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July 23rd is Vanilla Ice Cream Day! by Tonya Hopkins aka @TheFoodGriot

Before enslaved Chef James Hemings, America’s first classically-trained chef de cuisine (in the French culinary arts, in France 1784-1789) with several recipes for the firm style of vanilla icecream we all expect today, “ice cream was more like a milkshake” ~ JHS founder, Chef Ashbell McElveen shared ….

Want more scoop on the almost UNBELIEVABLE but true story (stories!) behind Vanilla Icecream ?! … how the majority of Americans might not have ever known this now ubiquitous (once ‘exotic’) ice-cold, creamy sweet treat the way we do today had it not been for the ingenuity of enslaved African-originated people across the centuries from both here and abroad?.…

Well then you should definitely Join my Patreon community to get this scoop! Take advantage of the myriad ways to get the full story, interact with me directly, ask your burning (or ice cold !) q’s about your fave food (& drink) history & culture subjects. Expand your mind AND your heart as you gain a better understanding, foster greater appreciation and gratitude for your own and “other” cultures that brought and continue to bring so much to this vast American table. ‘Not knowing’ (as many ‘powers that be’ prefer) only contributes to the widening divide among us. Choose inclusive intel over ignorance, and be an ambassador for what you believe in…I look forward to continuing the convo with you there!

BONUS SCOOP: Patreon Community Members Get Easier Access to a Compilation of Audio & Video REPLAY LINKS to all the TFG ice cream content currently on record including:

🔴 My Culinary History Talk (& Tasting!) At Lefferts Historic House FULL PRESENTATION REPLAY on how Vanilla Ice Cream and how it serves as an unlikely portal to our sometimes aghast American past"...

🟡 The Chasing Flavor with Chef Carla Hall” Ice cream episode streaming on HBO’s MAX where I’m featured in as the Culinary Historian. I’ll be hosting a real time interactive watch party of this episode with my Patreon Peeps THIS MONTH so be sure to sign up to stay in the loop on that scoop (including a replay if it’s already happened by the time you read this

🟣 All the (previously hidden) history I scoop up in my TFG Podcast Episode on the origins of ice cream in America …

🟠 the Milk Street Radio Summer series episode where I serve up the hidden history of the origins of American ice cream to host Christopher Kimball …

Last but not least you might also want to check out the docu film, “James Hemings: Ghost in America’s Kitchen(yes, yours truly makes a cameo ;)

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The Patreon hyperlinks are embedded above and here it is again, out in the open , for anybody who’s old-school (no judgement!) : https://www.patreon.com/thefoodgriot/membership