rant: chocolate ice cream.

So I love ice cream. Who doesn’t?

My cousins and brother sure do.

My favorite ice cream flavor has always been chocolate. Over the years, I’ve expanded my list of acceptable ice cream flavors to include strawberry, cheesecake, and the occasional coffee-flavored ice cream. However, at the end of the day, chocolate will always win out.

Bonus points for sprinkles.

Not all chocolate ice creams are created equal. SDSU is home to my favorite chocolate ice cream of all time, but you can usually find some good stuff in the grocery store’s freezer section. I’m partial to Häagen-Dazs, but honestly, even the store brand is a-ok.

But you know what’s not ok?

Vanilla ice cream mixed with chocolate syrup.

THAT IS NOT CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM.

Forgive me for being defensive, but I am a “chocolate ice cream or bust” kind of gal. If my options are vanilla ice cream or no ice cream, I will choose no ice cream.

And the weirdest thing is that NO ONE UNDERSTANDS. If I ask for chocolate ice cream and am told that there’s only vanilla, someone will usually suggest that I just mix some chocolate syrup in it. When I (always politely) decline, they say, “But then it’s just like chocolate ice cream!”

No. It isn’t.

There is a distinctly different flavor between real chocolate ice cream and vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup added. Same goes with real chocolate milk and white milk with chocolate syrup – you can’t tell me that they taste the same.

Allow me to put it in perspective: it’s like when the waiter brings you Pepsi when you ordered Coke. Cabbage when you ordered lettuce. Busch Light when you ordered Coors.

It is for this reason that I have never liked chocolate shakes. A chocolate shake is just a giant cup of vanilla ice cream blended up with chocolate syrup and a little bit of milk. Vanilla ice cream in any form just isn’t my thing. I’ll eat in in an ice cream sandwich, but that’s about it: no ice cream bars, no hot fudge sundaes, no ice cream cakes. Everything else must be chocolate or nothing.

Again, bonus points for sprinkles.

Luverne has a little drive-in, and it’s open from mid-March until mid-October. James and I were elated when it opened for the season: not only did it give us another place to eat (Luverne has VERY few choices), but it meant that we finally had a place to get ice cream! We went there for dinner on its first day open, and I ordered a chocolate cone…

…forgetting that the Luverne drive-in’s soft-serve chocolate ice cream is made with vanilla and chocolate syrup.

Seriously, Luverne drive-in. You specialize in ice cream. Fake chocolate ice cream is just not ok. Dairy Queen would never do that to me.

Neither would Blue Bunny.