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Saturday, October 10, 2009

Homemade Ice Cream

Every Labor Day, my cousin Shannon and her husband, Jim host a homemade ice cream contest. The first time I went, there were a handful of flavors to try. It has since morphed into a full-blown crazy contest with three tables worth of entries and categories! There is a lot of competition at this contest. My cousin Leif made lots of posters and hung them everywhere as well as cups with "inspirational messages" like "Don't eat Nathan's ice cream" (Not my Nathan--another cousin.) I love watching the friendly rivalry among my cousin's family. It just makes the contest that much more fun.


This year was my first year with an entry. I tried my hand at mint chocolate chip Ice Cream. I used fresh mint from my mom's garden and Dove chocolate. It was pretty good, except fresh mint is VERY powerful and I think I overdid how much I put in. The mint was very strong. I'll have to attempt it again another time (with considerably less mint.) My dream is to recreat Ben & Jerry's Phish Food. Maybe next year....

The ice cream is displayed out on the tables and everyone is given a number-it is all very anonymous.;) Then we all went around tasting the ice cream and got to vote for our favorites. Tessa didn't like any of the fruit flavored ice crams and refused to even give a sympathy vote to any in tht category. What a trip!

The other fun part about the party is of course being able to see our family and spend time with them. The kids were happy to see their cousins there.

Saving the best for last, is that my mom and dad were celebrating their 47th wedding anniversary that day too. Congratulations Mom & Dad.

2 comments:

Clair said...

Nice tradition! I hope there was peach! Love the photos- especially that first one with the touch of pink and the weathered ice cream maker. Cute parents!

tink said...

Thanks for sharing the photos. Jensen thinks your kids are his other siblings. Any day where there is gobs of ice cream and loads of family is a good day!