Mortensen's Ice Cream

August 31, 2012


I have a long weekend with no call! The last weekend of the summer. I hope I can concentrate on the positive instead of thinking of how the man I trusted with my life betrayed me. I can always turn to ice cream to soothe my soul.


This week Hilary and I went to Mortensen's for lunch and ice cream. There are two. One in Cromwell and one in Newington on the Berlin Turnpike. It is very much like a Friendly's but family run. It is in an unassuming building, somewhere I would never have stopped at in the past


We had a delicious lunch. Veggie burger and tuna melt. And homemade cole slaw. The hot dogs looked great! And the milk shakes!!! Wish I could have tried a little of everything. The ice cream was nothing special but the whole experience was fun. Having lunch with my daughter, trying a new ice cream place and shopping at a Marshalls we had never been to in Wethersfield made the day special.

Here's to the final summer weekend of 2012. To everyone who is going through a difficult time, get out in the sun and try to enjoy yourself. Start out slow if you have to, one step at a time.

Mad Martha's

August 14, 2012


Besides eating great seafood and drinking last weekend I also had the chance to try two of the Vineyards ice cream parlors. Instead of lunch we substituted ice cream cones.

Vineyard Scoops is in Edgartown. Their ice cream was just so-so. I got Mounds. Instead of coconut ice cream it was chocolatey and did not have much coconut flavor. I was accused by my friends of being an ice cream snob and too much of a city girl to appreciate the simple flavors of the island.

The next day we tried Mad Martha's. We took the bus to Vineyard Haven to shop and again traded lunch for ice cream. I had Reese's Cream. It was a wonderful combination of sweet cream ice cream with huge chunks of peanut butter cups. Mary had her favorite Peppermint. I never  saw Peppermint like this one. It had red and green pieces of peppermint stick and although I'm not a fan of that it looked delicious.

So I would have to vote for Mad Martha's as my favorite ice cream place in the Vineyard. And although I much prefer the city I could get into island living for short periods of time. Especially if I could live in one of those big "cottages" by the water!

Beach Day

August 7, 2012



Last Friday I took a road trip with my childhood friends, Margo and Annemarie. We went to Scarborough beach in Rhode Island. Since I had received my consolation prize (a new car) in the divorce settlement we had been talking about taking a day trip. We piled our beach gear in the trunk and took off early. For some reason I did not plug in the GPS and of course we got a little lost. But we finally arrived.

 It's not as easy to go to the beach as it was when we were teenagers. So much paraphernalia. Towels, blankets, food, umbrellas. One for each of us and an extra one just in case. Clothes to change into when we were done. Makeup, soap, jewelry etc. We planned to shower there and go out to dinner.

After spending all day in the sun we packed up to make the trek to the car. I'm not sure which one of us said, "Next time we're spending the night at the hotel across the street!" But we all agreed, it was getting way too hard to make do without the luxury of a room to freshen up in.

After eating at the Coast Guard Restaurant we started home. Margo was on a mission to find an ice cream place to try. She spent half the way home looking on her IPhone and finally found Dad's of Niantic. We stopped there and had LLBean muddy bean boots(peanut ice cream with brownie bits) and black raspberry chocolate chip. It was delicious and creamy. Dad's is a clam shack across from the beach in Niantic and from what I could see the food looked pretty good. Typical fried seafood.

So all in all a good weekend. Beach, Yankees and food. Some good days and some incredibly painful moments. Hopefully time will help.

Goodbye July

August 1, 2012


Yeah!! July is over. Normally the best month of the year for me. I love the summer, the beach, the warmth, the days lasting longer. And all my celebrations. My mother's birthday was in July and two of my best friends have children born in July. But this year it was just something to "get through." And I did. Thanks to my friends and my kids. Everyone went above and beyond to keep my spirits positive. But like I said before, sometimes a street sign, a memory, a TV commercial, will bring it all crashing around you. When you least expect it.

I am sure you can tell by yesterday's blog that it would have been my 31st anniversary. Instead of being on vacation like I had planned I went to work for half a day. But I was determined not to mope around when I got home.

I decided to go to The Collins Creamery with Hilary for ice cream. It is in Enfield. Who knew Enfield was so far away? Not being good with directions (and that's an understatement!) I put the address in my GPS. However I failed to look at the distance until we hit Hartford. I thought it said 36 more miles. But it couldn't. That would be almost in Massachusetts. Right at that point the GPS decided to stop working. I quickly got out my IPhone but I am not as familiar with using that for directions. But guess what? We found the place. And it was very near Longmeadow MA. It was a very long ride for ice cream, especially after waking up at 4:30 AM for work that morning.

The Collins Creamery is adorable. A quaint white building set on a farm. Cows were in the pasture next to us. I even bought a gorgeous pot of zinnias for my porch. The ice cream, coconut chocolate chip and Collins Compost (brownie batter base and oreo cookies) was flavorful and creamy. No ice, Josh! They had lots of flavors to choose from and also had soft serve and frozen yogurt. And as an added treat I found a Marshall's to stop at on the way home.

The Schmackery

July 30, 2012


Another birthday down. Joshua turned 27 on Saturday. We celebrated in Manhattan as we very often do for birthdays. We saw a play, One Man, Two Guvnors' at the Music Box Theater. It was hilarious. We laughed through the entire performance. Which kept me from getting morose and saying something to break the mood. We had lunch at Le Marseille, a french restaurant near the theater. We have eaten there in the past. When his father was around to share his celebrations. But this time it was Jocelyn and I.  However even without Dave, the food was just as good as we remembered.

But what I really want to talk about is The Schmackery. No, it is not a new form of sadomasochism. Not that I would know much about S&M. But this is a cookie shop in Hells Kitchen right near the restaurant. We passed it as we were going to lunch and I saw that they make ice cream sandwiches. I knew I would be saving room for one. We finished lunch at 1:15. The play was not until 2. Josh was worried about filling the gap but I knew exactly where we were headed.

We all shared one sandwich. Vanilla bean gelato in between two cookies of our choice. I picked a cookie made with candied bacon, maple syrup, toffee bits and sea salt. ( As if the bacon were not salty enough.) I know it sounds weird but it was unbelievably delicious. Jocelyn picked a banana, peanut butter cookie. At least I think she picked it. I was so excited I may have picked it for her.

It was the perfect way to spend time before we could take our seats. I will definitely be returning there next time I am in the city. Until then I am going to try to find a recipe for the cookies. Anyone know where to buy candied bacon?

More Ice Cream

July 12, 2012


Enough self pity for awhile. This will be all about ice cream! And that beats self pity any day. Not to say those days are over. I know better than that. I still have my birthday and anniversary to get through. But ice cream will be there for those days too.

Last week Hilary and I tried Pralines in Wallingford. I had been by that area many times and did not know there was an ice cream shop on Route 5 in a little strip mall. It's a cute place with a party room in the back. I had Reeses peanut butter cup and Hilary had cookie dough. We rated it at a 7.0.  It was creamy, no ice ( Josh's criteria! ) but just ok.

Yesterday to commemorate the non birthday day Hilary and I went out to Frankies Diner in Bridgeport for a quick lunch. I don't really know the area but we were headed to Timothy's for ice cream.

Timothy's is in the Black Rock section of Bridgeport. It has a country store decor and tables inside to enjoy your selection. Again, good ice cream but nothing very special. I had the Black Rock, french vanilla with chocolate-covered almonds and Hilary had sweet cream. Another 7.0. Good but not something I would drive back there to get in the future.

Wentworths and Walnut Beach Creamery are still our favorites. I'm sure there are many who do not agree with our ratings. This is truly an arbitrary system. Not something to seriously consider on your own ice cream adventures!

Guest Blog: Walnut Beach Creamery, a revised opinion

Guest blog by Josh Graboff, "the son," and author of the book of short stories Amalric Ogusson and the Fimbul Queen.

I went to Walnut Beach Creamery on my mother's advice. I can't believe she rated it so lowly in comparison to the other ice cream shops in the state! Jocelyn and I went together on our way back to New Jersey. The little community out there on the beach is quaint and well-maintained. The Sound actually looked attractive from the beach, and there are a number of little shops and restaurants right within walking distance.

Already, this is a step up from Wentworth's which, until we went to Walnut Beach, had been the standard by which we judged all other ice-cream. Wentworth's is on a busy highway and not really within walking distance of anything except a church, a masonic lodge, and a graveyard. There certainly aren't any little cottages on their own plots nearby.

So, when we got inside and discovered there were an amazing number of strange and delicious flavors (the lavender-fig was just the beginning of the list: I had Sandman, a peanut-butter ice-cream with chocolate covered graham crackers interspersed through it and Jocelyn had some lavender-fig and some carrot cake) that was just a bonus on top of the area.

The ice cream was creamy, there was no ice (as my mother has already made clear, ice in ice-cream is a major faux-paus. It is, essentially, the worst thing that can be done to the food), the flavors were varied, creative, and delicious. However, the real star of the show was none of those things. It wasn't even the beautiful area. It was, in fact, the pretzel cones that were hand-made and hand-shaped.

The salt on the cone elevated the ice-cream to a whole new realm. It was more delicious than I can begin to describe, and yet it remained crunchy throughout and was absolutely the best once the ice-cream above the level of the cone was gone.

I rebut my mother's review; indeed, I believe that Walnut Beach Creamery is the best ice-cream in the state and easily among the best ice-cream I've ever had anywhere. I can easily say, with no qualms and no reservations at all, that Walnut Beach Creamery is in fact, a solid and unabashed 10.

We all scream for ice cream

July is my favorite month. My birthday is in July. So is my son's and my mother's was also. My ex husband was born in July. Two of my very good friends have children with July birthdays. And my anniversary would have been July 31st. Is there a name for your wedding anniversary after you are divorced? Or do you start marking the anniversary of your divorce? Maybe June 22 will become my new anniversary. 

The memories of last July have made me determined to make the most of this month. In January, Annie told me things would be better by my birthday. Not anywhere near totally better, but a little better. I didn't believe her then but I guess she was right. So today I want to write about something fun.

Last month Connecticut Magazine wrote an article about the best ice cream parlors in the state. I told Hilary I was going to visit all of them. Ice cream is my number one dessert. In fact I could go without dessert if not for ice cream. Wentworths, in Hamden, makes the best ice cream, in my opinion. So I have judged the others by them. Today Josh, Jocelyn and I went to Dr. Mikes in Bethel. We ate lunch at The Sycamore, an old fashioned diner with car hop service. We all had the Dagwood, a burger with all kinds of condiments, and their famous root beer in frosted mugs. Then off to my ice cream tasting.

Dr. Mikes is a tiny shop. You can not eat inside but they have benches outside. I had the chocolate lace, which is their best seller. It was delicious. Josh's coffee ice cream was flavorful but it had ice crystals. Jocelyn had a malted which was just ok. The selection of flavors was small so because of that and the icy texture of the coffee flavor we rated that a 7.5. Wentworths is to me a 9.5 (going on the theory that nothing is perfect).

A few weeks ago Hilary and I went to Walnut Beach Creamery. Their ice cream was great! Almost as good as Wentworths. In fact maybe as good. I will have to try it again to be sure! It was also a very tiny shop and I had my doubts when we arrived. But it was wonderful. The flavor selection was large and unusual. I had lavender fig in a pretzel cone. My daughter had cupcake. The pretzel cone alone is worth the trip back.

We have also tried A.C. Petersen in West Hartford. They are a full service restaurant serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. If you go there you have to try the frips. A cross between french fries and chips. They also had lots of flavors but we were not that impressed with the ice cream. Not enough to go back there again unless its for the frips. Rating 5.

The UCONN Dairy Bar was also very good. Not as good as Walnut Beach or Wentworths but we rated them an 8.5. The ice cream was rich and creamy but not many exotic flavors. There was lots of
room to eat inside or out and they also sold eggs and milk from their livestock.

As you can see I am eating again. Life does indeed go on. I can still find pleasure in an ice cream cone.