The Big Muddy Ice Cream Blog

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...

YOU. GUYS. I've been waiting SO LONG to try Ben and Jerry's Salted Caramel Brownie Ale ice cream, a collaboration flavor with New Belgium Brewing.  I FINALLY HAVE IT I HAVE FINALLY TRIED IT AND IT IS DELICIOUS AND EVERYTHING I EVER WANTED AND MORE.  I went to the grocery store on Sunday and was disappointed that on first glance it seemed that Cub still did not have this flavor.  Because I'm a crazy ice cream person, I often look at the back of the shelves because people are terrible and they move things out of their assigned places and don't put them back.  Also, newly stocked ice cream often gets placed behind older flavors until the older flavors sell.  Good thing I decided to snoop because I caught a glimpse of a red lid at the back of the Ben and Jerry's section.  I had to move about 15 pints of ice cream out of the way to get to it, but by golly I got myself a pint of Salted Caramel Brownie Ale! This flavor is described as New Belgium Brown Ale ic...

A while ago, Madeline asked me if I had ever heard of Whitey's and if I'd tried their Sgt. Camo flavor. This was before I'd tried Whitey's Graham Central Station, so the only time I'd tried Whitey's was when I visited the University of Iowa back in the Spring. Apparently one of Madeline's friends loves Whitey's. Madeline described the Sgt. Camo flavor to me and I thought, "oh cool, a s'mores flavor" but wasn't too excited. I guess, at the time, what the flavor actually was  didn't register with me. The flavor is described as Graham cracker and marshmallow ice creams with a ribbon of Whitey's famous fudge.  Hold it right there, folks. An ice cream with graham cracker AND marshmallow ice creams? What the WHAT?! After trying the Graham Central Station flavor and loving it, I remember the conversation I'd had with Madeline, looking up the description of Sgt. Camo and was so stoked to try it. One more quick no...

Well, the time has come. This blog has been around long enough for us to start trying the weird stuff. You might ask what, exactly, is the weird stuff? Bare with me and you will find out. Also, this weird stuff I tried, has also been around for long enough it deserve to be tried. This weird stuff is Arctic Zero. This "Fit Frozen Dessert" has been around since 2010, so although I think it is weird, it has got some staying power. At this point, you are probably thinking, okay seriously, explain why you think this frozen dessert is so weird! Well, this frozen dessert has 150 calories per pint. ... crickets ... Yep those were my thoughts. If this stuff only has 150 calories per pint, what IS it? It's obviously not custard or ice cream or gelato or frozen yogurt or sorbet or even dairy free ice cream or any of the frozen desserts we are familiar with. So I might as well jump right in with the review to attempt to explain what this stuff is. The flavor I b...

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. ...

Wow you guys, Madeline has been killing the game when it comes to reviews. She's been churning them out faster than you can say slow-churned ice cream. While Madeline is totally out-doing me in quantity, I've got to think I'm earning some points from hype-factor with this post right now. Because, as you all know, David's Famous is DA BOMB and eating/reviewing the ice cream is a ton of fun. Also I'm slowly, but surely, making my way through every David's Famous flavor. Since I've now tried Sea Salt Caramel, the only flavors I have left to try are Rhubarb and Lemon!! (Yay plants!) The description of this flavor reads, Sea Salt Caramel was an accident! We were experimenting with different flavors when someone suggested caramel. It's a long story, but when I couldn't find a caramel I liked, I started making my own. It's a bit of sweet and salty heaven in a pint! So I'm quite confused by this description. I'm not exactly sure...