The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

Pepto-pink peppermint ice cream in the OG winter flavor, and Graeter's Peppermint Stick is the cream of the crop. The flavor is bejeweled with bits of peppermint candy and flavored with peppermint oil. The key to an edible peppermint ice cream is to remember that less is more. A few drops of peppermint oil go a long way and the base doesn't have to be overpoweringly sweet. Graeter's checks both boxes. While the peppermint oil is the primary flavor of the base it's light enough that the underlying cream taste comes through. This, combined with Graeter's rich, smooth base, helps balance the peppermint oil. The peppermint stick pieces were fairly small, which I like better - you get a nice crunch without having to chomp away at the candy and get it stuck in your teeth. There could have been more peppermint stick pieces, but that's my only quibble with this flavor. I give Graeter's Peppermint Stick  🍦🍦🍦/4. It's not an incredibly original ...

I'm convinced collective stress is a thing. I'm not taking classes and therefore don't have to take any finals. My teaching load this semester is very light. In theory, the end of the semester should mean I feel like I have more time than usual to work on my own work, but instead I FEEL SO STRESSED AND OMG FINALS AND OMG I HAVE SO MUCH WORK AND I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DO MATH! I think I'm just suffering the stress of the rest of the university population. So that's why the blog has been pretty dead the past few weeks. BUT. Minter is still in full swing, so you definitely want to hear about more mint and peppermint treats. Blue Bunny Peppermint Bark Bunny Snacks are pink peppermint ice cream with a layer of fudge enrobed in white chocolate with red peppermint candy pieces drizzled with milk chocolate . In short, these were not great. The Bunny Snacks are are fairly new for Blue Bunny, and it seems like they haven't yet hit their stride with these treats....

Haagen-Dazs' Peppermint Bark ice cream is the holy grail of peppermint ice cream, and they have really upped their bar game in the past year, so it makes sense that introduced a new, limited-edition Peppermint Bark Bar just in time for peak peppermint season.  Haagen-Dazs says, Our Peppermint Bark Ice Cream Bars start with decadent white chocolate ice cream dipped in thick, dark chocolate then speckled with cool peppermint candy pieces. I was already skeptical that a peppermint bark ice cream bar  could live up to peppermint ice cream, and I was even more skeptical after reading the description. I mean .... would peppermint in the shell be enough ? The pieces would have to be tiny and the ice cream-to-shell ratio might drown them out. My worries were for naught because Haagen-Dazs produced a first-rate peppermint bark bar. Who was I to doubt them?! I really think the white chocolate base is the secret to Haagen-Dazs peppermint bark success. A vanilla base is either ...

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...

It's a party over here in freezing cold Iowa! I bought this flavor a few weeks ago, but didn't get around to eating it until returning from visiting St. Louis for the holidays. Madeline spent a day and a half with me in Iowa before returning to the tundra, aka Minneapolis. In addition to the Iowa wind and hills, Madeline and I got a taste of the other Blue Bunny winter seasonal flavor. After being rather impressed with their Cocoa Bunny we were excited to try Peppermint Party. This flavor is described as Peppermint Ice Cream, Fudge Swirls, Peppermint Red and Green Filled Bunnies . I go back and forth on this flavor. Overall I enjoyed it and there were some fun elements, but I can't decide if I wanted more peppermint flavor and more chocolate. The peppermint base is probably the mildest peppermint ice cream out there. A lot of other reviewers have considered this to be negative, but I'm leaning to think it was just different, not worse. You could also compla...

PEPPERMINT IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON.  There are even carols about it.  Take, for example, the Irving Berlin classic "I'm Dreaming of a White (Chocolate Peppermint Bark) Christmas." The grocery stores in Minneapolis do not seem to fully appreciate the importance of seasonal peppermint flavors.  Christmas, the traditional peak of peppermint season, has past with nary a pint of peppermint ice cream in sight. Lizzy and I are currently home in St. Louis for the holidays, and luckily our dad had the next best thing, Prairie Farms Mint Moose Tracks ice cream.  There's not an official description, but it is a mint base with thick swirls of Moose Tracks fudge and chocolate mint cups. Prairie Farms (I keep wanting to type Purina Farms, which is a different thing entirely) is a generally solid brand of premium ice cream so I was expecting to like but not love this ice cream, and boy was I wrong! This moved into my top three favorite mint flavors of all time. The ...

For Thanksgiving break, Madeline and I visited our family that lives outside of Syracuse, NY. Other than all the fun of seeing family, we were quite excited to go to some local ice cream shops, as Madeline had never really gotten a good taste of the ice cream scene in the area. A lot of the shops around were closed for the season, but luckily Arctic Island, which has delicious ice cream, is open all year long! We went to get ice cream on Black Friday. I usually try to resist the onslaught of season flavors until the last second (they always overwhelm me), but it is now officially peppermint season, there is no denying it. I also would actually be down with it being peppermint season all year long, which I can not say about the flavors of other seasons (I'm looking at you pumpkin). Thus, I decided to start the holiday season with some Peppermint Candy ice cream! One note before I describe the flavor, this ice cream shop is a great  value. That is a small cup. Look how much ...

A while back Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry's fame created the ice cream flavor Bernie's Yearning in support of Vermont Senator and Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders.  The flavor was mint ice cream with a disk of chocolate covering the top meant to represent the wealth disparity between the wealthiest 1% of the nation and the rest of the county.  The idea is that you break up the hunk of chocolate into smaller pieces and distribute it throughout the pint, representing a redistribution of wealth!  This was not an official product, as a company can't endorse a presidential candidate, but Ben and Jerry, the people, not the company did have a give away of 50 pints of this flavor. Lizzy entered the drawing, but unfortunately wasn't selected. Ben and Jerry's new flavor, Empower Mint, pays tribute to the social mission of Bernie's Yearning.  This flavor is Peppermint ice cream with fudge brownies and fudge swirls. The blurb on the side of the pint re...

It feel like I am almost finished with my shipment of New Orleans Ice Cream, which is hard to believe. It seemed like such a monstrous amount of ice cream when I first got it. I guess this is just putting perspective on how much ice cream I eat, especially when I think about all of the other ice cream I haven't eat in the course of working through my New Orleans shipment! What is most interesting about this flavor is the packaging. It a totally different color than the rest of New Orleans pints. I'm assuming this is to signify that the proceeds of this flavor go to the organization, Make It Right NOLA, which builds green homes to rebuild the New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward after Katrina. And no I don't mean, green like the houses are the color green, I mean green like these houses are solar powered and all sorts of cool stuff! It sounds like a great organization and ice cream aside, it is definitely worth contributing to what they are doing! But now for ice crea...

Even though it's the beginning of a new year, it's still winter, which means it's still peppermint season! Today I have a review of Market Pantry seasonal flavor Peppermint Neapolitan.  This is described as Peppermint ice cream and artificially flavored vanilla ice cream swirled with mint stockings and trees. Again, what is up with that 'artificially flavored vanilla' description? This ice cream was so-so.  Not the greatest flavor, but pretty fun.  The artificially flavored vanilla was your standard, bland  cheap vanilla.  The peppermint ice cream was your standard, peppermint oil-flavored cheap peppermint ice cream; however, it was green! Normally peppermint ice cream is colored red, but I really enjoyed that Market Pantry decided to color theirs green instead! The mint stockings and trees were an awesome addition to a mediocre ice cream.  Surprisingly, these little guys were BUTTER MINTS! This is not at all what I was expecting.  T...

Wow the peppermint overload continues. Recently I've reviewed a lot of peppermint treats, from Yotopia, Thelma's Treats, Ben & Jerry's, and now from Heyn's. I might not have even called it an overload before, but now the peppermint train has left the station and I'm the conductor. This past weekend I ate at Heyn's with my roommate, Aileen, and her boyfriend. The next day I left Iowa and I will be gone for 4 whole weeks, which means 4 weeks with NO Heyn's. Sad day. I picked the Peppermint Candy because it is a seasonal flavor and S'mores because I noticed the mini marshmallows in the flavor and they looked delicious. I was also super excited about this peppermint flavor because it is more along the lines of old fashioned peppermint ice cream. The other peppermint treats I've tried have had a strong peppermint flavor like what you would find in a York Peppermint Patty. This peppermint flavor was more like, well, exactly what the name ...

Other than my factory tour adventure, it has been way too long since I've reviewed a Ben & Jerry's flavor.  And although this isn't exactly a seasonal flavor, 'tis the season for peppermint! After seeing another ice cream blogger post to Instagram about their recent review of this flavor, I was feeling nostalgic and knew I needed some B&J's asap. I get nostalgic about this flavor because Ben & Jerry's released it right when I was coming into my ice cream consciousness. It came out right when I knew enough about the existing Ben & Jerry's flavors that I could spot a new flavor when I saw one in stores. Back in my junior year in college, after successfully hunting for the then recently released 7-11 exclusive flavor, Nutty Caramel Swirl, my friends and I stopped at a grocery store to pick up a couple more pints for our freezer. We stumbled upon Chocolate Peppermint Crunch, which we didn't even know was coming out. It was a grand day a...

When Madeline came to visit Iowa City back in October, the number of flavors of Thelma's Treats ice cream sandwiches at my HyVee had diminished from five to two. I was quite scared eventually they would disappear altogether. However, my fears have been proven to be for naught. Recently two seasonal flavors of Thelma's were added to the shelves! There is this Double Chocolate Peppermint flavor and an eggnog flavor. I'm not an eggnog fan to begin with, and I've had quite the traumatic experience with eggnog. So, I'm not sure if I can bring myself to try the eggnog flavor, but we'll see. The sandwich is eggnog ice cream between snickerdoodle cookies. Possibly, if you, Dearest Readers, ask pretty please with enough sugar on top, I would try them. So this treat is peppermint ice cream sandwiched between two chocolate chocolate chip cookies. Once again, Thelma's has delivered a great ice cream sandwich. The peppermint ice cream was out of this world. It wa...

I missed out on Talenti Peppermint Bark last year because my local Cub does not stock all of the seasonal Talenti flavors.  Major fail.  My friend Alex (who I consider a success story in my quest to turn everyone I know into a drooling ice cream addict) mentioned that he found a pint at Kowalski's, so I asked him to pick up a pint for me the next time he was there.  He went back but there was none left! Oh no! I had to go downtown the next day to run and errand and decided to pop into Whole Foods.  It's a good thing I did because they had Talenti Peppermint Bark! I think the Talenti flavor writer has finally outdone him or herself with this flavor description.  It cannot be topped: We combine the most refreshing peppermint gelato with flecks of semisweet Belgian Callebaut chocolate (ok, nothing weird so far, but just wait!) , and it tastes like polar bear smiles and the northern lights. (Which is delicious, in case you were wondering.) Slayed. That absolu...

I stopped in at Whole Foods on a whim to see if they had any seasonal Talenti flavors.  (They did, and I have a review coming soon!)  I also picked up a pint of Ciao Bella White Chocolate Peppermint, a seasonal flavor.  This is a Whole Foods exclusive and is part of a trio of seasonal flavors including Mulled Apple Cider Sorbetto (I can't decide if this sounds awesome or disgusting) and Honey Almond Nougat Gelato (definitely sounds awesome). This flavor is described as White Chocolate Peppermint gelato marries crushed, all-natural peppermint candies into white chocolate for a lush dessert that makes this classic extra decadent. So how did this stack up against this season's other peppermint offerings? Solidly middle of the pack. The texture was decent, but didn't really scream "gelato" to me.  I typically think of gelato as being slicker and without much air.  This was slightly wetter than ice cream, but did have an airiness more common in ice cream. ...