Summer=Snowballs

No, I am not talking about snocones, the snowball's evil nemesis. I am talking about good, old fashioned, Baltimore snowballs. I think these only exist in Baltimore. They consist of shaved ice with sugary syrup and a healthy topping of marshmallow.

I have fond memories of walking down the street to the snowball stand to get everyone's order, and gingerly carrying them back to Josie's porch. I remember basic flavors growing up: cherry, skylite, spearmint, egg custard. Maybe that's because those are the flavors we always had on the 4th of July. My Aunt B would sit on the porch and hand shave ice with this tiny little ice scraper. It was the highlight of the day.

When I was little, I usually ate Cherry. Now, my favorite flavor is egg custard. Egg Custard is such a hard flavor to describe - slightly orangey, but not quite, vanilla-like, but not quite. Skylite is also difficult to describe, as most people will tell you it tastes like blue.

The highlight of my snowball eating years came when my friend opened her own snowball stand. I would bike over to her grandfather's house every day and get a free snowball. It was one of my favorite summers.

I moved outside of Baltimore proper, so my favorite snowball stand now is aptly named, "The Snowball Stand". It's a short drive from my house, and they make excellent snowballs.

I hope you all get to enjoy a snowball sometime soon!