I haven't finished talking about my trip to St. Paul, MN until I've mentioned our trip to get ice cream at Izzy's. It was, in a word, splendiferous.
Izzy's was packed with people patiently waiting in a line that wrapped up and then back down the length of the store. The regulars seemed to know that the ice cream would be worth their patience. And it looked like every local had brought 2 or more family members visiting from out of town.
In the photo above, you can see the circular ice cream signs that announced the night's available flavors. I could have happily chosen almost any one of them. There was incredible, tempting variety.
My nephew, who couldn't read the signs, announced that he wanted vanilla. "Vanilla!" he yelled every time his mom asked him if he was sure he didn't want her to read the list of flavors available. So she casually worked into conversation with the rest of us that it was too bad her son didn't want to know the flavors, as she was pretty sure he'd like to try the cotton candy ice cream. Wouldn't you know it -- someone happened to overhear that comment. That someone immediately changed his order from, "Vanilla!" to shockingly blue cotton candy ice cream (with a malted milk ball on top). And that someone ended up with a bright blue cotton candy face.
I had salted caramel ice cream. For my "Izzy" (that's the name they've given to the mini scoop on top of most of the adult-sized cones and cups), I tried their Norwegian chai flavor. Both managed to taste warm, despite being cold ice cream. They were rich and impressive flavors. Splendiferous.
As a bonus, we got to peek into a side room. There, on the wall, were hints of other flavors to come on other days. If I lived in St. Paul I would be stalking this place with a list of these names, trying to collect them all. Yum.
