Pumpkin and Spice

I was doing my weekly grocery shopping yesterday, and as I sometimes do, I wandered down the ice cream aisle to look wistfully at the frozen treats. I love ice cream, but I can't buy it here. My weird, tiny dorm-style fridge has a little "freezer box", but doesn't actually keep anything frozen. No, let me amend that- it doesn't freeze anything I want to be frozen (Lean Cuisines, Otter Pops, &c), but selectively freezes random items I don't want frozen (mustard, yogurt, apricot jam...) So, even though I don't buy, since I don't trust my fridge, I still like to look.

I especially like to look at the Ben & Jerry's flavors- I'm a big fan of the boys from Vermont, and I love scouting for flavors I haven't tried. Well, when I spotted one of their newest flavors, I was so excited I almost hyperventilated right there at the grocery store! The flavor? Mission to Marzipan- sweet cream ice cream with almond cookie bits and a marzipan swirl! Ben & Jerry's website says this about the new flavor:

We're not sure when marzipan captured our imagination, but after we captured the sweet almond stuff that marzipan's made of and boldly froze it like nobody froze it before, we knew it would go whirls beyond our almond cookie nuts' wildest fantasies. So next time you're cruising the ice cream galaxy exploring cool new swirls and amazing taste combinations, don't forget the directions to the almond frontier!

I love, love, love marzipan! If you aren't familiar with marzipan, it's a dough-like paste made from ground blanched almonds, sugar and egg whites. It can be rolled out in sheets and used as a filling in sweets and cakes or can be used like fondant to cover a cake. It has a sweet almondy favor (think the light sweet flavor of amaretto, not the roasty-toasty flavor of almond butter.) Some of my favorite marzipan applications are covered in chocolate (very popular in German candies, like the dark chocolate-marzipan Ritter Sport bar-Yum!) and rolled thin and used as a filling, along with some raspberry jam, in a layer cake.

As excited as I was, I was also surprised to see marzipan as a Ben & Jerry's flavor. While marzipan is popular and very mainstream in Europe, it's not as well-known as a flavoring here in the US. Ben & Jerry's also tends to go for All-American comfort flavors (cookie dough, peanut butter, chocolate...), so marzipan seems a little more international than I would have expected. I probably wouldn't have been quite as surprised to see it as a Haagen-Daas flavor, though I think it looks like Ben & Jerry's have made it more fun and playful than Haagen-Daas might have.

Like I mentioned, I didn't buy any, since my freezer is questionable, and I can't eat a whole pint in one setting. However, I'm going to be home in a mere 14 days (squee!), and we have a Ben & Jerry's Scoop Shop in Melbourne, so I'm sure I can find it there. I can't wait to try it!