Few foods have the ability to make adults behave like children quite as quickly as ice cream.
Mention chocolate, cookies and cream, strawberry cheesecake or mint chocolate chip, and suddenly very serious people are debating toppings.
But ice cream has a surprisingly long history.
Frozen desserts existed long before modern freezers and brightly colored ice cream shops. Ancient cultures enjoyed chilled or frozen treats made with ingredients such as snow, ice, fruit and other flavorings.
The history of ice cream is not quite as simple as saying one person "invented" it. Frozen desserts developed in different places over long periods of time.
According to the historical timeline published by IceCream.com, ancient Greeks enjoyed a dessert similar to ice cream as far back as the 5th century B.C. Frozen desserts later evolved, and ice cream became increasingly popular in Europe and eventually America. In the 1700s, ice cream was still considered a luxury because refrigeration was not widely available.
And that makes sense.
Today, we casually keep multiple flavors in the freezer.
Historically, keeping something frozen required considerably more effort.
Before modern refrigeration, people could harvest and store ice, but maintaining frozen food was much more difficult than opening a freezer door.
Ice cream also became associated with celebrations and social events.
In America, the dessert gradually moved beyond the tables of wealthy households and became more accessible as technology, production and refrigeration improved.
Eventually came the cone, the sundae, the ice cream sandwich, soft serve and the enormous variety of flavors we know today.
And the fun part is that ice cream continues to evolve.
Some people want simple vanilla.
Others want chunks of cookies, fruit swirls, caramel ribbons and enough toppings to require structural engineering.
There is no wrong answer.
So the next time you're enjoying a scoop, remember that you're eating more than dessert.
You're participating in a food tradition that has been evolving for centuries.
That's a lot of history in one little cone.
And somehow, it still melts faster than we can eat it.
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