I remember specifically, the day she/we discovered that she likes coffee. Or coffee flavoring, maybe.
She was five-years-old. We were in New York and we had promised her (early in the day) ice cream after dinner. By the time the evening rolled around, we were exhausted. And finding a local ice cream shop where we felt comfortable (given her food allergies) felt like a challenge we didn’t want to take on.
So we found the nearest grocery store and picked up a couple pints to take back to the hotel room. It was Haagen-Dazs. Sydney chose chocolate chip cookie dough and Keith and I decided to split a pint of coffee.
As she sat on the hotel bed, plastic spoon in hand, she asked to try a bite of the coffee ice cream. I was sure she wouldn’t like it. At all.
She took one bite and stopped. She looked at us, completely serious, and said, “WHY HAVE YOU BEEN KEEPING THIS FROM ME, MY WHOLE LIFE?!”
Needless to say, we didn’t get that pint back from her. And the rest is cliche history.
She doesn’t drink coffee daily, but on the occasion we stop by Starbucks, her go-to is a vanilla sweet cream cold brew. Not a frap. Not a pinkity drinkity (though we both love that too.) But a good solid cold brew. She likes the salted caramel also. And the Irish cream.
Every now and then at home, she pours a bit of coffee for herself and adds a bit of oat milk. No sugar.
I didn’t start drinking coffee until I was nearly thirty years old. And I didn’t start enjoying it until about 35. So having a kid with a much more sophisticated palate, is entertaining, to say the least.
And now she’s made it a personal mission to try coffee ice creams, whenever possible, which is a mission I can fully support. She (we) highly recommend the Haagen-Dazs coffee ice cream (her first true coffee ice cream love), and we’re also big fans of Greater’s mocha chocolate chip and Jeni’s coffee with cream & sugar.
But there are more. Many more coffee ice creams out there, which begs the question – which do we need to try next?
tween style file:
