christmas visits

Happy Holidays and a very [late] Merry Christmas to you all!  I hope the last few days have found you happiness + good health, and God as blessed you with time with family + friends!

        

Our Christmas was wonderful!  We spent our Christmas with both sides of our family, eating until we were stuffed and having a jolly good time!  Some of my favorite gifts included a new Coach purse from my in-laws, diamond earrings from the Hubs, an ice cream maker from the bro, and my new Vibram FiveFingers from the Hubs!  (I will be posting sometime about how + why I plan to incorporate barefoot running into my routine.)

And a certain someone just so happened to celebrate his 30th birthday on the 26th!  I can’t believe I’m married to a 30 year old!  CRAZY!

And for his annual “gift” for his birthday, we headed down to Matt’s “Happy Place” – Branson!  Or more specifically, Silver Dollar City…

 

We were also able to visit a fairly new distillery about 10 miles north of Branson – Copper Run Distillery.  They make small batch moonshine, whiskey, and rum.  It was delish and of course we ended up taking a bottle of whiskey home for the Hubs.

  

And of course, no trip to Branson could be complete without a stop at my absolute FAVORITE frozen custard place!

 

Yes, I know, it’s the 3rd time we’ve been this year, but it’s a definitely treat since there is not one in STL.  Plus, we went to one in Springfield instead of in Branson… so at least it was a different location, right?!

I decided to try something new that I had never seen before.  The Askinosie WooHoo Concrete.

A wonderful blend of bitter chocolate blended to pieces with Andy’s incredibly creamy vanilla custard.  And check out Askinosie Chocolate – they have a really great story.

Matt chose to get the Boomer Bear in support of local Missouri State University.  A new combination that seems a bit weird but totally worked.  Sweet + buttery + crunchy = delish!

  

Another successful Andy’s visit.  And although they are opened through the winter (GO if you have a chance), we won’t be back until SDC opens up again in the spring.

best of branson

After our Gulf Coast plans were ruined by oil and a sick grandpa, we decided we would head down to Matt's favorite place in the world -- Branson. Yes, we have already gone once, but we figured another trip down wouldn't hurt! (We typically go 3-4 times a year... we have already made it down 4 times, and will go at least 2 more time this year!)

On our quest to discover new frozen custard places, we did our research ahead of time and discovered there was another frozen custard "stand" besides Andy's on the Strip. You would really never know that Glenn's was there unless you noticed the ice cream cone out front OR wanted to see the world's largest banjo (whether you can actually consider this a banjo is debatable).


Glenn's Frozen Custard is located inside the Grand Country Inn Plaza, next to the all-you-can-eat pizza buffet (now, if they made that all-you-can-eat frozen custard, we'd be talkin'). We were a little underwhelmed by the menu -- a good choice of toppings, but nothing notable when it came to their "specialties". We each decided to create our own... Matt decided on a vanilla custard sundae with caramel + coconut, while I chose a good Fritz's standby, a vanilla custard concrete with Oreo's + caramel.

Mine was a little melty again, but held up pretty well. The custard was nice a creamy, but not too rich or vanilla-y. I also didn't get much caramel in mine, but tasted Matt's and it was mighty good! However, with the next place nearby... we will probably not be returning.

Which brings us to my ALL TIME FAVORITE to date: ANDY'S!

We compare everything we taste to Andy's. The have the absolute richest and creamiest vanilla (and chocolate) custard out there. It is AH-mazing! Why, oh why, must you be so far away!

What really drew us in this time was the Silver Dollar City Cake sundae. Silver Dollar City (Matt's Happy Place) is celebrating their 50th Anniversary this year. We actually went down in May to attend the celebration. In fact, we actually were able to try their birthday cake! Again, I am not a cake person unless it is wedding cake, but this cake was one of the most amazing cakes I have ever tasted. When it is that memorable, you know that I absolutely HAD to try this with my favorite frozen custard.

The cake is chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and a raspberry cream filling. To this, Andy's adds their rich + creamy vanilla custard and hot fudge (also amazing). They were advertising this as a sundae, but as the Concrete Runner, I felt it to be my obligation to get this in a concrete. The nice guy at the register gave me a little look with my request, but they happily obliged.

Matt decided on the Key Lime Pie concrete. Andy's actually takes an entire slice of key lime pie and mixes it in with their vanilla custard.

O.M.G. I do not use that phrase lightly. These were absolutely the 2 best concretes either of us has ever had. The cake was awesome with the vanilla custard -- very rich + sweet + perfect! And Matt's was equally awesome, if not BETTER. So refreshing on a hot summer day, with huge chunks of crust blended in. Mmmmm... I'm ready to go back!

UP NEXT
Summer is quickly coming to a close. Matt goes back to school this coming week, and I will also be starting up working again (nothing permanent, unfortunately, but enough to keep me busy for the next couple of months). We are hoping some of the stands stay open late into the fall so we can continue our tour.

I will probably be posting some more running things as we get closer to the marathon! I start week #9 this week of training, which will be half way! My runs have been great, although I'm a little disappointed to have lost some speed with all this endurance training. But, I'll get to that in a later post.

frozen custard branson style

Last week, we spent some time down in Branson with my best friend Julie, her husband Matt, and her parents. Her parents were lucky + nice enough to let us stay in some sample rooms they had for their time share down at Big Cedar Lodge in the Wilderness Club. I can’t explain to you how absolutely beautiful it was and how fortunate we were to get temperatures in the 80s with very low humidity – an oddity in the middle of summer in Missouri.

The resort had some wonderful walking/running trails, so I didn’t miss a beat in my marathon training. However, it was extremely hilly, so I slowed down a bit, but my morning runs felt amazing!

While we were down there, we of course had to stop by one of the only frozen custard stands in town – Andy’s Frozen Custard. It is right on the Branson strip -- you can't miss it! Now, we have been to Andy’s a handful of times, and I must say, it is one of my absolute favorite frozen custard places! They have amazingly rich + creamy vanilla custard that just makes everything all the more better.

I ended up getting the same concrete I got last time: the Snowmonster. The Snowmonster has vanilla custard with strawberries and chocolate shavings (think, Magic Shell broken apart as it gets mixed up in the concrete). Although it was awesome, as always, I looked up at the menu board and saw another concrete that sounded even better: the James Brownie Funky Jackhammer. A jackhammer concrete is a concrete that is filled in the center with the topping of your choice. In this case, the center of the concrete is filled with their delicious hot fudge, while the vanilla custard is mixed with peanut butter and brownies. AH-mazing! I will remember to get that one next time for sure! But again, Snowmonster equally as delicious!

My Matt is a root beer-aholic. Any new + different root beer he can get his hands on, he will try. Andy’s just so happens to have one of his favorites: Sprecher’s. So, instead of getting a concrete (or sundae), he decided to go with a Root Beer Float. His had 3 scoops – 2 vanilla custard and 1 chocolate custard. Yes, strange, but chocolate custard is actually really good in floats. And since we had never tried their chocolate custard, it was a great way to try it. OMG, guys, so SO rich and creamy and absolutely delicious! Who knows, I might be getting my Funky Jackhammer with chocolate custard next time!

Julie + Matt also went for concretes with strawberries – hers a strawberry cheesecake and his the Snowmonster. I think their favorite part probably was when we grabbed a Take Out Menu and saw that there was an Andy’s pretty close to where they live in Chicago. That might be the best things about Andy’s… most frozen custard is located in St. Louis only and maybe has only 1 or 2 places to go to in the area. Andy’s boasts locations in 5 Missouri cities (Branson, Cape Girardeau, Columbia, Osage Beach, and 4 in Springfield), along with 3 in Arkansas, 3 in Illinois/Chicago-area, and 1 in Texas. So, no matter where you are, you can get some delicious frozen custard!