I don’t remember whether or not these flavors made much of a splash here in the States – if I’m honest, I don’t actually remember them at all – but I can tell you one thing with absolute certainly: a decade after this groundbreaking pairing of fairytale creature and desert, Puss in Boots 2 continues to delight ice cream lovers in Baskin Robbins shops all across South Korea.
In fact, when I lived in Cheonan, South Korea, and was in
need of ice cream (the frequency of which need not be discussed), the flavor I
got more often than any other was Puss in Boots 2, which, as far as I can tell,
had the same basic components as the original Puss in Boots. I never knew what had become of poor Puss in
Boots 1, or even that this ice cream had anything to do with Shrek, as it had
been some time since any Shrek movie had graced theaters, but I didn’t ask any awkward
questions. I handed over my money,
crunched my chocolate covered pretzels in the satisfaction and slightly
too-alert joy that comes with every good sugar fix, and left such esoteric
concerns to be pondered by other minds.
So you can imagine my incredulity when Korean friends told
me one day that they didn’t know anything about this Puss in Boots 2, but there
was a different flavor at Baskin Robbins that I absolutely had to try. It was so good, it was delicious, it was
better than anything called Puss in Boots 2 could ever hope to be. It was called Your Mother Is an Alien.
I didn’t really know what to do with that. I think I might have snorted a little.
I well knew that none of the ice creams in my Baskin Robbins
were called any such thing. Along with
Puss in Boots, we had standards like Cookies and Cream (쿠키 앤
크림), Cherries Jubilee (체리쥬빌레), and Shooting Star (슈팅스타).
I was the only alien in the shop when I
was getting ice cream and I was registered, thank you very much. To buy myself time to formulate a more appropriate
response, I asked what was in it.
Chocolate ice cream, vanilla ice cream, chocolate chips, and something
crunchy and covered in chocolate. A
pretzel perhaps? Yes, a pretzel! It was my beloved Puss in Boots 2,
incognito. Fond as Koreans are of
transliteration, especially where names or titles are concerned, in this
inexplicable case, the Korean Baskin Robbins powers that be decided to chuck
Shrek and all his friends out on their collective ear and go with something
that made more sense to the Korean ice-cream-eating public. Like the obvious choice, Your Mother Is an
Alien. And the English name of my ice cream
had always so preoccupied me, I’d never bothered to look at the Korean name
alongside it on the label or cared how it translated.
Defying any effort to explain the phenomenon, I can only
tell you in solemn honesty that it tasted better the next time I ate it. Any ice cream that could inspire nonsensical
names in two different languages deserved all the respect and attention I could
give it. A person could waste a lifetime
trying to unravel the logic that turned the American Puss in Boots ice cream into
the Korean Your Mother Is an Alien, but that time would be better spent just
having another scoop instead. Which is
what I did. Rather often.
See, I like to consider myself something of a connoisseur of
ice creams which obviously requires regular consumption. It sounds better than saying I don’t have
much self-control, and I’ve been on enough job interviews to know the value of
being able to dress up a personality flaw as a positive quality. In any case, call it Puss in Boots, Your
Mother Is an Alien, or Choco-Vanilla Swirl with Stuff in It, I’ll try whatever
you put in front of me, and I’ll thank you for it.
Which is why, when I heard about the Lakeland Ice Cream
Festival, I used pen when I wrote it on my calendar. (Okay, so it might have just been a note in
my iPad, but I typed it emphatically, I can assure you.)
Now, while I will try most anything that isn’t the
abomination that is sherbet, my mother is a devoted chocolate ice cream aficionado
down to her core. It’s hard to fault the
choice on any particular occasion, but she expresses only grudging interest in
exploring the world of ice cream beyond that.
Oh, Mom might throw in a walnut or a berry if she’s feeling wild, but I
maintain that there’s more to life than variations on Rocky Road. In any case, stick in the mud pie or not, she
needed little convincing when it came time to head to Lakeland.
So we set out for Ice Cream Festival on a fine, sunny
morning, and only detoured once into the little town of Bartow after spying a
sign from the highway that promised an outdoor antique show downtown. “Antique”
may have been too strong a term, but it was pleasant to stand for a while in lofty
judgment of strangers’ bits and baubles and the prices they were cheeky enough
to consider reasonable. On the way back
to the car after deigning to buy some old postcards written by borderline
racists and someone who was took a trolley to Somerville in 1907, I saw a book
shop that was calling my name.
At least,
from a block away the sign said Book Shop, but as we came upon it, it had shifted
somehow and become Bake Shop. A bit
surprising, but not unwelcome. I was,
after all, in a desert mood. What was
unwelcome was the revelation that my questionable ability to read signs from
moderate distances didn’t matter at all because it was closed. It might as well have been a Lima Bean and
Lug Wrench Shop for all the good it did me.
After pausing briefly to curse the ground upon which the
little shop stood and every business that would occupy it from now until the end
of days, we resumed our progress toward Lakeland and vats of waiting ice cream. The website had promised me taste-testing,
popsicle stick sculptures, ice cream eating contests, an ice cream museum, and
more flavor choices than I could shake a scoop at, and with the help of all
these things I was ready to wring every last cone crumb of life out of this day.
And crumbs seemed all I was likely to get.
Upon arriving, it quickly became apparent that my
overwhelming love of ice cream and the fact that my dollar off admission coupon
had been printed so professionally had whipped me into a flurry of largely unfounded
hopes. These hopes were dashed not long
after I paid my three dollars, had my bag rifled halfheartedly at the plastic
table that seemed to serve as a security checkpoint, and found myself watching with
some concern the two unimpressed children riding the smallest Mini-Himalaya
I’ve ever seen.
The couple rows of tents and carts were selling mostly snow
cones, cotton candy, and bourbon chicken, though there was one extolling the
virtues of CPR which was very civic-minded and helpful. There were a few requisite balloon-popping
and ring-tossing carnival games and three or four inflatable play things that I
didn’t pay much attention to as they were suffering from an infestation of
children at the time. The closest thing
we were able to find to an ice cream museum was a tent that boasted several
rows of ice cream scoops along with some Betty Boops and old-timey Norman
Rockwell prints. The guy manning the
tent was a knowledgeable fellow, but I wouldn’t call him a docent or anything.
Even with this lackluster offering, I might have enjoyed the
scoops and the snow cones more if not for the Pumpkin Show, which has ruined my
ability to appreciate unexceptional food festivals.
I will tell you why.
Charging no admission fee and thus hailed by the residents
of Circleville, Ohio (among whom I was once numbered) as “The Greatest Free
Show on Earth,” the Pumpkin Show elevates the food festival to a plane
heretofore unseen in the annals of celebratory food-based gatherings. Granted, Circleville has had more than a
hundred years to get it right, but they have spent that time productively and
there is not a right-thinking patron of that festival who will go away unhappy
or hungry. It is nothing short of a
pumpkin extravaganza and you can have pumpkin for every meal of the day without
having to walk more than three blocks.
Pumpkin donuts and pumpkin pancakes for breakfast, pumpkin burgers and pumpkin
pie for lunch, and pumpkin pizza and pumpkin cheesecake for dinner. And, if you find yourself a bit peckish
between times, you can always tide yourself over with a bit of pumpkin fudge,
pumpkin log roll, a pumpkin whoopee pie, or, yes, even some pumpkin ice cream. There are buildings full of things to be
judged and awarded prizes – photography, painting, needlework, quilts, pies,
cakes, painted pumpkins and even pumpkin people.
Schools and businesses shut down, the center of town is
overrun by parades, pig-calling contests, bluegrass bands, and people waiting
in line to see the world’s largest pumpkin pie at Lindsay’s Bakery. The air is crisp and redolent of fall leaves
and elephant ears. In the shadow of the
town’s painted pumpkin water tower, for a week every October, anything is
possible. As long as a pumpkin is
involved.
This is a food festival.
(But don’t call it that. It’s
called the Pumpkin Show. Seriously.)
Having spent more of my youth than is probably healthy
hunting down specially-flavored versions of ordinary foods in the pursuit of
the perfect pumpkin delicacy, I am willing to admit that my standards regarding
such fare are perhaps now a bit unrealistic.
I have tried to temper this as I’ve grown older and seen more of the
world. Not every town can manage the
levels of food-related excellence to which Circleville, Ohio, has aspired.
Even so, I think that if popsicle stick sculptures are
promised, popsicle stick sculptures should be delivered, but I never saw one in
Lakeland. Graeter’s Ice Cream – an Ohio
company, no doubt with the Pumpkin Show in the back of their marketing mind –
had a tent there, but they were one of only about four places actually selling
ice cream. The ice cream eating contests
were entertaining, mostly because the emcee was an enthusiastic Australian in a
boater hat who managed to convince us that a stage full of children slowly and neatly
eating half pints of vanilla ice cream was in fact a spectator sport.
In order to buy anything inside the festival, actual money
needed to be changed into Moo-lah at conveniently located tents around the
field. It was a one to one exchange rate
that ended up feeling like one step too many as I stood in line to change my
four dollars into four Moo-lahs then stood in line to give my four Moo-lahs to
the Graeter’s Ice Cream guy in exchange for ice cream which was all I really
wanted. Graeter’s may not have made the
trip to Lakeland worth it all on its own, but there’s a reason Oprah once made
it an audience gift. My trio of Black
Raspberry Chocolate Chip, Salted Caramel Fudge Brownie, and Dark Chocolate
Truffle Gelato was well worth my four Moo-lahs, even if it wasn’t as exciting
to order as Your Mother Is an Alien or Puss in Boots 2.
The festival itself was held in a field just outside of town
that was connected to a small airfield and the Florida Air Museum, which made
for an odd mix. As I was finishing off my
last bit of Dark Chocolate Truffle Gelato in the cargo bay of a FedEx plane, I
briefly considered the dichotomy before the distraction of not being able to
find a trash can overwhelmed me entirely.
I feel very strongly about the obscene lack of moral fortitude of those
who litter, but I feel equally strongly about the unconscionable sadism of
event planners who force people into the untenable position of having to choose
between carrying around the tangible insult of an empty ice cream bowl or
descending into the morass of self-abasement and throwing that bowl on the
ground. It proved to be a difficult
moment for me.
Mom mostly enjoyed herself, as she usually does. She is, I
think, less fettered by the specter of the Pumpkin Show than I am. She liked
all the jokes our Aussie emcee told, especially when he was deriding the
children on stage for not being able to eat ice cream with any sort of
grace.
And I know she enjoyed being moderately belligerent to the
little boy who managed to foist a rubber bracelet on her as we were just
arriving because naturally he had it coming.
We were on our way to the ticket window when we were stopped by a
serious-looking lad of ten or eleven who asked if we wanted a bracelet.
“What’s it for?” Mom asked with narrowed eyes and palpable
suspicion. Most people think that
children should be wary of strange adults.
Mom takes a slightly different position.
“Evolution,” replied the boy, who was wearing a black
t-shirt emblazoned with the words “Evolution Martial Arts” alongside the
outline of a figure performing a painful-looking kick. Some distance behind him a tent and sign rose
up out of the festival crowd bearing the same logo. Not waiting for any further response and with
more hasty relief than impoliteness, he shoved a rubber bracelet each into our
hands. Glad both to have done his duty
and be rid of them himself, he continued on his way.
Mom stared momentarily at the bracelet as it sat flat on her
hand, touching as little skin as possible.
Her mistrust of the object seemed only to have increased. “For or against?” she shouted with great
force at the back of the boy’s rapidly retreating head, but by then it was too
late. Nine tenths of the law coming down
to possession isn’t always all it’s cracked up to be and Mom takes her martial
arts very seriously.
If she’d known that this was the best souvenir she’d bring
home from the Lakeland Ice Cream Festival, she might have asked for two.
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