After our conversation about terms for ice cream trucks, a listener reports that her harried mother used to tell her kids that the cheery sounds wafting through their neighborhood were from the music truck. This is part of a complete episode.
Surf’s up! When surfers describe the waves as going gangbusters, it’s a great time out on the water. But why that word? Plus, a thesaurus of flavors serves up delicious writing about the taste of foods and spices. And speaking of...
If you eat ice cream too quickly, the painful result is called an ice-cream headache, a cold headache, or brain freeze. But if you’d feel better using the medical term for it, it’s another mouthful: sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia. This...
A traffic-light sundae is a dish of vanilla ice cream decorated with red, white, and green cherries, topped with nuts, crushed fruit, or whipped cream. This is part of a complete episode.
Why is vanilla associated with blandness? When this flavor was first introduced to Europe in the 16th century, it was considered a delicacy. Thomas Jefferson came upon it during a stay in France and helped popularize it in the United States...
A slice of pie topped with ice cream is said to be served à la mode, a French phrase that means “in the fashion of.” A listener in Greenfield, Massachusetts, wants to know why. This is part of a complete episode.