Mmmm, Tastes Like America

Sno-balls in sweaty New Orleans. Fudge cake on the Outer Banks. Spicy fruit on a Los Angeles street corner. This is what an American summer tastes like.

The Blizzard was an instant hit when Dairy Queen introduced it in 1985. “Dairy Queen’s Blizzard Is Hot,” The New York Times reported the next year, crediting the delicacy with boosting the company’s stock price and sales of mix-ins, like Heath bars. Within just a few years, the Blizzard was “hot” in my Wheaton, Ill., household, too. Our house didn’t have air-conditioning, and on especially suffocating evenings, my family would walk to the nearby Dairy Queen after dinner to cool off. It was a no-frills location: open only in the summer, no burgers or fries, service through a window. My sister and I always ordered the same thing: small Blizzards studded with sour-sweet Nerds candy. When the teenager at the counter called out “Two small Nerds!” to the workers in back, my mom joked, “Hey, those are my kids you’re talking about.” Essentially an extra-thick milkshake swirled with crushed candy or cookies, the Blizzard is a simple concept enhanced by showmanship. Traditionally, an employee briefly flips the cup upside-down as she hands it over the counter, a flourish intended to prove its thickness. (I got a mild thrill a few years ago when I saw a Blizzard fail this test, slopping spectacularly onto an indoor table at a New Hampshire DQ. Call it — forgive me — schadenfrozen.)