This drink is easily a contributor to the usual Freshman 15 gained at college. Then again I didn’t discover this drink till Senior year I believe. Some of you will (SUCO Grads!) remember this delicious and decadent concoction from Red’s Filling Station in downtown Oneonta, NY. No it was not a gas station people! It was a bar. What else was Oneonta known for! Anyway, I remember a warm spring day (yes we did have them on occasion), going down to Red’s one Friday afternoon with my BFF Rose. I think we may have been going for what was called “sours”. It’s basically happy hour. Not really sure why it was called “sours” but it was. Well when we arrived at Red’s they had a special drink called an Ice Cream White Russian. Sounded good. I liked ice cream and I liked White Russians. So how bad could it be? It was like a White Russian milkshake really. They served them in large beer mugs with a straw! Boy did they go down smooth! Refreshing, delightful, delicious…But on the other hand LOADED with calories. But we were 20 somethings and we didn’t care about the calories back then. I did the math for this delight (I was curious) and this drink packs a whopping 444 calories, 16 grams of fat, 43 grams of carbs! But it has 1 gram of fiber and 5 grams of protein! Ok so the bad outweighs the good. But if you use low-calorie ice cream you can trim some of the bad away! But once you have one of these it won’t matter! It’s probably been 25 years since I had one but I still remember it like it was yesterday! Oh yeah and if you want, top with whipped cream! Why not!!

Red's Filling Station, Oneonta, NY (1983)

INGREDIENTS:

1 pint vanilla ice cream (of choice), softened

2 oz. vodka

2 oz. Kahlua

DIRECTIONS:

1. Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth but thick.

2. Pour into chilled beer mugs or tall chilled glasses.

Makes 2 drinks

You can make this stretch to 4 drinks if you serve in smaller glasses.