Eat ALL the ice cream!!!

Because it's important to challenge yourself, and I'm in Guatape for awhile, and it's $0.50 per cone, I decided to eat every flavor of ice cream in one of the little shops near the square.

I've now come full circle, as there are no flavors left to try in this town.  Hopefully, I will be able to pick this up again elsewhere...

Here is a list of all the flavors I have tasted in the last two weeks:

Brownie.  This was pretty average.  Not bad, not great.  The brownie pieces were more like crumbs than chunks, and not particularly rich.  B-

Arequipe. (Colombian"dulce de leche").  Arequipe itself, in a jar or plastic container, is deadly.  Never try this because you won't be able to stop eating it.  The ice cream was just okay.  B

Chocolate.  Because chocolate.  It was rich, and decent, and satisfied a craving that day.  B

**Maracuya. This flavor reminded me of mango, but I knew it wasn't mango. I asked her the next day what it was and she said maracuya, which is passionfruit.  This was an amazing ice cream cone, and soon to be on my repeats list.  Also inspired me to try the actual fruit it is based on, which is pretty good, but not ice cream.  A+

Maracuya.  Hell yes!

Frutas Rojas.  I expected more from red fruits.  This flavor was completely and totally underwhelming.  C.

Caramelo. This was definitely one of the better flavors, but not the best.  Vanilla with swirls of caramel.  It's not like you can mess that up.  A.

Vainilla Mora. Cherry vanilla.  Good but not amazing.  B+

Ron Pasas.  Melissa ordered this one every time we got ice cream, so I was expecting it to be awesome.  As it turns out, Melissa just happens to like rum a hell of a lot more than I do.  It tastes too boozy for ice cream greatness, and the raisins were too bulky and not cold.  C-

Chocolate Almendras, with a view!

**Chocolate Almendras.  I saved the expensive ones until near the end of the experiment, because, generally, I am more likely to have $1,500 pesos in my pocket than $3,000 (which is still only about $0.95 at today's exchange rate).  This was definitely a "save the best for last" scenario.  The reason it's more expensive is because it's a Mimmo's brand flavor, and that's the good stuff around these parts.  For the record, chocolate almendras, in addition to meaning "ice cream greatness" also means vanilla ice cream with chocolate shavings and almond chunks.  A+

Nata.  This was also a Mimmo's flavor, so double the price, but unequivocally not worth the $0.95.  Nata basically means cream, and it kind of tasted like a lamer version of butterscotch to me.  My favorite thing about this cone was that some of the maracuya had been mixed in by accident.  I loved those bites.  D

Vainilla Mani.  This flavor was vanilla ice cream with teeny tiny bits of peanut in it.  For such an ordinary flavor it was mildly delicious. A pleasant surprise.  B+

Flavor profile, top to bottom: fresa, mandarina.  Also, look at
the pretty boats!

Mandarina.  This is basically orange ice cream, and it had a tiny hint of that kind of creamsicle fake orange taste that I happened to really enjoy as a child.  I ate this in a double cone with strawberry because I bought it from the expensive place that serves two flavors per cone, and also because I told Billy I'd get a double cone for him if he drank an extra beer for me.  #priorities. A.

Fresa.  Strawberry has never been my favorite ice cream flavor.  This one was pretty good, not amazing.  Tasted a little more fake than past strawberry ice creams I've had, but I enjoyed it anyway, unlike nata and frutas rojas.  B.

Not ice cream, but similar, delicious
and adorbs!

Having basically tried all this town has to offer in the ice cream department, I have two options: I can stop eating ice cream until I get to a new city (6 days), or I can just eat the chocolate almendras and maracuya until I explode.  Option B is the answer, obviously.  (You didn't honestly think I'd stop, did you?)

Bonus: coffee smoothie for $500 COP that I got with my pastry at a place called Donde Willy last weekend: Tiny, but delicious.  An A for coffee smoothie not quite ice cream effort, especially since she squirted the top with sweetened condensed milk!

A week from yesterday, I head back to Cartagena, where the goal is to find such deliciousness as sapote ice cream to take pictures of in front of scenery for my next blog post.  Until then, I'm going to go do some pushups and crunches to prepare for tomorrow's cone.  (Just kidding.  I'm gonna sit here and read my Facebook.  I had you there, though, didn't I?)