The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

Klondike Cookie Dough Swirl bars are indulgent cookie dough ice cream with beautiful cookie dough swirls, all dipped in thick milk chocolate y coating. I had really high hopes for these bars, thinking that the cookie dough ice cream would be on a level with the caramel ice cream in the Caramel Pretzel bars and the toffee ice cream in HEATH bars. The cookie dough ice cream starts off with a nice strong eggy, sweet flavor, but this quickly fades. Klondike ice cream isn't particularly dense, so there's not that rich dairy base for the flavor to grab on to. The caramel and toffee ice creams complement the hint of toffee in the shell, so the two elements enhance each other, overcoming the lighter flavor of the ice cream. The cookie dough ice cream has to hold it's own against the chocolate shell, and the flavor is just not quite strong enough. Klondike swirls are always a bit weird - they are very thin ribbons, so don't add much of a textural element. The c...

Kemps' ice creams really run the gamut of quality. Some are phenomenal (omg, their YO2 line) and some less so. Even within the Yogurt Shop line, there is a huge range.  Sadly, Yogurt Shop Fudge Brownie Cookie Dough is at the low quality end of the range.  This flavor is Chocolate and vanilla frozen yogurt with a fudge swirl, cookie dough and brownies topped with semi sweet chocolate curls. Every element of this flavor was sub par. First, can we please just do away with chocolate curls. Almost without fail they are weirdly waxy and you have to be really careful you don't spill them everywhere since they just sit on top of the ice cream. If your name is Fudge Brownie Cookie Dough, you should really, really have substantial fudge brownie and cookie dough chunks. I honestly can't recall if I got any fudge brownie chunks. I got a few cookie dough chunks, but they were SO TINY! Itsy-bitsy cookie dough spheres without much flavor. Teensy-weensy flavorless dough ...

My favorite thing about the So Delicious line of non-dairy frozen desserts is that they make flavors with all of the different non-dairy bases. There is a lot of debate in the ice cream world about what non-dairy milk makes the best ice cream base. But with So Delicious, everyone can just have their fav, with no debates. They have some stellar cashew milk bases (which is under utilized as a non-dairy ice cream base imo), so I thought I'd check out a coconut milk base. This flavor is described as Vanilla coconut milk based, dairy-free frozen dessert packed with scrumptious cookie dough chunks and crispy chocolate flakes.  Often coconut milk is a popular base because the coconut flavor can be concealed. In this case, the coconut flavor was very prominent. It was like a coconut base with a hint of vanilla flavor. Now, I don't think this is a terrible thing, but if you don't think cookie dough and coconut will vibe well together, you will be disappointed. Other tha...

2018 is off to a pretty good start here in the ice cream world. Ben & Jerry's announced their new flavors the other day (and they are lit), Blue Bunny 2018 limited edition flavors are out (including this Cookie Butter flavor), and most importantly, I , Lizzy Handschy, am back to blogging. Just kidding about that being the most important. Right now the most important to us is this new Blue Bunny flavor. It is described as Speculoos cookie flavored ice cream, cinnamon graham and speculoos caramel swirls, and speculoos cookie dough chunks . This flavor is basically one step away from spooning cookie butter straight from the jar into your mouth. It is pretty one note, with a touch of nuance. The base was strong and speculoos was really the main flavor of the ice cream. The speculoos cookie dough chunks tasted pretty similar to the base, but with a bit of eggy-ness of cookie dough. I also don't think I know of another flavor that has speculoos cookie dough , so that...

Although it's still listed on Walmart's website, Sam's Choice Ice Cream seems to be no more, at least at my Walmart, but there are some interesting new released under the Great Value Brand including some new ice cream flavors as well as some new treats, including the O'Chunka Chocolate Ice Cream Cones, rich and chunky chocolate chip cookie dough mixed with super velvety chocolate brownie dough, nestled in vanilla ice cream side-by-side with chocolate ice cream and coated in chocolate flavored coating in a sugar cone. What is up with that name? Is it trying to be Irish? I don't exactly associate ice cream with Ireland. Some of the other new flavors and treats also had pretty weird names, but not ~fun~ weird or ~whimsical~ weird. Just weird. These cones would have been great had they been manufactured by Ben and Jerry's, and cost more per box, but as they were, it felt like Great Value was kind of skimping on the mix-ins. The cones are slightly smalle...

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...

How many Styx/ice cream lovers are there who have been waiting for decades for this ice cream?? Well, if you are one of them, HyVee has finally delivered. I almost couldn't bring myself to buy this ice cream because the pun is SO BAD. And not bad in a good way, just bad bad. Ugh. But I love cookie dough so I got over myself and bought it. This flavor is described as Cookie dough ice cream with cookie dough pieces, chocolate flavored chips, and cookie dough revel.  So this flavor is very similar to the Blue Bunny flavor that came out recently. Like basically the same elements. However, I think I enjoyed the Blue Bunny a bit more. All in all this flavor was just too much. Too sweet, too rich, too artificial tasting, just wow. I could only get through a third of a pint in one sitting before getting overwhelmed. The base was quite strong and the cookie dough revel was very thick with an even stronger cookie dough flavor. Similar to Blue Bunny, the swirl was quite goopy and ...

Every time I go to Target, I see these bars and think about getting them. I'm very drawn to them because they have incredibly attractive packaging. I usually don't purchase these types of things, frozen dairy desserts trying to be "healthy," but when I noticed the cookie dough flavor, I had to throw some in my cart because I am a lover of all things cookie dough. And a new year means time to try some different things! The description of these treats reads, Vanilla frozen greek yogurt bars with chocolate-flavored chips & pieces of cookie dough . The first thing I will say about these bars is man oh man is this company targeting a certain demographic, women between 25-40 I would guess. And oh gosh I'm almost in that demographic. Where the bar pictured below reads, "they say love is blind, but it must have taste buds" some of the bars in the package read, "no regrets, unlike that haircut in college." Ahhh! Second, these bars are ...

It's just a flesh wound! Aka, finals clearly beat me and Madeline up pretty hard, but we barely didn't die. Now prepare for an onslaught of catch up posts over the next few days. Quite a while ago I tried this Blue Bunny flavor, and in the car driving home to St. Louis, I discovered Madeline tried it recently, as well. So we decided to write a joint review. Many moons ago, two years ago, to be exact, I had the best cookie dough flavor I ever had in my life. The flavor was 2nd Street Creamery's Can't Tell Me No! Cookie Dough. This pint had cookie dough flavored ice cream, a cookie dough swirl, and two kinds of cookie dough chunks. Not long after I discovered this brand, 2nd Street Creamery went out of business. I died a little on the inside because I would never have this cookie dough flavor again, which I think I will say is my favorite ice cream ever. Tears. (Madeline's note: I'm still in mourning for 2nd Street Creamery. The ice cream gods are cruel and...

Grand Ole Creamery is a creamery in St. Paul, famously visited by President Obama in 2014.  In addition to serving up delicious scoops at their shop, they also sell pints at grocery stores throughout the Twin Cities.  I don't typically buy scoops shop ice cream outside of scoop shops, but, frustrated with the lack of seasonal flavors, I decided to pick up a pint of Grand Ole Creamery Cookie Monster. Lizzy has had her go at an ice cream that improves upon the standard cookies and cream with  Til the Cows Come Home Who Stole the Cookies from the Cookie Jar?  and now it's my turn.  Cookie Monster from Grand Ole Creamery is  Butter pecan ice cream with crushed cookies and chocolate chip cookie dough. I was quite surprised when I opened the pint and the ice cream was BLUE! Nothing in the description hints at the coloring, but I suppose if you name a flavor 'Cookie Monster' you had better dye it blue.  This is quite possibly the most perfect cooki...

Sanders is a new to me brand that makes chocolates and candies as well as ice cream.  They have several shops in Michigan, but seem to do mostly wholesale and online commerce. Loaded Peanut Butter Cookie is Vanilla ice cream loaded with Peanut Butter Caramel, Chocolate Chunks, and Cookie Dough. Let's start with the not so great and work our way up to the pretty good.  The vanilla base was pretty bland. I just don't understand this. If you want a plain base to let other flavors shine through, then make a decent sweet cream, but if you're going to make a vanilla base, then make a decent vanilla base.  This ice cream was also fairly airy. The mix-ins were much better than the base.  The peanut butter caramel infused the base with a strong peanut butter flavor. The swirl itself was thick with a slight graininess from the peanut butter.  I really, really like the peanut butter and caramel combo; it's a way to add sweetness to peanut butter and saltin...

After tasting and appreciating what Farr did with cookie dough in their  Cookie Dough Brownie  I couldn't resist grabbing a pint of Cookie Dough Caramel. Cookie Dough Caramel is Vanilla flavored custard with rich caramel ripple and cookie dough pieces. I won't comment on the texture because I walked home from the grocery store after purchasing this, and it had enough time to melt a bit and then refreeze in the freezer so there were a few ice crystals.  The Cookie Dough Brownie had a great texture, and I assume this would have the same if you got it home fast enough. The vanilla base wasn't anything remarkable, but it wasn't offensive either.  There were so many caramel swirls and they were so thick that it was almost as if the custard had a vanilla-caramel base rather than a plain vanilla base.  This was a pretty mild and sweet caramel rather than dark or buttery.. The cookie dough pieces were very grainy and tasted eggier than they did in the ...

I'm gonna go ahead and say it, St. Louis is the frozen custard capital of the world. Get at me Wisconsin.  The last evening I was in St. Louis, my parents and I decided to go out for dinner. We decided to go to Ranoush in Kirkwood because we're unoriginal and we always go to Ranoush and Ranoush is tasty. However, the Ranoush in Kirkwood CLOSED!! We were sad, but granted it could have been closed for a long time. We Fentonites don't make our way over to Kirkwood too often because we know all the Kirkwoodians are looking down their noses at us.  Anyways, we decided instead to go to Crushed Red. And because I had a healthy salad for dinner obviously that needed to be counteracted. So we stopped at the Andy's in Kirkwood before heading home. I decided on the Triple Chocolate Concrete because CHOCOLATE. Also can I just say that Andy's is actually the OG of the core trend? Their Jackhammers are basically make your own core sundaes, and they've had th...

Today I have a review of a new-to-me brand, Farr Better Frozen Custard.  I did a bit of research into this company and it seems they have scoop shops and wholesale and started in Ogden, Utah, but their website isn't great so information is a bit hard to track down.  Either way, this is more evidence to support my claim that Utah has a great but totally unknown and unappreciated ice cream scene. There were lots of interesting and delicious sounding Farr's flavors at the grocery store, but Cookie Dough Brownie really called my name.  This is Cookie dough flavored custard with brownie bits and cookie dough pieces. Ice cream glamour shot. Guys.  Seriously.  Utah. Is. Slaying. The. Ice. Cream. Game.  And nobody knows! Or maybe people know and I just didn't know.  I like cookie dough ice cream, but I've never loved it.  I always felt like it was missing something, and I think that something is brownies.  Ben and Jerry's has their iconic...

Dear Lizzy, You are killing it recently with all the new brands you're trying. Sincerely, Lizzy. No but really, I have totally enjoyed expanding my ice cream horizons, first with Gelato Fiasco, then the 7-Eleven brand, and now Phin & Phebes. Phin & Phebes is a Brooklyn based company that started in 2010 and has hit it big in the last 6 years. You can now buy their ice cream in most Wal-Marts, Whole Foods, Lucky's, and many other stores. But of course this brand isn't sold anywhere in Iowa City. :( Luckily the last few days I was hanging out in St. Louis before driving back to the good old, and at times ice cream barren, Iowa City, my mom picked some Phin & Phebes up for me at Wally World. Now P&P, as I will now call them, has a pretty small flavor line up. Only 12 flavors that are mostly classics, or sophisticated twists on classics, like Toasted Green Tea, Cookie Butter Blondie, Vietnamese Iced Coffee, and the Vanilla Malt Cookie Dough that I tr...