While some people have dismissed the chants of Capitol rioters to “Hang Mike Pence!” as nothing more than hyperbole, the January 6th hearings have made it clear that they were dead serious. Previously, witnesses to the events of that day testified that Donald Trump himself believed that maybe Pence deserved it. And during Thursday night’s primetime hearing, we learned that members of Pence’s own Secret Service detail were so convinced of the imminent danger they were in that some called their families and other loved ones to say goodbye.
We asked a security professional who had been working in the White House complex on January 6th what was meant by the comment that the Secret Service agents did not “sound good right now.”
The professional discusses what they heard from listening to the incoming radio traffic: pic.twitter.com/lDn8sNMaYR
— January 6th Committee (@January6thCmte) July 22, 2022
As Mediaite reports, a member of Pence’s security detail—who remained anonymous and whose face and voice were concealed—testified about the disturbing scene he witnessed that day, and was very emotional while doing so:
“The members of the VP detail at this time were starting to fear for their lives. There was a lot of yelling. A lot of very personal calls over the radio, so it was disturbing. I don’t like talking about it, but there were calls to say goodbye to family members, so on and so forth… For whatever the reason was on the ground, the VP detail thought this was about to get very ugly.”
When asked what prompted the security agent to officially log the details of what he described as the “chaos” on the ground, he admitted that it was because it seemed as if the agents “were running out of options” and that they came “very close to either Service having to use lethal options or worse.”
Let’s not forget how big Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy” was: It was her breakout single, it’s certified 6-times Platinum, it was her first (and so far only) No. 1 hit, and it managed to end the historic No. 1 run of Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road.” It remains her most popular song, so when Eilish attended yesterday’s Los Angeles Dodgers home game, whoever’s in charge of the PA speaker had some fun and played the song.
Eilish was into it, too, as she and the friends she was there with were seen on the game broadcast dancing along as “Bad Guy” played. Finneas was there, too, and is seated in the clip, but before you call him a bad sport for not letting loose and getting his groove on, at the start of the clip, he appears to have just sat down, so perhaps he got all his dancing in before the camera was on him.
The Islands Region of Scotch whisky is one of the most diverse and expansive. The “region” is technically still a sub-region of the Highlands in that it encompasses pretty much all the islands around Scotland’s Highland region to the north and west (and slightly southwest) except for Islay, which is its own one-island region.
That all translates to a rich and varied Scotch whisky scene that spans serious peat monsters and unpeated sweet whiskies touched by the sea. But because of that wild variation, purists still argue about whether or not the “Islands” even qualify as a unified region. Going deeper, there is a throughline of seaside distilling and aging that does give these Island whiskies a united front and deeper seaside flavor profile, but that’s not a be-all-end-all flavor note by any stretch.
But I’m not here to debate Scottish legal regional definitions. I’m here to help you dig into this specific regional style. To that end, I’m calling out ten of my favorite bottles from the region’s nine active distilleries (the Isle of Barra distillery is already operating but they’ve yet to release a whisky). These are whiskies made on Mull, Skye, Orkney, Lewis, Jura, Raasay, and Arran. And I’d argue that they’re some of the best Scotland has to offer. Let’s dive in!
Also Read: The Top 5 UPROXX Scotch Whisky Posts of The Last Six Months
This Island malt was aged in ex-Woodford Reserve rye barrels for an undisclosed amount of time before a finishing spell in Pedro Ximénez and Oloroso sherry quarter casks. Those whisky barrels were then vatted and bottled as-is.
Tasting Notes:
The whisky’s nose opens with dashes of green peppercorns next to a line of smoked almonds and plums with a hint of medicinal menthol in the background. The palate mixes freshly ground nutmeg with clove-spiked orange rinds as a creamy almond paste leads to a wintry mulled wine sour red fruit with a light sweetness and smoked plum vibe. The end is full of earthy and almost floral smoke next to more of that almond paste and mulled wine sour spiciness.
Bottom Line:
This is a good place to start, especially if you’re looking for something very new. This Hebridean distillery is very new and fresh and dropping great expressions right now.
All of that said, pour this over a rock to let it bloom in the glass and mellow out that fruity smoke.
This unpeated malt from Orkney starts its life on a barrel-shaped Lomond wash still. This still from the 1950s is super rare and only a few are left in operation. The whisky then spends an undisclosed amount of years mellowing barrels from Tennessee and Kentucky. Those barrels are then vatted and proofed all the way down to 40 percent before bottling.
Tasting Notes:
Old apple skins and floral honey lead the way on the nose with a hint of sour cream and roasted almond with a thin line of salt. The taste has a slight damp straw funk to it as more honey smooths out the mid-palate with notes of dry anise and licorice leading to a touch of lemon pepper spice. The finish has a note of old oak stave next to a lemon creaminess and that honey sweetness with a fair amount of that proofing water calming everything down.
Bottom Line:
This is an interesting pour. It’s varied but very light. It’s interesting while being super easy to drink. Still, I’d mostly use this for highballs or on the rocks applications.
8. Abhainn Dearg Cask Strength Single Malt Whisky (Lewis)
This whiskey from the Outer Hebrides is a peaty malt. The whisky is made from barley grown on the Isle of Lewis and malted at Abhainn Dearg. The juice is mellowed in sherry and finished in various casks — PX, Oloroso, Rioja, Sauternes — before vatting and bottling as-is.
Tasting Notes:
This opens with a funky bouquet of moldy old roses next to burnt moss and plenty of minced meat pie spice and date sweetness and leatheriness. The palate is full of oceanic fats with a hint of tinniness to it next to smoked plums and Christmas spices with a hint of old driftwood and a twinge of umami that’s nearly tomato paste. The end is aromatic and bitter with a rush of cloves and anise before the sweeter dark fruits come back on the finish.
Bottom Line:
This is really all over the place and funky but sort of just works. It really needs a rock to calm it down and let it bloom. Still, this is so funky that it might be a hard sell for anyone looking for an easy drinking experience.
This unpeated malt from the Isle of Mull spends 12 years aging in first-fill ex-bourbon barrels (those are barrels that haven’t had anything but bourbon in them so far). Once that whisky is just right, the juice is transferred to new American oak barrels for nine more months of mellowing before bottling at cask strength with no fussing whatsoever.
Tasting Notes:
Bourbon vanilla comes through on the nose with a deep creaminess that’s punctuated by orange zest, woody cinnamon, and a light hint of granite. The palate leans into warm and soft malts as soft hints of orchard fruit lead to pencil shavings and a touch of chili-chocolate tobacco. The end is a mix of winter spices with a woody edge next to soft suede, more vanilla cream, and soft maltiness that’s nearly chocolate custard.
Bottom Line:
This is one of those bottles that are just nice. It’s not going to blow any socks off, but it doesn’t need to. It’s an easy sipper, especially over a rock or two that also makes a really solid cocktail.
The juice from Jura is aged in ex-bourbon for an undisclosed amount of years. The whisky is then re-casked in seven barrels: first-fill ex-bourbon from the U.S. and Vosges, Bertranges, Jupilles, Allier, Tronçais, and Limousin barrels from France. The ripple here is that all of those French barrels were new (never held wine) when the whisky went in.
Tasting Notes:
This is shockingly un-woody. Instead, you get a burnt coffee note next to a dark chocolate bar cut with candied ginger and, maybe, a hint of strawberry. Black licorice arrives with a note of burnt orange peels and grilled peaches with a drop of honey next to a wisp of beach campfire smoke. The end lingers for just the right amount of time as the distant smoke fades, leaving a hint of sea spray, cacao, and burnt fruit.
Bottom Line:
This has a nice balance to it but ultimately feels kind of entry-level. The lower ABVs don’t help but don’t hold it back either. Look at it this way, this is a good way to end the bottom five of this ranking — this is good but not “OMG” great.
The Torabhaig Distillery is the new kid on the block on the Isle of Skye. This whisky is made from heavily peated malts and blended to highlight the seaside vibe of that northern island. The whisky was made back in 2018 from two bespoke barley varieties. It then went into first-fill and re-fill ex-bourbon casks before a touch of water for proofing and bottling as-is.
Tasting Notes:
The nose on this one is subtly maritime with a hint of sea spray on cold grey rocks mingling with soft nutmeg, lemon and vanilla-laced shortbread, oyster shells, and a hint of burnt newspaper. The palate leans into smoked salmon skins with a thick line of belly fat still attached as woody spices and dried apple skins lead to a sweet fruit throughline. The finish has a hint of fennel and rye next to more sea spray, pepperiness, and a minor note of Band-Aid.
Bottom Line:
This is a big and bold peated whisky. It does really lean into the seaside aspects of the Isle of Skye with that fishy fattiness and cold rocky beach vibe. Overall, this is a great dram if you’re looking for something briny and fruity, but it might be a little too turnt up on that iodine-y peatiness for some.
This Island’s whisky is all about reaching over the pond. The 100 percent unpeated malted barley juice is aged exclusively in ex-bourbon barrels (for an undisclosed amount of time) before it’s vatted, proofed, and bottled as-is to highlight that barrel.
Tasting Notes:
This has a nose full of ripe apples and pears with stems and cores alongside soft and damp cedar and chewy vanilla-laced toffee. The palate counters with grapefruit pith, silken vanilla cream, and apple butter brimming with dark spice. The finish comes about with a singed cedar bark feel next to soft powdery spices, orange oils, and a very light vanilla ice cream scoop.
Bottom Line:
This is one of the easiest drinking whiskies on this list. It’s subtle and well-rounded. It works really well on the rocks or in a cocktail. It’s also very familiar, which does drop it in this ranking slightly.
Sticking with the Tobermory Distillery on Mull, this brand is all about the peat. The whisky was made to mimic the hardcore peated whiskies of the 1700s that were made in the Inner Hebrides. That heavily peated barley is mixed with local spring water for fermentation. Finally, the whisky spends 18 years in used oak before a finishing spell in Oloroso sherry casks.
Tasting Notes:
This opens with a nose full of smoked apple and pear chips with a woody underbelly next to dates and prunes swimming in dark spices and honey with a touch of sweet cherrywood. The palate leans into the spice with a mix of ground ginger, allspice, clove, nutmeg, and maybe some mace as fatty pork belly smokiness adds some serious depth and creaminess. The finish has a malty chocolate vibe that leads to more smoky fat, woody spice, and dark leather fruit on the very end.
Bottom Line:
Okay, we’re into the seriously good stuff now. These top three are all more of a mood than a one, two, or three rankings. This is bold and fruity while still having a good peaty depth tied to a nostalgic backyard bbq. This might be more your vibe, especially during the summer months.
2. Highland Park 15 Years Old Viking Heart (Orkney)
Highland Park’s Master Whisky Maker Gordon Motion hand-picked sherry seasoned American oak barrels of single malt to create this new expression. The whisky is then decanted/bottled in a throwback ceramic bottle from Wade Ceramics, which has been making bottles like this since the early 1800s.
Tasting Notes:
Even though this is a peated whisky, the nose is all about bright notes of orange and lemon oils with a deep vanilla sauce vibe, a touch of dried heather, and old sticks of cider-soaked cinnamon. The palate lets the smoke sneak in via grilled pineapple that turns towards smoked plums, soft and moist Christmas cake with plenty of dried fruits, and a sense of cinnamon-flecked tobacco leaves that have just been singed around the edges. The peat sneaks in late via an almost sea salt element that lets the orange oils, vanilla, and cinnamon tobacco all mellow towards a silky finish.
The Bottom Line:
The subtly of this peated whisky is astounding. It’s so nuanced yet deep and inviting. It’s fruity but not overly sweet. The brininess is dailed way back before mellow spices and creamy vanilla. It’s just a really nice pour all around, especially on a rock.
This is a classic single malt that also happens to hold the title of “Best Single Malt Whisky in the World” from the World Whiskies Awards. The iconic juice is rendered in Talisker’s bespoke stills and then spends nearly two decades resting in both ex-bourbon and ex-sherry barrels, like most of the true classic single malts.
Tasting Notes:
This is subtle. The nose has a light yet clear sense of ripe plums, orange oils, buttery toffee, and an almost sour apple next to a distant whiff of briny campfire smoke from one beach over. The orange oils remain on the palate as eggnog spices peek in gently, with hints of that butter toffee driving a rich silkiness. The smoke remains in the distance as the spices warm your senses and the meaty fruit takes the edge off on the slow and satisfying fade.
Bottom Line:
Full disclosure, this is one of my all-time favorite drams. So, yeah, this was going to be first on any Islands Scotch whisky list.
All of that aside, this is a subtle masterpiece of maritime whisky making combined with a soft peated depth and true nuance and balance. This is the whisky to buy on this list. It’ll take you to new heights and might just make you a peated whisky fan for life.
No sandwich, sub, classic roast beef, or anything served up in The Bear (though we don’t doubt Carmy could do it if he tried) has sh*t on the ice cream sando. The only way to improve upon the tastebud igniting ecstasy that is a cold lick of ice cream on a hot summer’s day is to stick that ice cream between something that provides crunch or texture and allows you to enjoy said ice cream completely bowl and utensil-free. It satisfies what the rich and decadent combination of cake and ice cream does, without the need for a spoon, plates, utensils, or, you know, cake.
From Australia, where it’s known as a “cream between,” to Vietnam, the home of the bánh mì kęp kem, the whole world loves slapping ice cream between wafers, cookies, or whatever they can find to make a sandwich out of it. It’s the perfect snack of the summer, so if you haven’t hit up the freezer aisle at your favorite grocery store to pick up a box of one of the many ice cream sandwiches available to you yet, get on that ASAP! But with so many ice cream sandwiches out there, which one is actually worth your money?
We decided to find out by picking up as many ice cream sandwiches we could find and putting them head-to-head in the ultimate ice cream sandwich ranking of the summer. Let’s get into it and find out which brands to avoid, and which deserve that coveted freezer space starting with the worst of the bunch…
Before I tried Good Humor’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Sandwich, I was all in. Why don’t more cookie sandwiches have actual chocolate chips in the ice cream itself? It’s a great idea. Then I realized Good Humor’s small concession was just an attempt to distract us from how bad this ice cream sandwich is. It’s awful. The chocolate chip cookie used as the ‘bread’ of this sandwich has this dirty and dry graham cracker-like flavor to it that dominates the whole sandwich.
The cookies ironically don’t have more than a few tiny chocolate chips on them, which makes all the chocolate chips in the ice cream look more comical than appetizing. The cookie along with the insane amount of chocolate chips give this sandwich an overall bitter flavor, with the vanilla ice cream acting as more of a mouthfeel than a flavor.
The Bottom Line:
Avoid at all costs!
19. Le Cafe De La Plage — La Vanille Macaron Sandwich
I love the idea of a macaron ice cream sandwich and I’m sure when you order this treat at the actual Le Cafe De La Plage in Malibu it’s delicious. But in this pre-packaged form sold at Whole Foods? It fails to deliver. The ice cream is incredibly dense, with a sweet vanilla bean flavor, but the macaron buns are soft and mushy and don’t really provide that same crispy airiness that makes macarons so addicting.
The Bottom Line:
A great idea. But in practice, it tastes and looks like something that melted in the freezer and then re-formed.
Le Cafe De La Plage’s Rose Macaron Sandwich isn’t at all an improvement over the vanilla version, but it is a bit more novel. And that’s something right? This sandwich has a refreshing floral flavor but still suffers from that mushy macaron construction. Also, the presentation isn’t quite as beautiful as the packaging suggests. This wasn’t so much a pretty pink ice cream sandwich as it was something that resembled a pineapple and cherry Big Stick popsicle in disk form. I kind of wish it tasted like one given what this brought.
The Bottom Line:
Don’t give in to the novelty of the rose flavor or the macaron construction, this sandwich will only bring disappointment.
For this ranking, we tried to stay away from dairy-free options to make way for the insane amount of traditional ice cream sandwiches that are on the market, but we wanted the dairy-free crowd to have at least one entry, so we went with Cool Haus. It’s not great. It’s by no means bad, but there is hardly anything redeemable about this sandwich aside from its dairy-free status.
The cookie is too soft, the texture is more like raw cookie dough than an actual fully baked cookie and it sticks to your tongue and the roof of your mouth in this really off-putting way. While the sandwich has a slight sweetness to it, the dominating flavor is this blunt blandness that overpowers the vanilla and leaves your mouth feeling dry and in desperate need of some sort of liquid to loosen the cookie that has coated your palate.
The Bottom Line:
Bland and certainly not worth its obscenely high price tag.
Tillamook’s Vanilla Bean Waffle Cone sandwich is another snack that fails to deliver on the promise of its concept. This sandwich attempts to satisfy the craving for a cone while using the ice cream sandwich form factor and it, unfortunately, ends up failing at both. The chocolate-dipped waffle pieces that make up this sandwich don’t have that same cone crunch, they’re soft and mushy, but hard enough not to break apart easily causing the ice cream filling to wedge around each time you bite it, spilling out the sides and causing a mess.
You’re better off throwing this in a bowl and eating it with a spoon, which kind of defeats the purpose of an ice cream sandwich.
The Bottom Line:
Another great concept with poor execution. This is a great idea, Tillamook just hasn’t figured out how to make it work.
Not only was I surprised to find that there were more than ten different ice cream sandwich varieties in the supermarket, but I was also surprised by the fact that the ice cream filling in almost all of these sandwiches was of pretty decent quality. I fully expected more of them to taste like this Cookies and Cream Sandwich from Target brand Favorite Day, which is to say: cheap, icy, and watery.
This sandwich isn’t good and that comes down to the fact that the ice cream itself tastes more like ice than it does cream. You can just tell this one is cheap, but we’re ranking it a bit higher than the other bottom-of-the-barrel stuff because I liked this dark Oreo-like chocolate cookie.
The Bottom Line:
It tastes cheap and freezer burned.
14. Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie Sandwich
I love the classic Nestle Toll House chocolate chip recipe. It’s simple and results in one of the most straightforward but best-tasting chocolate chip cookies you can make at home, so I fully expected to love this but I’m a bit disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, the cookie absolutely delivers, it’s delicious, with a brown sugar and butter forward flavor and the perfect amount and distribution of chocolate chips, but it totally overpowers the vanilla ice cream sandwiched in-between.
Here the vanilla serves more as a cold mouthfeel. The flavor doesn’t really register beyond the cookie.
The Bottom Line:
You’re better off making some Nestle Toll House cookies yourself and putting your favorite ice cream between two cookies than buying this.
Tillamook’s Chocolate Mudslide still suffers all of the same structural problems as the Vanilla Bean iteration but the combination of chocolate ice cream and a chocolate waffle cone tastes so much better than the vanilla combo that we’re willing to give it a pass. I’d say all of the sandwiches proceeding this entry aren’t worth your money or time, but the Chocolate Mudslide gets a pass. The flavor is rich and decadent, and while as a sandwich it’s a mess to eat, it’s definitely worth throwing in a bowl with a fresh banana, some cinnamon, crushed nuts, and whipped cream for an easy ice cream sundae.
The Bottom Line:
As a sandwich it sucks, but flavorwise it definitely delivers and will inspire you to get creative with it and turn it into something better with a few more ingredients. If you don’t have the patience for that, skip this one.
It’s exactly what want it to be. Kroger’s Snowboard Sandwiches are that classic chocolate wafer cake ice cream sandwich, with a creamy vanilla-forward flavor with notes of chocolate cake. It’s not going to wow, but it’s undeniably delicious.
The Bottom Line:
A classic ice cream sandwich that tastes just as good as you remember it. It doesn’t have the flash of a cookie sandwich, but it delivers.
After the disaster that was the Le Cafe De La Plage Macaron sandwiches, I didn’t have high hopes for this one. But it managed to surprise me. The Madagascar Vanilla Bean ice cream is refreshing and creamy but the real star of the show here is this cookie which has a delicious cinnamon, brown sugar, and butter flavor with giant chocolate chips (only on one cookie for some reason, the bottom cookie is standard chocolate chip) that infuses each bite with gooey chocolatey goodness.
The Bottom Line:
Of all the cookie sandwiches in this ranking, this one is in the running for having the best chocolate chip cookie. Unfortunately, the vanilla ice cream doesn’t live up to the promise of the cookie.
10. Alden’s Organic Old School Vanilla Ice Cream Sandwich
I have nothing bad to say about Alden’s Organic Old School Vanilla Ice Cream Sandwich, but nothing really nice to say either. This is a good ice cream sandwich, the vanilla is sweet and delicate and the chocolate cake is a bit thinner than your typical sandwich, allowing for a more vanilla-forward flavor. Overall, it’s solid but I just can’t see it being anyone’s favorite. For a similar price, there are better brands out there that do this same classic ice cream sando formula better.
The Bottom Line:
Good, but not good enough that you should seek it out. Buy it because it’s on sale, eat it because it’s offered to you, but don’t make space in the freezer for it.
Whole Foods Organic Ice Cream Sandwich is another standard chocolate cake vanilla ice cream combo with a great flavor. The vanilla here is a bit creamier than what Alden’s offers and the chocolate portion of the sandwich is sweet, decadent, and rich.
The Bottom Line:
It’s nothing special but if you love that classic ice cream sandwich flavor, you’re going to love this.
The Klondike Classic Vanilla Ice Cream Sandwich might look like a standard ice cream sandwich from a well-known brand, but it actually presents a different take on the classic flavor combination. The chocolate Klondike uses has a distinctly smooth and rich quality to it, it comes across as lighter and more natural than a lot of other chocolate-covered ice cream treats while still delivering an intense flavor.
The Bottom Line:
This isn’t just your standard ice cream sandwich with Klondike branding, if you love the brand you’re going to love this. It delivers the classic chocolate vanilla flavor combo but with a characteristic Klondike twist that you’ll either love or hate depending on how you feel about the brand.
I love the Fatboy Jr. It might look like a standard ice cream sandwich but everything is on point here. The chocolate cake is rich, the vanilla creamy and refreshing, but what really gets me is the form factor. The Fatboy Jr. is a three-bite snack, and that’s its strength. The flavors never overstay their welcome, and by the time you’re finished with it you’re left wanting more, rather than feeling burnt out or overwhelmed.
It also lives up to its name, the ice cream filling is thick, offering a different ratio of chocolate to vanilla than your typical ice cream sando.
The Bottom Line:
For a no-frills ice cream sandwich, the FatBoy Jr. is one of the best tasting in a bite-sized less indulgent form factor.
The Klondike Sandwiches Mrs. Frields Cookie Sandwich delivers where the Tollhouse version fails. The cookie is soft and buttery and the vanilla is milky and rich with both flavors elevating one another to something greater than the sum of its parts. There’s a true marriage of flavors here that stands out above a lot of the other chocolate chip cookie-based sandwiches on this ranking.
The Bottom Line:
This is the best budget chocolate chip cookie-based ice cream sando.
This was the biggest surprise of the ranking. Target’s Favorite Day brand is generally pretty middling but this is one of the best-tasting standard ice cream sandwiches I’ve come across. The chocolate has this fluffy texture to it that makes it taste more in line with actual cake, and the vanilla is creamy and refreshing. This really delivers on the promise of an ice cream sandwich, no complaints here.
The Bottom Line:
It’s a great standard ice cream sandwich that delivers more flavor and quality than its affordable price would suggest. A real surprise from the Favorite Day brand.
What’s not to like? This is essentially a giant oreo cookie. It’s sweet, creamy, chocolatey, rich, and decadent. My only complaint is that Klondike didn’t team up with Oreo to get some legit Oreo buns for this sandwich. The cookie is softer than I want it to be. Small granules of chocolate in the ice cream attempt to make up for that but come up a bit short. Overall though, this is a winner.
The Bottom Line:
It tastes exactly like it looks, like a giant Oreo cookie.
This is the highest-ranked standard ice cream sandwich on this list because it does everything that those other ice cream sandwiches did, just a bit better. Blue Bunny is a brand that knows how to deliver on its various products and the ice cream sandwich is no different. The vanilla is thick and creamy, with a luxuriously soft mouthfeel that melts on the tongue slowly while the chocolate cake notes take over and dominate the aftertaste.
The Bottom Line:
The best standard ice cream sandwich your money can buy.
Had I been able to find the mint chocolate It’s It I have no doubt it would’ve swept this ranking. Unfortunately, all I could find was the original vanilla, which we’re giving the second place spot. I’m an It’s It fan, such a big fan that I ate mine before I could remember to take a picture of it. This cookie sandwich just offers something completely unique to the competition: an oatmeal cookie.
That cinnamon-infused oat cookie is covered in chocolate with a thick scoop of creamy vanilla sandwiched between, offering a crispy mouthfeel and a sweet, earthy, rich, and distinct flavor that tastes so good a single bite will stop you in your tracks.
The Bottom Line:
Perfect texture, perfect flavor, it’s hard to beat the unique combination of flavors offered by the It’s It.
I didn’t want this to be my top choice. Cool Haus’ Classic Ice Cream Sammies come three to a box at $15 per box. That’s $5 per sandwich, which is absurd. The form factor is also ridiculous for the price, this isn’t a large chocolate chip cookie, the sandwich is built on your standard three-inch cookie. But holy shit does it taste f*cking delicious.
The cookie is perfect, it’s sugary and buttery with semi-sweet chocolate chips that deliver the right balance of sweetness and bitter cocoa notes. The Tahitian vanilla ice cream is rich, luxurious, and perfectly creamy, with a texture that matches a fresh scoop of ice cream. Every component is perfectly realized.
The Bottom Line:
As perfect an ice cream sandwich as you’re going to find in the freezer section. It easily rivals what you could make with some fresh baked cookies and your favorite ice cream.
“I think she’s ready to explore the world outside the halls of East High,” creator Tim Federle told Entertainment Weekly about Rodrigo’s character, Nini. “And Olivia herself was having such a monumental explosion in the music industry that it felt like the right thing to, frankly, work with Olivia to say, ‘How do we get you out there into the world with us taking a little bit more of a backseat?’ Which we were all proud to do to support her.”
Rodrigo will get a “proper sendoff” in High School Musical, Etc. season three, which premieres on July 27. “It’s a joy to see Olivia’s music explode in such a big way. It was so fun to have her back and reminisce on the beginning,” Federle added.
For Rodrigo, it’s a blessing that she’ll no longer have to say the show’s title anymore.
DC Comics is making it clear that the “SnyderVerse” had its day with the release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League, and now, the comics giant is moving on to other projects. During an appearance at the 2022 San Diego Comic-Con, Chief Creative Officer Jim Lee gave a diplomatic statement on Warner Bros. not expanding the storylines that were set up in the “Snyder Cut” despite the #RestoreTheSnyderVerse campaign that sprang up immediately after the film debuted on HBO Max.
“I work on the projects that are in development. And so, I think the Snyder Cut was Zack’s vision realized, and it was a really satisfying story told, but there’s no plans for additional work on that material,” Lee said via CBR. “So, I was happy to help contribute to the pitch for the other stuff, and it was kind of fun to actually see that stuff get out there, ’cause I did that years ago. I actually thought it had been erased, but they had kept it in storage.”
Of course, this stance doesn’t come as a total surprise. Shortly after the Snyder Cut release, the director started making pointed comments that hinted at tensions with Warner Bros. According to Snyder, the studio passed on a third 300 film that he wrote during the pandemic because “they’re not huge fans of mine.” Sensing he wasn’t wanted, Snyder set up shop at Netflix where he’s currently at work on Rebel Moon, an original sci-project that started out as a pitch for a standalone Star Wars movie.
However, just this week, the bad blood between Snyder and Warner Bros. came into more focus due to a Rolling Stone report that detailed how the studio launched an investigation into the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut campaign after having concerns about its authenticity. Warner Bros. execs were also reportedly targeted by overly aggressive Snyder fans who went so far to review bomb Godzilla vs. Kong for stealing the Snyder Cut’s thunder. Judging by Lee’s Comic-Con statement, Warner Bros. and DC probably aren’t looking to go through any of that again.
Just four days ago (July 18), Nardo Wick shared an Instagram post with the caption “Who Is Nardo Wick? 2” and confirmed its release date for July 22. The cover art resembled its predecessor as the colors remain black and white, only the rapper is found now sitting on the porch of the broken-down home.
Thus, many believed that this was going to be the follow-up to his December 2021 debut album. Today (July 22), the project is here but instead is just the deluxe version of Who Is Nardo Wick? with an extra question mark to the title.
Who Is Nardo Wick?? (Deluxe) adds 12 new songs to the original version, including The Kid Laroi-assisted “Burning Up” and a Latto verse on the remix to “Baby Wyd” with Lakeyah. For an album that already boasts appearances from Future, Lil Baby, Lil Durk, 21 Savage, and G Herbo, the 20-year-old found a way to up the ante even further, add some life to an already well-received LP and maybe even avoid any disappointment in the fact it is not a completely new offering.
Besides, the Jacksonville rapper has delivered plenty of new verses in 2022, appearing on projects from Latto, Gucci Mane, Money Man and Doe Boy
Who Is Nardo Wick?? (Deluxe) is available now via Flawless Ent. and RCA Records. Listen to it here.
The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.
ITEM NUMBER ONE – Listen to me
Something kind of cool happened this week. Alan Dershowitz, the famous attorney who recently did some work with various figures in the Trump administration, told a story about running into Larry David, co-creator of Seinfeld and star of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Per Dersh, the interaction went down something like this…
Dershowitz: “We can still talk, Larry.”
David: “No. No. We really can’t. I saw you. I saw you with your arm around [Trump Secretary of State Mike] Pompeo! It’s disgusting!”
Dershowitz: “He’s my former student [at Harvard Law]. I greet all of my former students that way. I can’t greet my former students?”
Which is… I mean, it’s perfect. Both the thing where Larry David is apparently always 100 percent Larry David whether the cameras are on or off or nowhere nearby and the thing where he used the word “enclave.” That’s a really good word. I don’t use it enough. I suspect you don’t either. Let’s all try to slip it into a conversation at some point this weekend, just to see how it goes. I bet it’ll feel great. I’m excited.
Reading that got me thinking, though. A lot. About how strange it must be to be friends with Larry David, sure, but also about what a singular personality he has. How no one else is really like him, now or at any other point in history. And that got me thinking about how much fun it would be to just parachute him, as himself, into various other shows in the HBO family.
Larry David cussing out Kendall Roy inside an upscale coffee shop in an episode of Succession.
Larry David on The Righteous Gemstones talking to Baby Billy Freeman about the finer points of Judaism and why organized religion as a whole is a sham.
Larry David on Euphoria talking to Rue about… I don’t know… scratchy sweaters. For the full hour.
Larry David with NoHo Hank on Barry doing a whole bit about criminal organizations and contract killings and why he could never do it for some small reason that’s extremely important to him.
Larry David on Westworld complaining about the robots.
Larry David on Hacks discussing the finer points of comedy with Deborah and pissing her off royally in the process.
Larry David as a guest in the hotel on The White Lotus.
Larry David and Nathan Fielder having the single most awkward/interesting conversation in history on The Rehearsal.
Larry David ranting about dragons on one of many Game of Thrones-based spin-offs.
It could work. Maybe. Just a little. Or it could be terrible. I suspect I will like it either way, though. And really, isn’t that the important thing here?
ITEM NUMBER TWO – The brand was strong
SHOWTIME
Earlier this week, although it somehow feels like a month ago (this is how time works sometimes), rumors started bubbling about a rift between Desus and Mero, the hosts of, well, Desus & Mero. This was a bummer and something I hoped was not true because Desus and Mero are funny and funny together and had been doing stuff on television that no one else was doing, really. The day went on and the whole thing came to a boil and neither of them commented on it, which was weird because both of them are super online. Then, just after closing of business on the East Coast, this happened.
Bodega Hive: The illustrious @desusnice and @THEKIDMERO will be pursuing separate creative endeavors moving forward. #DESUSandMERO will not be returning to SHOWTIME. It’s been a good run, fam.
— DESUS & MERO on SHOWTIME (@SHODesusAndMero) July 18, 2022
I’m going to come back to the rest of it in a second, but first, let’s all take a second and think about how fast this all happened. We’re talking, like, hours between rumors being floated and the whole thing ending. That’s kind of crazy. Something had obviously been simmering for a while and this was just the heat being cranked up to high, but still. Hours. If you worked the night shift and got home at 8 am and slept from 9-5, you could have gone from thinking everything was fine to watching the world burn in a flash. The internet is wild.
More importantly, this stinks. I don’t care too much about the whys or the hows of it all ended, I’m just sad it did. The story itself is so cool. They were just two funny dudes on Twitter who got plopped together for a project and they kept turning that into more projects until they were full-on interviewing Barack Obama on a premium cable channel. That… it kind of doesn’t happen. If there was a movie where that happened, you’d be like “uh huh, sure.” It’s all very cool.
And they did cool stuff once they had the chance, in addition to talking to a slew of famous people and breaking the form of that kind of show a little. Like this. They did that. It was cool. Uproxx’s Aaron Williams said it all better than I’m saying it.
Before Desus & Mero, it’s hard to find too many examples of hip-hop culture in the late-night TV space. Sure there was Arsenio Hall, doing his best to bring the fashion, music, and voice of the streets to America’s living rooms in the early ’90s. But while The Arsenio Hall Show was a landmark in bringing hip-hop to mainstream audiences, it was also watered-down, polished, and presented in a way that the whole thing slicker and more palatable to those audiences. It also largely avoided political topics, although the show did come under fire for booking — or not booking — some guests that audiences found controversial.
Again, cool. I should probably stop talking about them in the past tense, though. They’re still around and doing stuff, just as Desus and Mero instead of Desus & Mero. I’d love to see Desus get another late-night show, like maybe in James Corden’s empty slot. I’d love to see Mero get a crack at daytime television, maybe the Wendy Williams slot. I’d love to fast-forward 5-10 years for the reunion special. But right now, I’m just bummed out. I wish them both the best, but I’m bummed out.
ITEM NUMBER THREE – Russell Crowe seems to be having a good time
This made me so happy when I saw it. It’s still making me happy right now, days later. Imagine you’re on vacation in Rome and a sweaty Russell Crowe offers to pose for a selfie with you. Imagine how you’d react. I hope he just starts doing this, hanging around the outside of the Colosseum offering to pose for pictures with people. I hope he starts charging, like, $5 for them. Not so much where you’re like “Damn, Russell Crowe is really greedy and/or down on his luck.” Just enough to be funny. Maybe $4. I like the idea of him making change for people.
If you spent any time on the internet in the last week or so, you probably saw or at least heard about Emmanuel, the rascal emu. I hope you did, at least. If not, please click on that video up there at once. Click on it anyway, actually. You deserve to have a little fun. Go watch all of them later tonight, maybe after a glass or two of wine. It’s Friday.
Anyway, it brings me great pleasure to report that the Washington Post caught up with the young woman in those videos, Taylor Blake, who works at a place called Knuckle Bump Farms, which is both a tremendous name for a farm and where my sweetly naughty boy Emmanuel lives.
In their first joint interview, Emmanuel stared into our Zoom call, then at Blake, then away from the screen. He refused to comment.
“Emmanuel’s just kind of a down-to-earth guy,” Blake told The Post. “I don’t really think he cares [about being famous].”
Blake says fame isn’t going to change Emmanuel: “I have talked to him about it a few times, but he hasn’t really had much of a reaction. I think he’s just … adapting to this new life of fame.”
I love it. I want them to start making videos where they solve mysteries, with Taylor trying to do things by the book and Emmanuel flying off the handle like a loose cannon who plays by his own rules but gets results, dammit. At the very least, I would like to see him in sunglasses. But I’m serious about the first thing.
Blake was raised near her grandparents’ farm and developed a deep love for animals as a child. She has been creating social media content professionally since 2013. After a brief stint in Los Angeles, she moved to Knuckle Bump Farms with her girlfriend to help Blake’s aging grandparents care for their animals full time.
She began posting videos with the animals — cows, donkeys, ducks and, yes, emus in the plural — in 2018. Her rationale: “The world is dark, and animals bring everyone joy. They’re funny, they’re entertaining.”
This is correct. Everyone is doing great here. As is this dog who ran away from home and won a dog show while he was out in the world. That doesn’t have much to do with any of this beyond both of them being animals I liked a lot this week, but I don’t have room to talk about it anywhere else because the news section at the bottom of this post has to focus on the beauty queen who was arrested for her part in a million-dollar wine heist. So here we are. I hope Emmanuel stars as an Interpol agent in the movie about it all.
ITEM NUMBER FIVE – Liam Gallagher, please recap Our Flag Means Death for Uproxx
HBO
Two pretty important things happened this week. The first was that I finally finished Our Flag Means Death. What a good and fun show that is. Go watch it if you haven’t. It’s a bunch of pirates and everyone is gay and Taika Waititi plays Blackbeard. I could probably explain this all more and better, but then I’d risk ruining some of it for you. I can’t have that. This is all you get. For now.
Which brings me to the second important thing from this week. Liam Gallagher, former lead singer of Oasis and noted fan of profanity and chaos, tweeted this.
This is the first official image from the fourth John Wick movie, which will hit theaters in March 2023. A few things are worth noting:
There are so many candles here
More like John Wicks
Get it? Because of the candles
NO, YOU SHUT UP
I cannot possibly be expected to wait until March for this movie
New rule: From now on, do not give me more than, like, three weeks notice before a movie comes out. I’ll go as far as one month. Drop the trailer four Thursdays before the release date, do the little publicity tour, go on Hot Ones or something, then blammo, put it in theaters. What the hell am I supposed to do until March? Maintain healthy relationships with my family and friends? Collect a series of new experiences and memories that I can carry with me for the rest of my life? Watch the first three John Wick movies like five times each?
Well, joke’s on them. I was already going to do that last one. The other two… I mean, we’ll see how it goes.
READER MAIL
If you have questions about television, movies, food, local news, weather, or whatever you want, shoot them to me on Twitter or at [email protected] (put “RUNDOWN” in the subject line). I am the first writer to ever answer reader mail in a column. Do not look up this last part.
From James:
Are you watching the new season of Blood and Treasure? I need to know your thoughts on the Mongolian ninja Vatican secret vault heist.
Well… no. I have not been watching Blood and Treasure. But I kind of feel like I need to now. “Mongolian ninja Vatican secret vault heist” speaks to me in ways few phrases ever have or will again. There’s so much happening there. I kind of can’t even picture exactly what it all means, but I feel like I like it very much. I appreciate when television is made this narrowly tailored to my own stupid interests, even if I’m not there in the moment to watch it. Thank you, Blood and Treasure.
In my defense, I have been a little busy. And by that, I mean “I have been watching and thinking about this week’s basically perfect episode of What We Do in the Shadows, which features all of the following things: a genie negotiating an extremely specific wish about a penis, a vampire rapper named Richie Suck, and, most enjoyably, for me, Matt Berry doing cartwheels and somersaults through lasers to steal some sort of artifact.” Here, look.
FX
It was great. Easily one of the funniest episodes of television I’ve seen this year. My former podcast partner Alan Sepinwall wrote up a big thing about it because, well, that’s what Alan does and Alan is good at it. Watch the episode and go read it. Maybe tell Liam Gallagher to watch it, too, if you run into him. He’ll probably like it if he liked Our Flag Means Death. Then maybe he can do a podcast with me about it. Think about this, too, Liam.
A former Mexican beauty queen and a Romanian-Dutch accomplice have been arrested in Croatia over the theft of $1.7 million worth of prestige bottles of wine in Spain after a nine-month chase across Europe, police said on Wednesday.
This is the only thing I care about now.
Police investigators believe the woman, a 29-year-old Mexican, who according to Spanish daily El Pais had competed in a beauty pageant in her homeland, distracted El Atrio waiters by ordering room service from the Michelin-starred restaurant after its kitchen had closed.
Meanwhile, her 47-year-old male accomplice slipped down to the wine cellar, opened it with a master key he had stolen during a prior visit, and filled three backpacks with the bottles, wrapping them in hotel room towels for protection, according to the police statement.
Ah, of course, the old “a beauty queen distracts the staff while her accomplice sneaks downstairs with a stolen key and shoves millions of dollars worth of wine into his backpacks” ruse. I’ve seen it a million times.
The next day, hotel CCTV captured the pair, who had checked in with false Swiss identity documents, checking out at 5.30 a.m. and leaving on foot with no forensic trace of their presence left at the hotel, it said, leading police to initially believe an organised gang was behind the heist.
I don’t think I have ever been angrier in my entire life than I was the first time I read this when I realized they weren’t going to tell me the fake Swiss names they used. I was so excited. I wanted to see, like, Dr. Klaus Klausman and Inga Blickensderfer. I feel so cheated here. The million-dollar wine heist and European manhunt helps, sure. But still.
The two suspects left Spain within days and were pursued for months across Europe before being identified by Croatian border guards as they crossed from Montenegro, police said.
I need this to be a six-episode docuseries as soon as possible and I need Agent Doug from McMillions to pop up as a talking head who explains and/or analyzes various law enforcement strategies. I think… let’s say November. Let’s have this ready by November. December at the latest. I believe we can do it
Dungeons and Dragons has been the basis for countless movies and TV shows for decades whether the less Chessex-experienced among us realize it or not. The character archetypes, monsters, and magic from the fantasy realm can be found all across the entertainment landscape, so perhaps it was only a matter of time before an IP-specificDungeons and Dragons movie came to fruition.
That time is now, with Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, set to hit theaters next March. The movie’s cast is fittingly making the rounds at San Diego Comic-Con this week to hype the first trailer for the star-studded fantasy epic. And among them is Hugh Grant, who apparently cannot help himself when being associated with the word “dungeon.”
Grant, who will play a rogue named Forge, may not have the 5e rulebook in his library. But he does know how to make some kinky wordplay to get the movie some buzz. In an SDCC interview with Entertainment Weekly, Grant joked that he’s been a longtime “dungeon master,” but not with any dice involved.
“Well, I was a Dungeon Master,” Grant said dryly, before quipping, “But it was more S&M and less D&D. It’s the English version.”
As the group burst into laughter, Rodriguez spoke for everyone when she replied, “I wasn’t expecting that!”
Apparently, this is a joke you might get from Grant quite a bit in the junket circuit, as he later elaborated during an SDCC panel.
The jokes continued at a panel later in the day at Hall H. When the moderator joked that he had heard Grant was a lifelong D&D fan, Rodriguez corrected him: “I think you mixed it up with S&M.”
“She’s not wrong,” said Grant. “I’ve been an enthusiastic Dungeon Master for some years now. That’s a British pastime, [a] national sport almost. I believe that’s why the Jonathans [the directors] thought of me for this, my reputation.”
There’s really no telling what this movie will be or if it will be any good at all, but at least Grant is having some fun with the press tour. No kink-shaming here.
Big Sean and Jhene Aiko are fully leaning into this whole pregnancy thing. After Jhene shared her first set of maternity photos — which had a spacey theme very in line with the content of her music and general demeanor — last week, the couple followed up this week with some new photos featuring both of them. Today, they shared a new photo in which Big Sean strips down and joins his partner, who is radiant and accented with golden rays of celestial energy. Which, again, fits her whole thing. In the comments on Instagram, Sean jokes that they “tried to post this so many times”; maybe the IG filters were against all the (tasteful) nudity.
The couple’s fans now wonder which will arrive first: the baby or their follow-up Twenty88 album, which they said they were working on as recently as February of this year. In the meantime, they’ve been plenty busy individually, with festival appearances at Smokin’ Grooves and Sol Blume for Jhene, as well as a recent collaboration with fellow LA-based singer August 08, “Water Sign” (also, check out August’s latest EP, Towards The Moon, in full, as its well worth the listen). Big Sean, meanwhile, most recently contributed a verse to Ellie Goulding’s “Easy Lover.”
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