ice cream

Hope you Americans had a good long weekend!

Metro Square is starting to host interesting events...it seems like every time I look out my home office window, there is a marching band warming up or a choir or an orchestra. I can usually hear a muffled rendition of the music; if it sounds halfway decent, I open my window. If it sounds REALLY good, then I'll go down for a few minutes and listen.

Allison is commenting on ice cream in Blatherchat, saying she recently saw Ben and Jerry's "Bovinity Divinity" ice cream in the grocery store. Sounds yummy, I must go search for that. My favourite ice cream flavour at present is Haagen Dazs Caramel. As I discussed in Blatherchat ages ago, my favourite brand of ice cream is Greg's ice cream, a homemade ice cream shop on St. George Street, on the University of Toronto campus...I loved his Oreo Cookie ice cream (Lissa, you must look for this next time you're in Toronto) and his Pear & Ginger ice cream. The flavours change every day. On hot summer evenings, there's always a long lineup winding its way out onto the sidewalk, but it's definitely worth the wait.

A couple of weekends ago, Sara and Annie made homemade ice cream (with help from Jeff). They were too impatient to wait until it froze completely, so the result was more like ice cream soup than ice cream...but it was delicious!

So an ice cream poll...when you take a small tub of ice cream out of the freezer, are you the type that is patient enough to let it soften a few minutes, or do you hammer away at it with a spoon because you can't wait? You can guess which camp I fall into. I have also tried microwaving it for a few seconds; this actually does work sometimes, though it tends to turn the ice cream around the sides of container soft while leaving the middle hard, and you tend to get more freezer burn after (or at least that's what I've found).

re: Kodo Drums. Lissa, you should check whether the Kodo Drummers are in town when you visit! They do a great show. I went to see a Kodo drummer workshop at the Winnipeg Folk Festival a while back.

And finally, Mr. Jelly Belly has sent me a sample of his new Jelly Belly flavour line...Jelly Belly SOURS: blueberry, peach, raspberry, strawberry, and watermelon. Lissa and Phil signed me up for The Taste Bud Club ages ago, and I've been getting the Mr. Jelly Belly newsletter ever since. :-) (Thanks, Phil & Lissa!)