was not the only time to get them.  LONG LIVE SUMMER! Now that my little breakdown is over, I have a review of my first of (hopefully) many pumpkin-fl...

The first time I shopped at the HyVee by my house I was pretty underwhelmed by the ice cream selection. There were enough of the big national brands and Whitey's which is an Iowa brand, but nothing else. Sad day. However, the second or third time I was there, I noticed there was one freezer of ice cream separate from the rest of the ice cream. This contain the teeny Ben & Jerry's and Haagen-Dazs containers and other single serving ice cream treats. This included individually wrapped Thelma's ice cream sandwiches. Thelma's Treats started out as a cookie delivery business back in 2012 in Des Moines by a guy names Derek Lewis. Derek's grandmother was, as you may suspect, named Thelma, and she made delicious cookies. In 2013, Thelma, the woman herself, passed away at age 108! Pretty impressive, Thelma. Also in 2013, Thelma's started making ice cream sandwiches, which were delivered to Des Moines area HyVees. They've been pretty popular, so now you can ...

I picked up Ben and Jerry's Strawberry Not So Shortcake, a Wal-Mart exclusive flavor, on my recent ice cream purchasing binge.  This flavor is Strawberry Cake Ice Cream with Strawberries & Shortbread Pieces. If you thought there was no room for invention left in the ice cream world, you were wrong.  I've seen cake ice cream, cake batter ice cream, and strawberry ice cream, but I've never seen strawberry cake ice cream.  I recently bought a can of strawberry frosting that I'm pretty sure was from Pilbury, but it was some sort of special edition "Strawberry Something" flavor that I can't find online.  This ice cream tasted exactly like that frosting in all of its fake, palm oil-filled glory.  I don't know that I've ever had strawberry cake, but looking at recipes, it seems most are flavored and colored using strawberry Jell-O, so I imagine the taste is similar.  Either way, it is definitely distinct from normal strawberry ice cream. ...

I need to start shopping at a grocery store other than HyVee. Not that HyVee isn't fabulous, but I keep getting $1 off 2 pints of Haagen-Dazs coupons from them. Again, not that Haagen-Dazs isn't fabulous, but I need to branch out sometimes. But for the mean time, prepare yourselves for another onslaught of Haagen-Dazs reviews. Pomegranate is one of those trendy foods. Like kale or quinoa. It is constructed as having health benefits so high it is almost magical, and all of a sudden Big Food industries decided to capitalize on this. Big marketing campaigns, jacking up the prices of these foods, and convincing the insecure American public of a food's health qualities and bam! you've got profit. Okay, I'll stop anthropology-ing now. But for real, pomegranates had a big moment a few years ago. But unlike other foods having similar moments, pomegranates lend themselves quite well to desserts. However, I don't remember seeing tons of pomegranate desserts. Which...