A heat-sensitive tradition

So it is time to post my paper about a family food tradition. My paper is 8 pages, this will take up the entire screen and take way too much time. So here are little snip-its.

I have the window down. I am in the back seat of a minivan. My dad is driving down the streets of San Antonio, Texas to find some retail store that my brother wants to see. “No I think we need to turn down that road,” mom navigates from the back. “No the GPS says to go this way,” my dad responds. “I think we need a snack”… “Let’s go to that museum”… “I wanted to find that old wheat mill that is still in business”... “No, dad promised we could see this store.” Oh how we love family vacations. As we drive up a hill, I shout, “Wow look at that bright blue building with the massive chalkboard. It’s Amy’s Ice Cream. Look at all the flavors.” My dad suddenly pulls an illegal U-turn and after a little shouting and some grasping of the doors for dear life, we are parked at Amy’s Ice Cream. We pile out of the van, and study the chalkboard saying comments such as, “You order”… “No what are you going to get”… “That sounds good”… “Can we share?” I am usually the last to make a decision after I try everyone else’s. Then we sit, eat, and pile back into the car for the next adventure. This is most definitely a frequent occurrence for my seven person family. My dad leads us to ice cream whether we are in Utah or China or the airport in between. He loves it and he loves us.

The transitions don't make sense, please get over it. :)

Luckily more flavors and types of ice cream have become available to the general public. When my sister was turned four in California, my mom had a birthday party for her that included chocolate ice cream. My aunt Kathy, a gourmet chef, happened to be in attendance helping my mom with the small children. She must have been holding me, the four month old, when the ice cream came out because the party became a baby-ice cream eating performance. Once my sister Melissa found out, she said to my mom, “I thought you weren’t eating chocolate because it is not good for the baby while you are nursing because it makes Becca gassy.” My mom nodded in agreement. Melissa continued, “Then how come Becca can eat chocolate?” Needless to say, my mom quickly discovered me and saved my little body from the wrath of chocolate ice cream. We have plenty of pictures of me with messy melted ice cream all over my face and an extremely large grin covering my face. It could have been that very moment when I realized my ice cream potential.

In 6^th grade my obsession with vanilla ice cream officially began. I loved to make shakes for everyone. I didn’t make the type where you dump all the ingredients in a blender and let it do all the work- No…we make the lumpy kind that has a little splash of milk and the ingredients are just smashed with a big spoon. There was a stage in my life that lasted at least a couple years where I would make the entire family oreo -banana shakes. I would start with one oreo, hand broken in pieces at the bottom of the glass, and ½ of the banana chopped up. Next a scoop of ice cream, and repeat the process. Just two crushed oreos are the right amount, but the banana portion is dependent on the eater. Last, a splash of milk to help the stirring process. I put them in tall glasses with special long spoons my mom bought precisely for our shake purposes. I mix them with our little spoon, but not too much. You still want the flavors separate so that some of the crunching can be done by the shake partaker. I like to have some bites of the plain vanilla ice cream uninhibited by oreo chunk, so as to emphasize each separate element that combine in this beautiful creation.
At the present time, we own the perfect scoop. A plastic handle holds the metal spoon with sharp corner edges to slice through the cream. The time saved using the new scooper is well spent. We know that if the ice cream is out of the freezer, we are assembled together. It is an easy treat that makes my family rush to the kitchen before it melts. My dad steps away from the financial statements, Lizzy turns off the TV, Melissa and her husband come over, Jesse comes upstairs, Emily stops playing the piano, and my mom turns the sewing machine off. This tradition has evolved with us in our ability to adapt with developed taste buds and new flavors and then learning to make decisions about toppings and sizes. Sometimes ice cream makes Jesse sick, some days Emily wishes for Italian gelato, and sometimes chocolate still makes me gassy. Each serving changes like us. But as long as there is ice cream, I know that my family will be enjoying it together, no matter where we may be, one scoop at a time.