The Ice Cream Flavor Problem (A Confession from Behind the Counter)

Oh, hi. I didn’t see you come in. Grab a spoon.

I have a confession, and I need you to take it seriously.

I work at an ice cream shop. Three afternoons a week, at Mrs. P’s in Castle Hill. And I cannot choose a flavor.

Twenty flavors. Two kinds of cones. Every single shift, I stand in front of that glass case like it’s the final question on a game show.

Mint chocolate chip or cookie dough. Cookie dough or butter pecan. Butter pecan or… no, wait, back to mint.

Two flavors can ruin my whole afternoon. And I work there.

Meanwhile, customers walk in and order in two seconds. “Scoop of chocolate, please.” That’s it. Done. They don’t even look at the other nineteen. I watch them leave happy and I think, who ARE you people, and how did you get like this?

So I’ve been doing research. Here are my tricks. Some of them even work.

Trick 1: Flip a coin, but watch your face.

Assign one flavor to heads and one to tails. Flip it. While the coin is in the air, notice which side you’re secretly hoping for. That’s your answer. You don’t even need to look at the coin. (Look anyway. It’s fun.)

Trick 2: Ask what you’d pick if nobody was watching.

Sometimes I don’t pick the flavor I want. I pick the flavor that sounds cool, or the one my sister would approve of. If nobody in the whole world was watching, what would you get? Get that.

Trick 3: Remember a scoop is not forever.

This one is from Mrs. P, my boss, who is possibly the wisest woman in the state of Maine. When I drop a scoop, she doesn’t yell. She says, “Well, we’ll call that one a sample,” and hands me the scooper back.

A wrong flavor isn’t a disaster. It’s a sample. Tomorrow there will be more ice cream. That’s just science.

Trick 4: Let somebody rename it.

Our new coworker accidentally learned Rocky Road as “Roadie Rock” (okay, I said it wrong, fine) and now he refuses to call it anything else. Somehow, once a flavor has a ridiculous name, it’s way easier to order. I can’t explain this. I’m just reporting it.

Trick 5: Ask the person behind the counter.

They know which flavors are fresh and which ones ran soft today. Plus, people love being asked. Try it. Watch them light up.

Now here’s the weird part.

Lately I’ve had to make some decisions that are a lot bigger than ice cream. I’m not allowed to tell you what they were. (I KNOW. I’m sorry. Rules are rules, and these rules are very old.) But something strange happened.

The big ones were easier.

Not easy. Easier. When it really mattered, I got quiet inside, and I just… knew. Like the answer had been sitting there the whole time, waiting for me to stop talking long enough to hear it.

So maybe some decisions are only hard until the ones that actually matter show up.

That said, I still can’t choose between mint chip and cookie dough. Some mysteries are too deep even for me.

Double scoop. Both. Final answer.

Stella

P.S. If you’re ever in Castle Hill, the Mount Crumberton sundae is three scoops and enough fudge to need its own spoon. You’ll need a friend to help. That’s not a suggestion.