ANN BAILEY: When it comes to ice cream, it's all good

• Ann Bailey

Ann Bailey

Talk about it

When it comes to desserts, ice cream is one of my favorites. Chocolate, vanilla and strawberry are tops on my list, but I don’t think I’d pass on most any flavor offered to me.

The form isn’t important; shakes, sundaes or on a stick, I like it equally. I also enjoy dishing up plain, old scoops from the carton.

One of my earliest memories of eating ice cream is sitting on the open, front porch at my mom’s house. In between bites, I’d recite the old television commercial that went something like, “You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream.”

I also recall that when I was growing up, my mom gave us sherbet, another frozen dairy treat, when we had sore throats. The smooth, creamy texture of lime, my favorite flavor, cooled the burning sensation and the attention from my mom when she served it to me, were good medicine.

Like my mom, I also think ice cream has medicinal qualities and after many of my daughter, Ellen’s, chemotherapy treatments, our family would go out for ice cream. The combination of a solicitous family and a tasty treat always lifted her spirits.

Cool facts

Given my appetite for ice cream, I enjoyed reading a news release from the Cowabunga Ice Cream Co. that noted that July is National Ice Cream month. According to Cowabunga, the true origin of ice cream is unknown, but reports of frozen desserts have been reported as early as the second century, B.C.

The first recorded account of ice cream was in 1700 from a letter written by a guest of Maryland Gov. William Bladen.

Here are some other fun facts about ice cream, courtesy of Cowabunga.

• Italo Marchiony, a New Yorker who emigrated from Italy in the late 1800s, invented the ice cream cone in 1896.

• President Ronald Reagan proclaimed July National Ice Cream month in 1984.

• Each American eats a yearly average of 23.2 quarts of ice cream, ice milk, sherbet, ices and other commercially produced dairy products.

• The north-central states, where people eat 41.7 quarts of ice cream annually, have the highest per capita consumption.

• People buy more ice cream on Sunday than on any other day of the week.

• Children, ages 2 through 12, and adults, 45 and over eat the most ice cream per person.

• An average of 50 licks will finish off a single scoop of ice cream.

• Ice cream consumption is highest during July and August.

Year-round treat

Although the summer months are synonymous with ice cream, my family and I eat it year-round and our freezer usually is stocked with a gallon container of vanilla. Down below, in the refrigerator, there are bottles of strawberry and chocolate syrup to pour on it.

We also occasionally make homemade ice cream. My mom gave me an ice cream maker for my birthday one year and my family and I have enjoyed experimenting with different flavors. My sons and Ellen also have simply used a can or a plastic bag to make ice cream.

No matter how we make it, where we eat or what flavor it is, ice cream is a winner with me. I can’t think of any better way to salute it than going out with my family for ice cream. I think I’ll order with my favorite shake, a delectable combination of peanut butter and chocolate… Or should I have a butterscotch sundae? Or…

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