By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor
Sunday Inquirer Magazine

AS far as I am concerned, the pinipig crunch is the height of ice cream engineering. It is an amazing balance of the solid chocolate shell, creamy vanilla interior and, the piece de resistance, the crisp rice embedded in the shell. It was all the different sensations you can possibly get, all in one confection. It was a delicate task, eating the pinipig crunch, because you had to keep just enough of the shell intact so the vanilla doesn’t just plop on the floor, and yet it was also a race against time because wait too long and even the chocolate shell would start to melt.

Every grade school field trip to the Magnolia factory along Aurora Boulevard was laced with the promise of ice cream at the very end, usually in those huge gallon plastic containers. I wanted pinipig crunch, of course, which is interesting considering that I don’t usually enjoy ice cream: the cold of the treat tends to give people like me a sore throat. Early on, my pediatrician gave me a choice, ice cream or my tonsils. I chose to keep my tonsils.

But ice cream still kept a bit of a lure. I still occasionally enjoy a scoop of chocolate and mint ice cream. But the glorious creation of “dirty ice cream” continues to capture the imagination. When I see a sorbetero pushing his cart by the road, ringing a handheld bell, I think of the uniquely grainy consistency of sorbets, and its wonderfully original and distinct flavors, like chocolate (not the chocolate you know), mango (what better flavor for us) and perhaps the greatest sorbetes flavor of all, quezo (the bigger the chunks the better). Perhaps the height of ice cream goodness (on par with the pinipig crunch) is the small local sugar cone topped by three scoops of dirty ice cream—chocolate, mango and quezo, of course.

Everyone loves some kind of ice cream, be it ube espesyal or the more recent Chocnut vintage. My wife swears by the lady fingers ice cream from the Cambridge, Massachusetts institution Toscanini’s. My brother-in-law, who is based abroad, still speaks fondly of Magnolia Twin Popsies—Orange flavor, of course.

There are many different aspects of ice cream here. The ice drop, best exemplified by buko, is one such creation. There are the dueling digital tones of the ambulant ice cream vendors on pedicabs. Have you ever been caught in traffic with one of those ice cream pedicabs next to you, music going? Maddening.

But ice cream is a mix of different textures and tastes, a creation of cold and creamy, sweet and tart. It is a masterpiece of food imagination made real. What’s your favorite flavor?

Read about all kinds of sweet indulgences in the April 26, 2009 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.