Good morning, it’s Tuesday.
It’s National Ice Cream Sandwich Day, and, as is often the case when it comes to delicious treats, this one has a number of fathers, and its origin story is not entirely clear.
Pushcart vendors in the late 1800s reportedly sold slabs of ice cream “sandwiched” between two sheets of (not edible) paper. These were referred to as “hokey pokeys” and cost a penny.
The precursor of the ice cream sandwich as we know it – in other words, ice cream placed between two chocolate cookie-like sheets (we’ll get back to this a bit later) seems to have first appeared on the streets of New York City.
The earliest US patent having to do with ice cream sandwiches (No. 1,387,613) is by Russell H. Proper for an “Ice Cream Sandwich Machine” was filed in 1921.
Folks tried a variety of sandwich materials, including sponge cake slices and graham crackers, but these tended to get soggy and were unreliable in terms of structure.
The ice cream sandwich in its current form – vanilla between two chocolate wafer cookies – was, according to no less an expert than the man himself, the brainchild of a vendor named Jerry Newberg, who sold the treats at Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field during baseball games starting in the 1940s.
(The chocolate cookies, BTW, start their lives as hard and crunchy, but they soften after ice cream is added to the equation, leading to that toothsome – and rather messy – consistency for which they are known).
In the early 1980s, a New Yorker named Richard LaMotta turned his childhood love of dunking cookies into milk into a product known (and widely loved) as the Chipwich, which bills itself as the “original ice cream cookie sandwich” and features two chocolate chip cookies lovingly embracing a scoop of vanilla ice cream that is rolled in more chocolate chips.
Fun facts: The average number of ice cream sandwiches eaten per second nationally is 48. If all the ice cream sandwiches made last year were placed end to end, they would circle Earth 3 1/2 times.
There are a lot of different versions of ice cream sandwiches, but one of the best known is made by Hood, which in the busy season reportedly sells more than 9,000 cases of ice cream sandwiches every week – around 100,000 sandwiches. Throughout the entire year, two sandwiches are made every second in their factory in Connecticut.
FWIW, they also sell a number of versions apart from the traditional chocolate-and-vanilla combo – including pumpkin (truly vile; is nothing sacred?!) and the limited “Unicorn Confetti” flavor. I disapprove strongly.
Also, now might be a good time to confess that I have never had a Klondike Choco Taco. And it looks like I’m too late. If you’ve got one to spare that you’re willing to part with, hit me up.
There might be some ice cream sandwiches on offer during National Night Out events across the state and nation tonight. This annual community-building campaign that promotes police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie has been held since 1984.
Needless to say, the relationship between law enforcement and the communities that are charged with protecting and serving has grown increasingly strained in recent years. But National Night Out isn’t necessarily just about improving the ties between the police and the community, but also – perhaps more so – helping neighbors get to know one another – something we do much too little of these days.
If you are out and about, be on the alert for scattered showers and even some thunderstorms…there are some in the forecast throughout the day. Temperatures will be in the high 80s.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden announced that al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Kabul, an operation he said delivered justice and hopefully “one more measure of closure” to families of the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks on the US.
The early-morning strike capped a 21-year manhunt for an Egyptian radical who more than anyone besides Bin Laden was deemed responsible for the deadliest foreign attack on the US in modern times and never gave up targeting Americans.
In a televised address, Biden said he gave the final go-ahead for the strike that successfully targeted Zawahiri in the Afghan capital over the weekend, and he hoped Zawahiri’s death would bring “closure” to families of the 3,000 people killed in the US on 9/11.
For Biden, the opportunity to take out the world’s most wanted terrorist, one of the masterminds of the Sept. 11 attacks, was fraught with the risk of accidentally killing civilians in the Afghan capital — just as a US drone strike did 11 months ago.
An agreement with Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia salvaged a key piece of Biden’s agenda. But Democrats still have a few crucial steps to take before it becomes law.
Manchin has secured a promise from Democratic leaders and the White House to complete a highly contested 304-mile gas pipeline in his state, his office said, a major concession won as part of negotiations over a climate and tax bill.
Democrats have been campaigning for 30 years on promises they’d let Medicare directly negotiate the cost of prescription drugs — and after all that time, they might finally be about to achieve it.
Former President Trump leads Biden and Vice President Harris in hypothetical 2024 presidential match-ups, according to a new Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll survey released exclusively to The Hill.
The Biden administration faces a legal deadline at midnight to defend Trump’s China tariffs, even as the White House considers scaling them back to lower consumer prices and ease inflation.
A federal judge sentenced Guy Wesley Reffitt, the first defendant to go on trial in the Justice Department’s sprawling criminal inquiry into the Jan. 6 attack, to more than seven years in prison, the longest sentence to date in a case stemming from the riot.
Reffitt’s case has been watched closely as hundreds of other Jan. 6 defendants weigh whether to take plea deals or continue fighting their charges.
Two influential House Democrats called for two officials at the Department of Homeland Security’s independent watchdog to testify about the handling of missing Secret Service text messages from the day of the Jan. 6 attack, accusing their office of a cover-up.
As the White House mulls over its decision regarding student debt, members of the NAACP are demanding that the president eliminate a large portion of what Black borrowers owe.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was set to visit Taiwan today, three people briefed on the matter said, as China warned that its military would never “sit idly by” if she went to the self-ruled island claimed by Beijing.
The stop – the first for a US House speaker in 25 years – is not currently on Pelosi’s public itinerary and comes at a time when US-China relations are already at a low point. A Taiwanese official said she is expected to stay in Taiwan overnight.
The United States warned China not to respond to Pelosi’s trip with military provocations even as American officials sought to reassure Beijing that such a visit would not be the first of its kind nor represent any change in policy toward the region.
New Zealand fully has reopened its borders for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic hit, making it the final Western country to do so.
Many parents were once Democrats and Republicans. But fears for their children in the pandemic transformed their thinking, turning them into single-issue voters for November’s midterms.
The Steuben County Public Health Department has received notification of a COVID-related death, it is the first death released by the Health Department since June 6, 2022.
Metro-North’s largest union is calling for an end to the mask mandate on trains, saying masks should be optional because members who have tried to enforce the mandate have been physically and verbally assaulted by defiant riders.
Drake has tested positive for COVID-19, forcing him to postpone his Young Money reunion performance with Nicki Minaj and Lil Wayne. “I am truly devastated,” the artist told fans in his text message on Stories.
Biden is set to name top officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to serve as the White House coordinators to combat the growing monkeypox outbreak.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency over the rapidly spreading monkeypox outbreak, the third U.S. state to do so in a matter of days.
The moves, which help streamline and coordinate the monkeypox response among different levels of government, come amid an uptick in infections as well as increasingly vocal complaints about the public health response.
At the start of the monkeypox outbreak the U.S. stockpile contained just 2,400 doses of vaccine, a far cry from the more than 20 million it once held. How those vaccines were allowed to expire is just now coming to light.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker declared a state of emergency over monkeypox in order to “expand the resources” needed to combat the current outbreak.
Mayor Eric Adams declared a state of emergency over monkeypox — a move that lets him suspend local laws and enact new rulesto better manage the city’s outbreak.
“NYC now has over 1,200 reported cases, approximately 25 percent of cases nationally, and we are continuing to see the numbers rise,” he said. “This order will bolster our existing efforts to educate, vaccinate, test, and treat as many New Yorkers as possible.”
The city Health Department “whistleblower” reassigned after he called out as political correctness run amok the agency’s tepid response to the monkeypox outbreak says it also mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic.
Political watchers across party lines are questioning another instance of apparent “pay to play” behavior involving campaign cash raised by Gov. Kathy Hochul ahead of the Nov. 8 election.
Online portals that allow someone to request absentee ballots in the names of others with very little identity verification were apparently exploited in two recent voter fraud cases that resulted in federal criminal charges.
As the economy sails into choppy waters, New York’s pension fund at the end of the state’s fiscal year in March posted a 9.5% rate of return and hit $272.1 billion in value, Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s office said.
A sagging stock market is undermining city and state projections for the health of their pension funds — a trend that will likely cost billions of dollars to correct.
Republicans in the state Senate called for a formalized cap on state spending in New York’s budget as inflationary costs continue to take their toll.
New district maps for the state Senate have caused some incumbents to run in neighboring districts and to contemplate new living arrangements. Queens Sen. Joe Addabbo will likely move in with his mom, who lives in his new district, if he wins.
Long Island Sen. Todd Kaminsky released a statement on Friday that he would step down from position in the state Senate to start a new job outside government. Yesterday, he revealed he had joined the lobbying and law firm Greenberg Traurig.
A Taiwanese-American state lawmaker, state Sen. John Liu, of Queens, said he was targeted by a racist verbal attack amid an ongoing surge in anti-Asian hate crimes across the five boroughs.
Pelosi endorsed Rep. Mondaire Jones, a first-term upstate congressman who is facing a stiff battle in his bid to capture an open seat in New York City.
Some experts say Pelosi’s nod could actually hurt Jones in the crowded race for the NY-10 seat.
In a statement, Pelsoi praised Jones, saying that the first-term congressman “has gotten real results for New Yorkers.”
Veteran Democratic House members Jerrold Nadler and Carolyn Maloney are locked in a virtual dead heat in their Manhattan congressional cage fight, a new poll revealed.
Longshot candidate Suraj Patel is feeling the love from disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s top aide, Melissa DeRosa, following a weekend poll showing him gaining ground against Maloney and Nadler ahead of the Aug. 23 election.
Dan Goldman, who served as lead Democratic counsel in Trump’s first impeachment, would be among the richest members of Congress if he’s successful in his bid to represent a newly redrawn district in New York City.
Adams announced an emergency procurement declaration to quickly obtain shelter and other services for people seeking asylum in NYC.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott invited Adams to the southern border “to see firsthand the dire situation” with City Hall hitting back that Abbott only wants a “photo-op at the border” as thousands of migrants have landed in the Big Apple.
The Brooklyn pastor who called for clergy members to get special gun privileges after getting robbed at gunpoint got a rebuke from his longtime pal Adams, who said he doesn’t support such a policy.
New York Republicans have a new messenger to push their law-and-order agenda ahead of the November midterms: A former cop who wants to rollback the state’s progressive bail reforms. The only problem: He’s not a Republican; he’s Eric Adams.
Adams defended his administration’s move to reduce the hours of operation for a pair of busways uptown and in Queens, saying the changes were in response to opposition by local leaders.
Adams tapped Transport Workers Union International President John Samuelsen for a state board that will come up with tolls and exemptions for New York City’s congestion pricing program.
New York City’s 2,000 speed cameras are officially working overtime, after a law went into effect allowing the cameras to monitor roadways for drivers going 10 miles an hour or more above the speed limit 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
New York officials are cutting and inserting pages in a book about an uprising at the state’s most notorious prison – Attica – in an attempt to resolve a festering First Amendment dispute.
A lane of the the West Side Highway would turn into the West Side Bikeway under a proposal announced by Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine.
There simply aren’t enough places to live in New York City – a crisis decades in the making and one that poses a threat to the city’s continuing recovery.
The NYPD must disclose thousands of documents and emails revealing facial recognition surveillance of Black Lives Matter protesters in 2020, a judge has ruled.
The city Education Department will have at least $500 million in unspent federal stimulus funds left over from last school year — enough to offset budget cuts to schools that lost enrollment, according to a new analysis from city Comptroller Brad Lander.
A group of Big Apple residents have slapped the city with a lawsuit opposing an outdoor street dining program started during the pandemic – claiming it has increased trash, vermin, drug use, graffiti, noise and awful stenches throughout the boroughs.
Restaurateur Danny Meyer is stepping down as CEO of Union Square Hospitality Group, which he launched in 1985 with the opening of Union Square Cafe.
The polio virus has been detected in wastewater samples from early June in Rockland County and is genetically linked to a case confirmed last month in the area, New York state Department of Health officials said.
Amtrak trains began rolling past the derelict Central Warehouse in Albany yesterday afternoon, an Amtrak spokesman confirmed, restoring services that in pre-pandemic times typically carried as many as 2,000 passengers a day.
The city has already spent more than $100,000 on the deteriorating Central Warehouse and is warning that the building is still not considered safe, four days after falling masonry forced Amtrak to temporarily suspend rail service west of Albany.
Citing numerous issues, including a fuzzy public benefit, the Malta Planning Board unanimously voted against the controversial proposal to redevelop the South Shore Marina on Saratoga Lake.
The Knickerbacker Park Pool complex that’s been closed since the end of the 2016 swimming season will be demolished and hauled away for disposal as the city prepares to build a new pool, City of Troy officials said.
Chris Cuomo’s new podcast is among Apple iTune’s “Top Shows,” climbing the rankings in both “news” and “all categories” over the weekend.
