The Bliss of Ice Cream..!!

God must hav bin in a particularly bad mood wen he made the Indian Summer... and a particularly good one wen he invented the ICE-CREAM..!!

Well, maybe he dint actually invent it, bt it sure does feel tht way.. Especially for someone who comes frm Gujarat, ice cream is a kind of religion of which kesar pista is d ruling diety. For ice cream is d almost perfect form of bliss tht no amount of cynicism of today's world can dent. Eating ice cream is lyk an act of surrender-we relinquish control over our senses and a desire to shape the world. 

 We lose 5 mins of our existence every time we get a cup, for in tht time we r our slaves frm d world we live in & inhabit one where pleasure runs barefoot..!! Ice cream allows for nuthing intellectual, nuthing self-conscious n nuthin negative. Ice cream slows time; d world takes on d dreamy quality of slow motion sound. We r addled into benevolence; d world luks lyk a gud place... as a frnd of mine once remarked, "Hav u ever seen a villain eating ice cream?"

Ice cream is an intermediate form – it is a solid, which is infact a contained liquid; it is d warmth of our mouth tht makes something frozen n hard, lush n liquid. We savour d slow death of d solid n d exquisite birth of d liquid as d pleasure paint, tht is ice cream, fills our mouth. No wonder ice cream is d favorite comfort food – heartbreak inHollywood is signified routinely by d woman diving into those impossibly large cans of ice cream. It provides comfort coz it fills up in a way tht leaves no room for thought. Ice ceam consumes us even as we consume it.

Its d fate of all creamy things to be considered “sinful” n ice cream is no exception. Pour some hot chocolate sauce and ice cream bcomes an experience is sinful profusion.  Ice cream makes us all go back to being 5 yrs old n feel deeply nostalgic about the simplicity n purity of earlier times. Growing up in middle class India meant tht ice cream wuz an occasional treat to be savoured in d full.. the wooden spoon wud hit d paper bottom time n again as we scraped out every single drop of wet ice cream tht we were firmly convinced, still remained in d cup. D bell of d ice cream man wuz lyk a distant sound of hope as we opened negotiations wid our parents (only if its Kwality, sometimes dey wud deign to say). And once in a while, we managed to get a slice of tht mythical 3 layered treat called Cassata; d epitome of everythin impossibly indulgent.

                         And who can forget the ice cream cone, especially d softy..?? D softy is perhaps d most romantic form of ice cream as it is designed to for us to take it in our hand n proceed to make love to our mouths. D softy makes d ice cream an extension of ourselves as we launch ourselves into d ice cream n lose our tongue n hearts to it.

Vanilla remains d favorite ice cream flavor coz it captures its essence best. It is white, smells of luxurious escape n is something one can sink languidly into. The taste of vanilla is a hint, a whiff tht d mind does not need to work hard to process. Vanilla elevates ice cream frm being dairy product  into something more refined. It doesn’t matter how much u serve it – even d thick unappetizing slabs we r served at weddings transform into something heavenly once it enters our mouth.

                                              In a world tht is bcoming faster day by day, ice cream is d slowest food there is; u cannot gulp it down in a hurry. While we r eating ice cream, we know tht everything else is trivial… Maybe, we shud b eating a lot more of it.. wot say..??