Sure, we could spend all our time in air-conditioned comfort, but where’s the fun in that? Especially when there are so many tastier ways of beating the summer heat.
What follows are five supremely delicious ways to stay cool during the doggiest days of summer. We make no claim to having chosen the absolute best. That’s a matter of taste, and quite probably of where you live or grew up.
No doubt, there are plenty of wonderful places to get summer treats all over the metropolitan area, and we’ve no intention of putting down, for example, the snowballs at Opie’s in Catonsville, the cinnamon ice cream at Bruster’s in Glen Burnie or the many ice cream flavors offered by Taharka Bros., which can be found at multiple locations or purchased from its “Change-Maker Mobile” ice cream truck.
But we will promise: Stick with these five, and you won’t go wrong — or stay hot.
Ice Cream
The Cow, 201 Main St., Reisterstown. 410-526-1800.
You see a cow on wheels in front of a building, maybe you figure this is a place to buy ice cream. And at The Cow in Reisterstown, an ice-cream stand inside a refurbished 1920s-era gas station, you’re getting just about the best around — rich, creamy soft-serve frozen custard, poured generously into a cup or cone, guaranteed to chill even the steamiest of days.
“We love the frozen custard,” says Jennifer Daniels, 41, here with her 9-year-old nephew, Archer. “And all the Italian ice flavors — I haven’t found another place with so many flavors.”
When it comes to its signature frozen custard, The Cow sticks to basics — vanilla, chocolate and the two combined in a twist. But the toppings — including peanuts, M&Ms, strawberry, caramel, crushed Whoppers and more than a dozen others — make all things possible.
Owner Mike Reiner, who was working at a Blockbuster before inspiration hit him and a frozen custard showplace was born, believes the key to The Cow’s popularity lies both in its funky appeal — “The Cow is a neighborhood spot,” he says — and his reliance on fresh, local products. The frozen custard is made on premises, using Cloverland milk (a Baltimore mainstay since 1919), with toppings and other ingredients obtained from local, smaller, often family-run businesses
Other ice cream places may offer more flavors per se but it’s hard to imagine any ice-cream lover leaving The Cow wanting. Plus, it also offers more than 60 flavors of Italian ice.
That, and you get to lick your frozen custard while sitting on a bench alongside a 75-pound cow-on-wheels..
“We don’t take things very seriously,” says Reiner, who opened The Cow in 2000 (it used to be called Dairy Fresh, but everyone knew it by the cow outside, so Reiner bowed to popular sentiment and re-named it in 2005). “It’s supposed to be fun — it’s summer!”
Snowballs
B&B Snowballs, 7193 Baltimore-Annapolis Blvd., Ferndale. 410-761-0944.
Nothing says summer refreshment, particularly in Baltimore, like a snowball — a cup of shaved ice soaked with sugary syrup of just about any imaginable flavor, sometimes topped with marshmallow (unnecessary for some, essential for others), eaten with a plastic spoon.
As every local who’s ever had the pleasure knows, nothing in the world cools you down faster. Or tastes much better.
On B&A Boulevard in Ferndale, B&B has been serving up snowballs for a quarter-century. Take a plastic foam cup, fill it about two inches above the brim with ice, pour in the flavor (B&B never skimps on the flavored syrup) and prepare to be chilled.
The stand goes through 800-900 pounds of ice a day. Owner Brian Lee says B&B mixes all its own flavors right there, all 40 of them, using a mix of concentrate and sugar.
“We try to stick with the basics” when it comes to flavor, Lee says. The most popular? Perennial local favorite egg custard, by an almost three-to-one margin.
But perhaps what sets B&B apart from so many other snowball stands (and there are plenty around, although once you get outside of the greater Baltimore area, they’re scarce as hen’s teeth) is that you can also buy steamed crabs here, from a stand around the back.
And if there’s anything that says summer in Baltimore better than steamed crabs and snowballs, it hasn’t been discovered yet.
Gelato
Pitango Gelato, 802 S. Broadway, Fells Point. 410-236-0741 or pitangogelato.com.
Don’t be too mad if there’s a line at Pitango Gelato. It’s worth it.
On Broadway, just about a block north of the waterfront, Pitango has been serving its delicious take on Italian ice cream since 2005. In that time, it has expanded from this original location to four more, all in the D.C.-Virginia area.
It’s not hard to taste why. On a hot summer day, order yourself a cup — there are some 60 flavors in all, with 20 offered at any given time — and prepare to have your palate soothed (and cooled) to within an inch of its overheated life.
On a recent Friday afternoon, the offerings included staples like vanilla and chocolate (several varieties of chocolate, we should note), as well as passion fruit, tangerine, pistachio and plenty of other flavors.
“We’re very traditional,” owner Noah Dan says. “We don’t go for any of those strange flavors.” Plus, he promises, your mouth will continue savoring every last bit of gelato until that cup or cone is empty. In fact, the only off-putting thing about a gelato at Pitango’s is the line you might have to stand in to get one; on a hot summer night or weekend afternoon, the line of waiting-to-be-chilled supplicants can be daunting. But Dan promises his staff has become expert at keeping the line moving.
“Don’t worry if you see a line,” he reassures. “They move fast. We don’t want anyone to wait for more than a few minutes.”
Orange Crush
Portside Tavern, 2821 O’Donnell St., Canton. 410-522-7678 or portsidetavern.com.
For a cooling refreshment with a little kick to it, they don’t come any better — or more distinctly Maryland — than an Orange Crush.
After all, take some (preferably fresh-squeezed) orange juice, some orange-flavored vodka, some triple sec and a little Sprite, and what’s not to like?
“It’s a total native Baltimore drink,” says Portside Tavern owner Steve Roop, who estimates his bartenders serve about 200 on a busy night. “You go to Southern California or Florida, they have no idea about them.”
Roop says the secret to Portside’s Orange Crushes is in the details — the fresh oranges, the “top of the line” vodka.
And there’s no pre-mixing, he promises. That Orange Crush you’re enjoying, in anticipation of a dinner of O’Donnell Street Shrimp? It was created just seconds earlier.
And for the record, they were popular way before the Orioles’ Chris Davis started launching home run after home run a couple years back, earning the nickname “Crush” and seeing it on orange T-shirts throughout the city.
“Oh, I think they were way popular before that,” Roop assures. “But it didn’t hurt.”
Milkshakes
Charlesmead Pharmacy, 6242 Bellona Ave. 410-435-0210 or charlesmeadpharmacy.com.
Sitting quietly just a few blocks south of the Baltimore County line, this little pharmacy, with its vintage lunch counter, round spinning seats and jars of penny candy (although they cost a dime these days) almost literally takes its customers back to a gentler time.
And the milkshakes? Wow.
The ingredients are as basic as can be: milk, ice cream and, when necessary, flavoring (strawberry, peach or peanut butter, for example). “There’s nothing synthetic,” assures owner Marilyn Weisman, who took over operation of the neighborhood institution 38 years ago.
The shakes are thick, but they can easily be drunk through a straw. They’re supremely tasty, plenty big (a steal for only $4) and utterly refreshing.
Plus, when sitting at the counter, you get to enjoy them in exactly the same way your parents and grandparents did decades before.
If you prefer, you can even enjoy one on the picnic table outside, shielded from the sun by a big green umbrella.
“We’re one of the last of the old-time pharmacies,” owner Weisman says with pride. There’s been a pharmacy here since at least the early ’50s, says pharmacist Doug Campbell. The current lunch counter was installed in the latter part of that decade.
“It’s a good place,” Weisman says with a smile.
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