The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

I'm about a month late with this blog post. I ate this pint of ice cream only recently, but February 1st was Baked Alaska Day. Who knew that Baked Alaskas have their own day dedicated to them. I didn't, and next year I will have to celebrate it, seeing as I haven't ever had a Baked Alaska. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this crazy dessert, a Baked Alaska is sponge cake topped with ice cream, topped with meringue and baked in a very hot oven for just long enough to firm the meringue, but not long enough to melt the ice cream. Baked Alaskas can also be called Norwegian Omelettes, and were probably originally called Alaska Floridas by the chef who invented them. The turn-a-dessert-into-an-ice-cream-flaor motif is a common one, but New Orleans takes this to another level. I mean, everybody's got a cake flavor. Everybody's got a cookie flavor. Everybody's got a brownie flavor. But Moon Pies and now Baked Alaskas? I was super excited to try this ...

I've got to say, I am proud of myself. I'm smoking through the Iowa City frozen dessert offerings. This past Friday, I visted Yotopia with a local fan (can I use that word?) of the blog. Thus, I participated in #FroYoFriday. By which I mean I ate froyo on a Friday, but I did not partake in any social media. It would have required me to take my attention away from my froyo for like 30 seconds and that's way too much time. I have been reviewing a lot of froyo shops as of late, so if you aren't familiar with my 8 step review process for froyo shops, you need to get it together. Please spend more of your life reading my blog and less time doing important, productive activities. 1) The variety of flavors: is there a good selection. 2) The flavor of my choices. 3) The quality of the combination of my choices. 4) The texture of the froyo 5) The variety of the toppings. 6) Quality of the toppings. 7) How well my toppings coordinated with my froyo flavors. 8) Overall ...

This past weekend I had the exciting opportunity to visit the Iowa State Fair. For those of you not familiar with Iowa, this is exciting for a couple of reasons. One, Iowa has a legitimate state fair with crazy foods on a stick and music and beer and butter sculptures and animals and giant vegetables (unlike the Missouri State fair, which unless you know something about showing livestock, is kind of lame). Two, presidential candidates like to hang out at the Iowa State Fair, because Iowa. So of course, I jumped on my opportunity to go. Sadly, I did not see any presidential candidates I was too excited about: Bernie Sanders, Hilary Clinton, or Donald Trump (because seeing his toupee in person is an event in and of itself). But I did see Chris Christie, kind of cool, and two other Republican candidates who I didn't know well. But one of them was super passionate about Radical Islam and spicy chicken sandwiches sooo yeah. I was able to peruse most of the state fair offerings befor...

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...

A few weekends ago my friend Bronwyn and I were going to go to the Ben & Jerry's Scoop Shop on the Delmar Loop. I was really excited because I wanted to try the Tonight Dough flavor. However, it was super snowy that day and Ben & Jerry's wasn't open. However, FroYo across the street was. So we decided to hit that up, instead. If you've read my reviews of previous frozen yogurt shops, you know I have a whole check list of questions that I try to address in each post. They are as follows: 1) The variety of flavors: is there a good selection? 2) The flavor of my choices. 3) The quality of the combination of my choices. 4) The texture of the froyo (or sorbet, etc.) 5) The variety of the toppings. 6) Quality of the toppings. 7) How well my toppings coordinate with my froyo flavors. 8) Overall experience. Lets get right to it! 1) Variety of flavors. This was definitely good. Plenty of chocolatey flavors, plenty of fruity flavors, some sorbets, an...

The frozen yogurt bar, Tutti Frutti opened a University City location back in the summer of 2012. After not being super impressed my first visit that summer, I was convinced to go back when I was told they had amazing vegan flavors made with soy. Their soy peanut butter, taro root, and banana milk have been favorites of mine ever since. Look at the adorable designs on the Tutti Frutti cups!! But the University City location, on North & South and Delmar, isn't actually close to where I used to live in University City, so I didn't go a ton, and I hadn't had a chance to go since moving out of St. Louis. Even though frozen yogurt bars aren't the most exciting, I had really been craving some vegan peanut butter froyo, so after my birthday dinner (at the all vegan brick and mortar location of Lulu's Local Eatery) last weekend we all headed to Tutti Frutti for some froyo. A list of things to help you convince yourself that froyo is good for you. A while...

Happy National Strawberry Ice Cream Day!! Now I know not everyone is a fan of these sort of arbitrary food holidays, but I am trying to use them as an opportunity to eat ice cream outside of what I normally eat. Not that I don't like strawberry ice cream, but I would not call myself a connoisseur like Madeline would and I would probably choose cookie dough or something over strawberry ice cream. I also have been wanting to try another flavor of Blue Bell after my review of their Old Fashioned Malt Shoppe was so popular. This flavor is described as Our famous Homemade Vanilla ice cream blended with juicy ripe strawberries.  So random notes about Blue Bell. I absolutely love their packaging. I honestly bought this pint over the Haagen Dazs Strawberry because the packaging was so pretty. Also Madeline has already reviewed the Haagen Dazs Strawberry flavor. When I opened this pint I saw a light pink, fluffy looking ice cream with bits of strawberry poking through. This ...

My friend Molly asked me to review Yo My Goodness. Yo My Goodness is a fro-yo chain that just opened up a location on Wydown, not far from Wash U, this past spring, when Chill closed. I reviewed the Yo My Goodness Yummy Yellow Cake Batter Flavor  here . However, this was a review of just one flavor, not really the whole experience. As any avid fro-yoer (is some one who yo-yos at a fro-yo place a fro-yo-yoer??) will tell you, fro-yo is not just about the flavors, or just the textures, or just the toppings, but the whole experience. So how do I go about reviewing a froyo place for it's entire experience? I've decided there are a few categories with which I can evaluate the fro-yo experience: 1) The variety of flavors: Is there a good selection? 2) The flavor of my choices. 3) The quality of the combination of my choices. 4) The texture of the fro-yo (or sorbet, etc.) 5) The variety of toppings. 6) Quality of toppings 7) How well my toppings coordinate with my fro-yo flavor...

I also ate Izzy's Ice Cream! I went to Izzy's for the first time in the week following finals.  This was a good week for ice cream; I went to Sebastian Joe's and Izzy's for the first time. When looking at the flavors online before I went (because obviously I would do this) there were several I was really excited about including Cereal Milk and Hot Brown Sugar, so when I saw Hot Brown Sugar was available I knew that this flavor would be mine.  Immediately.  Because I was so excited about this flavor I failed to read anything about anything on their menu, so I didn't realize I would have to choose a flavor for my Izzy scoop.  I panicked and chose Vanilla. The Vanilla wasn't bad, but it wasn't an outstanding vanilla either.  I'm not too upset because I don't typically order vanilla at a scoop shop. Now on to the good stuff.  Er mah gerd the Hot Brown Sugar was the most amazing thing ever.  I want to eat this every day!  Here is the descriptio...

So this isn't ice cream, but Madeline talked about a froyo place in her introduction, so I'm just gonna say I think froyo is fair game. My St. Louis readers may remember the froyo place on Wydown called Chill. However, recently Chill closed down because the owners were moving to California. Now in its place is a new local chain called, Yo My Goodness. When I went the first time I had heard amazing things about their cake batter flavor. I'm not typically a fan of cake batter flavored ice creams and froyos, because in my opinion they often taste super artificial and not even really like cake batter. Despite my hesitations I tried the flavor. Oh. Em. Gee. This is good. The flavor is subtle and creamy and not artificial tasting at all. It tasted like licking the batter straight out of a mixing bowl. Seriously if a froyo could be life changing this would be it. My ice cream and other frozen dairy product consumption habits are a major part of my identity and before this I ...