Maw Maw Fern's Mississippi Mud

My grandma Fern was a very wise woman. I remember discussing recently her feelings about raising kids (and grandkids) who were spread all over the world. She said that she made a decision early on that she wanted her children to be independent and to follow their dreams and careers. She didn’t want them to feel tied down to familial obligations or to guilt or manipulate them into staying nearby. She insisted they go off to college instead of going to school in their native St. Louis. 

For my dad this meant attending University of Missouri at Rolla, a school renowned for it’s engineering program. He went into petroleum engineering, a field that wasn’t quite bustling in Missouri. Instead he graduated and moved to Louisiana where he met a drop dead gorgeous local lady and the rest is history. 

My parents lived in Louisiana, Saudi Arabia, Texas, Nigeria, and Scotland before boomeranging back to Louisiana. When I asked my MawMaw Fern how she felt about this, she said she felt ambivalent. On the one hand she felt proud of them for finding their own path in life. On the other hand she felt sad; sad that because of her pushing, they weren’t a part of her daily life. That she had to watch her grandchildren grow up from afar. 

To combat this, her strategy was to make visiting her a vacation. She and my PawPaw Lee bought a house on the Lake of the Ozarks and in the summer we would ski and fish and in the winter we would sled and build snowmen. Because of these memories, she is inextricably linked to the very best memories of my childhood. 

Besides lakeside fun, she knew another way to endear herself to her grandchildren and that was through sweets. I always looked forward to visiting and immediately scarfing down a whole tin full of her delicious sugar cookies. When we were apart for the holidays she would always make sure to send me a batch. I’ve tried recreating her recipe but I just don’t seem to have her special touch. They just tasted better when she made them, you know? 

And every summer when we visited, she’d have the downstairs freezer stocked with Mississippi Mud Ice Cream put into perfectly proportioned Dixie cup servings. As I review all my fondest memories of my grandma, I can’t help but get a hankering for this childhood treat. I figured that this weekend I’d whip up a batch in her honor, and share the SUPER easy and SUPER delicious and SUPER crowd pleasing treat with you guys. 

So here’s what you’ll need: 

A carton of vanilla ice cream, a box of oreos, and a package (or two*) of cool whip. Oh yea, it’s SUPER healthy too. Hahahaha. But you can always cut calories by buying frozen yogurt instead of ice cream and get the low fat cool whip. And I guess you could also get non-double-stuffed oreos, but then I’m not sure we could be friends anymore. 

The beauty of this snack is that you put them in individual 3 oz Dixie cup servings so that it’s ok to indulge. Portion control, people! 

Ok, so first things first is you melt the ice cream and thaw the cool whip. You also crush the oreos into itty bitty pieces.

Once these three measure are taken (pay attention, this is where it gets tricky) you mix them all together. Then you pour the concoction into the Dixie cups and put them on trays in the freezer (or straight onto the shelf depending on which type of freezer you have). 

And that’s pretty much it. Wait for them to freeze and then try not to binge eat one after another. One batch will make about 3o individual servings.

I can’t wait to introduce Forest to this Doublin family delicacy. He started solids this weekend (more on that later) so it’s only a matter of time til he can try a bite. Rice cereal…it’s a gateway food. 

Any of you folks have a summer time treat that brings back your childhood? 

*I used 2 cool whip packages, but in hindsight, I think 1.5 would have been the perfect ratio. But the thing about a recipe whose three ingredients are oreos, whipped cream, and vanilla ice cream is that you really can't mess it up. Tastes just like a Dairy Queen oreo blizzard. Yum yum!