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I Scream, You Scream, We all Scream for Ice Cream
Is there anything better on a hot summer day - heck is there anything better on any day - than ice cream?
Turns out July is National Ice Cream Month. (OK, it's also National Anti-Boredom Month, National Blueberry Month, National Hotdog Month and National Read-an-Almanac Month, among a dozen or so others).
But what better excuse than ice cream for Kids' Corner to take a break from union history, child labor and the rest of the weighty issues we talk about on this page?
This July not only celebrates ice cream, it marks the 100-year anniversary of the ice cream cone. It was invented at the World's Fair in St. Louis, Mo., on July 23, 2004. As one story goes, a vendor serving scoops of ice cream ran out of dishes and began dumping the scoops inside another vendor's waffle-shaped cookies. Is it true? Nobody's sure. There were over 50 ice cream vendors at the fair and many of them took credit for creating the first cone.
Ice cream was popular long before the World's Fair. It was one of President George Washington's favorite treats. In fact, he's said to have run up a $200 bill for ice cream during the summer of 1790 - a huge sum of money back then.
Early ice creams weren't anything like today's creamy, smooth, dairy confections. Perhaps the earliest was known as "sweet snow," first served in 52 A.D. The Roman emperor, Nero, sent slaves into the mountains to gather snow. They raced back to the kitchen with it, where cooks flavored it with fruit, wine or honey.
Some people believe that Italian explorer Marco Polo brought a recipe for ice cream back from China in 1295. Historians now say that isn't true, but on his return he did describe "milk dried into a kind of paste," that was another primitive form of ice cream.
Our country's first ice cream parlor opened in New York City the year of America's independence, 1776. Making ice cream was hard work. Cooks put a pail of cream inside a bucket of ice and spent hours stirring the cream and shaking the ice. Things got a little easier in 1843 when a New England woman invented a crank machine. Turning the crank stirred all the ingredients, and the ice cream froze smoothly.
Ice cream sodas became popular during the 1800s, a mix of bubbly soda, syrup and ice cream. For whatever reason, some cities frowned on drinking soda on Sundays and banned it on that day. So soda shops began selling just ice cream and syrup - and the "sundae" was born.
Americans love their ice cream today just as much as they did then. In fact, as a country we spend $20 billion - that's billion - on ice cream and frozen desserts each year. George Washington would be proud.
Most of the historical information in our story came from National Geographic Explorer online. Learn more at www.nationalgeographic.com/kids.
Turns out July is National Ice Cream Month. (OK, it's also National Anti-Boredom Month, National Blueberry Month, National Hotdog Month and National Read-an-Almanac Month, among a dozen or so others).
But what better excuse than ice cream for Kids' Corner to take a break from union history, child labor and the rest of the weighty issues we talk about on this page?
This July not only celebrates ice cream, it marks the 100-year anniversary of the ice cream cone. It was invented at the World's Fair in St. Louis, Mo., on July 23, 2004. As one story goes, a vendor serving scoops of ice cream ran out of dishes and began dumping the scoops inside another vendor's waffle-shaped cookies. Is it true? Nobody's sure. There were over 50 ice cream vendors at the fair and many of them took credit for creating the first cone.
Ice cream was popular long before the World's Fair. It was one of President George Washington's favorite treats. In fact, he's said to have run up a $200 bill for ice cream during the summer of 1790 - a huge sum of money back then.
Early ice creams weren't anything like today's creamy, smooth, dairy confections. Perhaps the earliest was known as "sweet snow," first served in 52 A.D. The Roman emperor, Nero, sent slaves into the mountains to gather snow. They raced back to the kitchen with it, where cooks flavored it with fruit, wine or honey.
Some people believe that Italian explorer Marco Polo brought a recipe for ice cream back from China in 1295. Historians now say that isn't true, but on his return he did describe "milk dried into a kind of paste," that was another primitive form of ice cream.
Our country's first ice cream parlor opened in New York City the year of America's independence, 1776. Making ice cream was hard work. Cooks put a pail of cream inside a bucket of ice and spent hours stirring the cream and shaking the ice. Things got a little easier in 1843 when a New England woman invented a crank machine. Turning the crank stirred all the ingredients, and the ice cream froze smoothly.
Ice cream sodas became popular during the 1800s, a mix of bubbly soda, syrup and ice cream. For whatever reason, some cities frowned on drinking soda on Sundays and banned it on that day. So soda shops began selling just ice cream and syrup - and the "sundae" was born.
Americans love their ice cream today just as much as they did then. In fact, as a country we spend $20 billion - that's billion - on ice cream and frozen desserts each year. George Washington would be proud.
Most of the historical information in our story came from National Geographic Explorer online. Learn more at www.nationalgeographic.com/kids.