August is historically the steamiest, stickiest, sweatiest month of the year–brilliant move, Founding Fathers, building the nation’s capital on a swamp–in these parts. We’ve tracked down 31 frozen treats (one a day for the rest of this month) to provide you with some temporary, and often insanely delicious, relief.
The place: Burgers N’ Things – 12000 Lee Highway, Sperryville; 540-987-8311
The prescription: Black and white shake. You can imagine how thrilled this refreshment seeker was–particularly after spending umpteen torturous hours baking in a car fruitlessly searching for illusory exurban dessert huts–when this unassuming chow house appeared seemingly out of nowhere. The excitement only grew when I spotted those three magic words–black-and-white–on the menu. The shake was textbook, bonding Galliker’s vanilla soft serve and chocolate syrup into a frosty mass of muddy brown sweetness. Mind you, it was real work, dutifully aspirating every last bit of dairy goodness through the narrow straw. But reaching rock bottom proved eminently rewarding (the point of contact where the ice cream and syrup first met conjured up an almost coffee like-flavor, expressed, no doubt, by the residual concentrate).
Perhaps more importantly, this pilgrimage rekindled my long held fantasy (I’ll never actually do it; but it’s fun to imagine) to open up a greasy spoon/dive dubbed “Beer N Stuff.”
–Warren
————————————————————————————————————————————————
Keep tabs on the month long Freeze Jag trek here.