Tuesday, January 19, 2010

What the Heck is Snow Cream

In the recent Dim Sum Sunday Snowdays announcement post, I casually mentioned making Snow Cream. Stirred up a bit of curiosity, it did. Now it's time to explain. But first, I had to do a little research and then make a call back to the Mothership because you see Snow Cream lives as the one memory branded on my brain of the Great Blizzard of 1966. In late January of 1966 the DC Metro was quickly blanketed with up to 22" of snow. Not content to let the snow lie where it fell, Mother Nature decided to add 55 mile per hour winds to whip that snow into child swallowing drifts. With conditions like that you've got a storm for the ages in the Mid Atlantic region.

TV Chopper helping to evacuate pregnant woman to the hospital during Blizzard of '66.

Yours truly was but a wee child who was trapped with the rest of my family at our grandparents house. Seems the weekly family poker game was just too good to resist. Unfortunately the various aunts, uncles, spouses and children were trapped for 6 days in a very tiny house. VERY. TINY. And, might I add, this was in the time before disposable diapers. Are you digging me? Some people had bad acid experiences in the sixties...this little Almost Donner Party was a very bad trip. Acid might have helped but I can't be sure. Uglier details can not be revealed...some wounds are too deep. Still, I remember making snow cream.
Recipe for Snow Cream

Snow - fresh clean snow (no, yellow snow is not lemon flavored)
Milk or cream
Sugar
some flavoring ingredient (depends on your spice shelf and whether your mom made pancakes every Sunday morning to have maple syrup in the house)

Fold gently together.
Serve to ravenous children.
Repeat until:
A. Snow runs out.
B. Milk runs out.
C. Sugar runs out.
D. Patience runs out.

That, my friends, is Snow Cream.

12 comments:

moi said...

It really IS made with snow! That is so cool! Looks like we're having another one of those winters. We're getting slammed with one snow storm after the other, so look out.

Big Shamu said...

NOOOOOOOOOO! The snow on my roof just melted.

Making Space said...

Yum? In 66 maybe, but is the snow these days edible? Looks good though...

Aunty Belle said...

Heh...thas' a lot a bodies in one wee teeeny house. I'd be driven oput into the snow too.

Dani said...

I didn't want to expose my WVA hillbilly roots, but since we're talking about it...my dad let us do this as kids. Dads favorite was snow cream with maple flavoring extract. I tried finding some of that extract awhile ago, but I never had any luck. It would be nice just to sniff if so I could hold him a little tighter.

Big Shamu said...

Actually Aunty, two of my uncles did walk out, one was a fireman who could not be stuck and the other knew that if he didn't get out, there would be blood. It's a good thing to be too young to remember.

Dani, you know I'm all over that maple extract for you. You hillbilly.

Jenny said...

what happened to my comment??

Boo.

Cream and sugar are my two favorite food groups.

Big Shamu said...

I'm not sure why Blogger is dropping comments. I had that happen to me over at Diva's blog. I know she has had trouble here. I do know only one comment showed up at my email address for the blog. I have a bad habit of just hitting return thinking that the comment will take when perhaps it didn't. Too quick for my own good sometimes.

As for cream and sugar yes they ROCK!

Buzz Kill said...

Well, this certainly is simple. I've never heard of it before. I wonder how it would taste with beer?

Big Shamu said...

I see more yellow snow in our future...

LaDivaCucina said...

Donner party, haha!!!!!

Wow, you have some memory Sham! I don't remember that blizzard....but then again, I was three.

Thanks for the snow cream info, certainly adding cream and sugar to anything is divine. We never did this, just ate the snow as it was. Thanks for the vivid story!

Big Shamu said...

Some things my dear Diva, get seared into the memory banks. That's one for sure.