Cookies and Cream Popsicle

When I was growing up I thought grape jelly was a secret everyone kept from me. We only spoke Adam’s peanut butter and I had no idea that Dijon wasn’t the only kind of mustard on our street.

We weren’t rich, but there was a certain food language in my house. We did have boxed Mac and Cheese now and again (c’mon, my parents weren’t animals), but when friends slept over at my house they spoke in whispers to me at the breakfast table—“your syrup tastes weird”—and I looked back at them, blankly, like we were strangers meeting for the first time, while I munched the maple sugar that had crystallized at the top of the bottle.

I clearly remember the first time I ate Oreo cookies like a rumspringa. My mom had arranged for a friend to pick me up from school and the kids were sitting in the back of the car eating Oreos on the way home. The others were eating the cream out of the middle and giving fancy speeches about their technique, while I ate each one in simple, complete bites. I couldn’t believe the dancing syllables of cream and crunchy chocolate against my teeth, my tongue. Crunch melted into softness in the dips of my molars and a sweet stayed in my throat as I reached for another. Everything felt completely surreal as I realized no adult was going to stop me from eating as many as I wanted.We laughed about how good Oreos could be, giddy and talking fast, and in the distance I could hear Chips Ahoy talking with the Keebler Elves about those seductive Girl Scout Thin Mints.

I had no idea that my parents just hate Oreos until a couple of months ago.

I guess I’m a wayward daughter.

P.S. However, Peanut Butter Newman O’s rock the Oreo world. And I really love to eat Oreos frozen, and then dipped in milk.

Cookies and Cream Popsicles (makes 2-3, depending on your mold)

These are a bit tricky. Unmolding the popsicle without breaking it is more difficult because of the whole Oreo or Newman O’s cookie. But, you will be rewarded if you put the Oreo in the middle of the popsicle stick. If it’s at the tip, the icy milk doesn’t have enough to hold onto and you’ll lose half of the popsicle in the mold. Think of the popsicle as milk with a creamy Oreo center.

These melt FAST. Eat them faster.

• 2/3 Cup whole milk
• 1 Tbsp sugar (or to taste—it needs to be slightly sweeter than you think, because freezing makes everything taste slightly less sweet)
• 4 Oreo or Newman O cookies, divided

1. Whisk the sugar into the milk. Crumble 2 of the Oreo cookies into the milk and then pour a Tablespoon or so of the milk into the bottom of the mold.
2. Quickly open an Oreo and use the filling to help stick the two halves back together with the popsicle stick, toward the middle. Put the stick into the mold and then fill the rest of the mold up with the milk. Repeat for the other popsicle.
3. Let freeze according to popsicle mold directions.