The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

Dearest readers, I've had some sort of super-virus. I was really sick for two weeks about a month ago, felt pretty much better for two weeks, and now I'm sick again with what feels like the exact same cold+fatigue thing. So apologies, I've had this post written for a few weeks, but I'm just now getting around to publishing it. Oatmeal Cookie Chunk was a popular Ben and Jerry's ice cream with somewhat of a cult following that got sent to the flavor graveyard in 2012. Oatmeal Cookie Chunk was sweet cream cinnamon ice cream with chunks of oatmeal cookies and fudge.   This sounds pretty darn close to the description of Oat of This Swirld: buttery brown sugar ice cream with fudge flakes and oatmeal cinnamon cookie swirls.  Unfortunately, Oatmeal Cookie Chunk left this world for the next before I really got into ice cream, so I know I've tried it, but I don't really remember it; however I was pretty disappointed by Oat of this Swirled, and it seems to be t

When I was growing up, Monster Mash was one of my favorite songs. Not just one of my favorite Halloween songs, but one of my favorite songs, period. I'm sure Madeline can attest to how often I listened to that song. However, I don't think I often ate monster cookies growing up. I'm not sure I was really cognizant of what a monster cookie was until college. Monster cookies are peanut butter and oatmeal dough with some combination of M&M candies, chocolate chips, and raisins mixed in. I think raisins are gross, and often monster cookies don't have raisins, which I obviously prefer. For all of these reasons, I was very excited to try Blue Bunny's NEW (yay for new!!) flavor Monster Cookie Mash. Unfortunately, I did not listen to Monster Mash while eating this ice cream. This flavor is described as Peanut butter ice cream, fudge ribbon, monster cookie dough pieces . One interesting fact before I start the review. Blue Bunny used to have a Monster Cookie flavo

One thing that happens when you're an ice cream blogger is that your friends start to get more into ice cream, which is AWESOME because then you always have recommendations and requests! One friend of mine said that some of his friends swear by Halo Top ice cream, and asked if I would review it for their benefit. Lizzy has reviewed a few Arctic Zero flavors, but I don't think we've ever had Halo Top on the blog. I get why Halo Top, Arctic Zero, and other 'healthier' ice creams have an audience and respect their place in the ice cream market; however I buy 99% of the ice cream I review. I'm a grad student without a ton of disposable income, so I tend to buy ice cream that I find interesting or think I will like, and 'health' ice creams just don't appeal to me that much. This post will be in two parts. First I'll review the ice creams, and then I'll provide some rambling thoughts about food, food guilt, and 'health' foods. Feel

I almost typed 'New for 1017' in the title. Throwing it back to the Middle Ages! In much more recent news, Lizzy and I are still working our way through the new 2017 flavors, and I have a review of a new Magnum bar: Double Chocolate Hazelnut described as Chocolate hazelnut ice cream dipped in chocolatey coating, hazelnut sauce and milk chocolate. Nutella is the ubiquitous chocolate/hazelnut combo, so I subconsciously expected biting into these bars to be like eating a spoonful of Nutella; however, they had a much different balance. The hazelnut sauce was the most notable element. It was thick and sticky and tasted like sweetened hazelnuts. In Nutella, the chocolate and hazelnut meld together to form a single flavor, but the hazelnut sauce lent the bars a hazelnut flavor distinct from the chocolate. The chocolate shell was the typical dark-ish chocolate in other Magnum bar flavors. I didn't actually have too much trouble with the shell cracking and making a mes

Lizzy just reviewed new Thelma's flavor  Sugar Cookie Coffee , and I unknowingly, but serendipitously bought Double Chocolate Mint, the other new Thelma's flavor. I don't keep close track of Thelma's line-up because, until recently, they've only been available in a few stores in the twin cities, but they're getting wider distribution and have finally made it to my local Cub! I actually thought this was a winter seasonal flavor and picked it up in a resentful embrace of the snowfall we recently had in Minneapolis. Like, dude, no one wants winter anymore. Stop snowing. These treats are chocolate chocolate chip cookies with mint ice creams.  Thelma's really nails the perfect ice cream sandwich cookie texture. Crunchy cookies break leaving a mess of ice cream, and soft cookies sort of smush ice cream out everywhere. Thelma's cookies are the perfect middle ground; thick, soft enough to cleanly bite, but hard enough to avoid the smush-factor. The c

When I first heard about the new Haagen-Dazs Trio flavors, I thought they sounded kind of gimmicky. The trio flavors are layers of two different ice cream flavors and crispy Belgian chocolate. But then one of my roommates got a pint before I did, and I asked her what she thought. She emphatically said it was good, so my expectations went up. There are three other Trio flavors, a salted caramel, coffee, and blackberry flavor. My HyVee had all but the blackberry, but just a classic triple chocolate sounded the most delicious the other day when I picked up this flavor. The triple chocolate is described as Layers of crispy Belgian chocolate, white & milk chocolate ice cream. Something weird happened in shipping I think. My first impression of this flavor was not good. It must have melted and refrozen a bit somewhere along the line, so the top looked very weird. However, after that first layer this flavor was pure bliss. The milk chocolate ice cream was both super milk and

In 2015, Lizzy predicted that alcoholic ice cream would be the new ice cream trend of 2016. Turns out, she was a year early in her predictions, and 2017 is the year that multiple mainstream brands came out with alcohol-flavored ice creams. Both Haagen-Dazs and Ben and Jerry's, arguably the two behemoths of grocery store super-premium brands, released a bourbon ice cream.  Haagen-Dazs has Bourbon Pecan Praline, nutty pecan pralines  and pools of brown sugar bourbon folded into bourbon ice cream.   Bourban Pecan Praline is a very grown-up flavor. Bourbon is a very sweet and smooth alcohol, which makes it the idea alcoholic ice cream flavor. The bourbon base had these sweet and smooth qualities, but it also had that uniquely alcoholic burn that you could both smell and taste.  The pecan pralines and brown sugar were the perfect mix-ins. The flavors were distinct from, complementary to, and not overpowered by the strong bourbon base.  The pecans were coated with a finely gra

Y'ALL it's time for NEW for 2017 ice cream yayayayayay! The HyVee by my house must have just gotten in a major ice cream order because of this week they've got ALLLLL the new stuff. So buckle up kids it's time for new stuff! I was super pumped to see Thelma's released a bunch of new flavors, including this one. Also Thelma's is now sold in ALL HyVee's around the Midwest, so hopefully some delicious ice cream sandwiches will be coming soon to a grocery store near you. Can you tell that it's spring break? I've been chilling on my couch playing major catch up with all of my reviews. This treat features sugar cookies and coffee ice cream. Thelma's has a very sweet sugar cookie. It also tasted more cookie-y than other sugar cookies, if that makes any sense. Which it doesn't. The cookies also very moist, as per usual for Thelma's. The coffee ice cream is new to Thelma's, I don't think it was featured in any of their older fl

Lizzy and I are both on spring break right now. Last weekend, she and her boyfriend visited Minneapolis, so we obviously went to ice cream. We only had time to check out one shop, and also wanted to go out to dinner, so we decided on Milkjam and it's companion restaurant World Street Kitchen. In honor of Women's History Month, Milkjam temporarily renamed all of their flavors after amazing women (I'll put the full list of honorees at the end of the post).  I got Gloria Steinem ( molasses with salted peanut brittle ) and Beyonce ( Caramelized goat, cow, and condensed milks ).  Note, the 'Beyonce' is normally 'Milkjam,' the shop's signature flavor. HOLY GLORIA, MOTHER OF FEMINISM, the Gloria Steinem was amazing. I want to cry right now just thinking about it. I just love nut brittle so much, and this was a nearly perfect brittle ice cream. I feel so, so sorry for you if you don't live in Minneapolis and can't try this flavor. I would more ac

Coffee and chocolate is such an obvious combination, but I don't think it's often done well in ice cream form. It's hard to strike the perfect balance between the darkness or lightness of the coffee and the darkness or lightness and texture of the chocolate. Haagen-Dazs takes a new approach to this combo, and I think I like it.  Haagen Dazs describes Espresso Chocolate Cookie as The smooth sophistication of coffee ice cream swirled with cookie crumbles and sprinkled with chocolate espresso flakes; let its bold flavors invigorate your senses. Somewhat serendipitously, I recently reviewed Haagen-Dazs Coffee , so I can compare that to Espresso Cookie Crumble. While Coffee was a lighter roast with plenty of cream and sugar, Espresso Chocolate Chip was a fuller-bodied, darker roast with just a hint of cream and sugar. The chocolate cookie crumbles reminded me of the chocolate cookie butter in Ben and Jerry's Boom Chocolatta. They had a similar thick and grainy

A few weeks ago, it felt like spring in Iowa City. Now that spring break has arrived, we've been pulled right back to winter, with highs in the 20s and a few inches of snow! For those of you who don't live in the Midwest you may be thinking, isn't it the wrong season for Peppermint Bark ice cream? Well, you are 100% correct, but if it feels like winter outside, I'm going to eat winter ice cream flavors. Peppermint Bark was the second Talenti flavor I got at the Coralville Wal-Mart the other day. I never saw this flavor, or very many seasonal winter flavors at all, for that matter, at my grocery store. This disappointed me, so I was happy to pick up a pint in March! This flavor is described as We combine the most refreshing peppermint gelato with chocolatey flecks of semisweet Belgian Callebaut, and it tastes like polar bear smiles and the northern lights. (Which is delicious, in case you were wondering.)  Gosh Talenti, you are getting real with your flavor d

The other day I went grocery shopping with Colin at the Coralville Wal-Mart. I'd never been over to that Wal-Mart before because it is quite far away from me, but it just around the corner from his apartment. I was hoping to find some of the new for 2017 flavors, and was disappointed. (Don't worry I found some the next couple of days at my own grocery store.) Instead, I found some Talenti flavors I've never tried that I've also never seen at any grocery store in Iowa City. Obviously, I snatched them up immediately. This flavor is described as We loved our creamy, traditional, perfect hazelnut gelato so much that we had to give it some friends. And by friends, we mean tons of roasted hazelnuts and bits of rich chocolatey chips. Giving-isn't that what love is all about? The Talenti flavor description writer is back at it again. I'm just imagining the plain hazelnut gelato being all sad and lonely without any friends. Chocolate chips and hazelnut chunks

I keep reading the name of this flavor as coocoo for coconuts, which would be something completely different, albeit delicious. I've finally worked my way around to trying this flavor, which I was very excited about when it came out. I love coconut flakes in ice cream. The description of this flavor is Caramel & Sweet Cream Coconut Ice Cream with Fudge Flakes & a Caramel Core . Overall I really enjoyed this ice cream. I think it is my second ever core flavor after Boom Chocolatta Core. I wanted to say that first cause I have a few nit picky issues with it, and I didn't want it to sound like I didn't like the flavor. First, is a good comment. I loved the sweet cream coconut ice cream. It had a perfect balance of sweet and nutty flavors. It was also filled with coconut flakes, which are just the perfect texture in ice cream. However, the fudge flakes were also in the coconut ice cream, but not in the caramel. So there was a whole lot of texture on one side, an

I'm calling it right now; Ben and Jerry's Truffle Kerfuffle wins for best-named ice cream of the year.  I love the word 'kerfuffle'! Truffle Kerfuffle is Vanilla ice cream with roasted pecans, fudge flakes, and a salted chocolate ganache swirl.  If you're a regular reader of the blog, you probably know how I feel about Ben and Jerry's vanilla base. If you're not a regular reader, just know that it tastes weakly of fake vanilla.  Luckily, this pint is all about the mix-ins, and not at all about the base (sorry, Meghan Trainor). There were, indeed, a kerfuffle of mix-ins. The pecans were whole or nearly whole. I got one what seemed like every bite, and I definitely got fudge flakes in every spoonful. The fudge flakes were smaller than in some other Ben and Jerry's flavors like Cherry Garcia, but this served Truffle Kerfuffle well because it allowed the pecans to stand out. Is there anything better than perfectly roasted pecans? Roasting

I'm a little salty (heh) that Minneapolis is just now starting to get this year's new flavors.  It's March people, the third month of the year! On the other hand, I'm kind of ok with it, because how the hell is it already March?! Haagen-Dazs Peanut Butter Salted Fudge is the first is Peanut butter ice cream with salted fudge swirls and chocolate covered peanuts. When I opened this pint, the smell of peanut butter walloped me in the face.  Whoa! I thought this was a quite auspicious beginning for this flavor.  Haagen-Dazs has a 50/50 record on peanut butter ice creams; their Chocolate Peanut Butter is amazing, but their Limited Edition Peanut Butter Pie was only so-so.  With Peanut Butter Salted Fudge, they're now batting over .500.  The peanut butter flavor was intense, but with enough dairy element that it almost tasted like the peanut butter/cream cheese combination of a peanut butter pie. The salted fudge swirls would have been amazing in a less int

Hooray! It's the first new for 2017 flavor. For a while now I'll be bringing you lots of new for 2017 flavors as my HyVee just stocked the new Haagen-Dazs Trio flavors, which I'm soooo pumped about. I was feeling a bit ambivalent about these new Edy's/Hostess flavors, on the other hand. Hostess desserts are so bad, but so good and you don't really want to admit that you eat them as an adult. But new ice cream is new ice cream so lets see how this goes. This flavor is described as Chocolate cake ice cream, chocolate cake pieces, and a frosting swirl.  Given I had super low expectations for this ice cream, it wasn't too bad. The base had a hint of cake flavor to it, but it mostly tasted like chocolate. A strong, rich chocolate, but not very much cake flavor. The texture of the base, however, was lacking. There was a lot of air and it melted very quickly. It just did not stay frozen at all in my freezer. My freezer could be colder, but at the same time,