I scream; you scream; we all scream for ice cream

from Google Images

            After typing in the title of this post, I Googled the phrase, wondering about the punctuation. To some, semicolons are anathema, verboten. But grammar maven Patricia O’Connor says it’s OK to use them. So I shall.

            The reason for this piece was reading that July is National Ice Cream Month. At the same time, I had a vanilla ice-cream cup from Schwan’s—a standing order—in my hands, spoon poised to dig out the first creamy white, sweet bite and allow it to melt in my mouth. One little cup really wasn’t enough to satisfy me, but I usually sacrificed the gratification of another cup. Usually.

            That led me to my office trivia shelf, which led me to . . . well, these ice cream-related tidbits:

The hand-cranked ice cream churn was invented in 1846 by American Nancy Johnson. And now children across the nation get to take their turn at the freezer handle. Her design was patented in 1848 by William G. Young. [reprinted in AR Living, July ’12 with source listed as “WorldOfIceCream.com.”]

The ice cream cone traces its origin to the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904. Ernest Hamwi opened a concession to sell zalabia, a crisp, waferlike Persian pastry baked on a flat waffle iron and topped with sugar, fruit, or other sweets.

The stand next to Hamwi’s offered ice cream in five- and ten-cent dishes. One busy day, the ice cream vendor ran out of glass cups and the quick-thinking Hamwi rolled one of his wafers into a cornucopia, let it cool, and then scooped the ice cream into its opening. Ta-dah . . . the first ice cream cone. [from David Hoffman’s Who Knew: Things You Didn’t Know About Things You Know Well. A shorter version of this incident was included in this month’s AR Living.]

 Uh-oh! On the blog, “tween us,” by Shannan Younger, is a list of “8 ice cream facts …”: About the origin of the cone, she writes, “Charles E. Minches of St. Louis, Missouri is said to have invented the ice cream cone in 1904 at the World's Fair in St. Louis when he filled a pastry cone with two scoops of ice cream.

“This claim, however, is not without controversy. Italo Marchiony of New York City filed a patent for the ice cream cone months before the fair opened. And, he was selling lemon ice in cones as early as 1896.” (If it makes any difference to you, you can research further to try to find the REAL ice cream cone maker.)

Number 2 on Younger’s list tells us that the exact origins of ice cream are unknown. (Surprise, surprise!) S. J. Arnold wrote in “Everybody Loves Ice Cream: The Whole Scoop on America’s Favorite Treat,” that stories abound.  One is that Marco Polo brought back the recipe for ice cream from China. Another is that Italian Catherine de Medici introduced the treat to France when she married King Henry II. (Again, if it matters, scoop it out. Or crank out your own story.)

I think I’ll reward myself with . . . you guessed it: a cup of vanilla ice cream. (Schwan’s comes tomorrow.)