Falls Church Celebrates the Centennial Summer of the All-American Dessert

The days are lengthening and the temperatures are rising. On June 21, the summer months will officially start.

In this particular Summer of 2004 there is a debate on everyone’s minds, a debate that is heating up along with the mid-summer sun. No, it isn’t the presidential election; it is the great ice cream debate over who invented the ice cream cone.

According to American myth, 2004 marks the 100th anniversary of the ice cream cone. The story goes, that at the 1904 World’s Fair on a particularly hot day in St. Louis, MO, Charles Menches, an ice cream concessionaire ran out of bowls for his customers. Desperate to satisfy his patrons, Menches looked around for a solution. Nearby, a man was selling zalabis, a Syrian waffle-like pastry. Thinking quickly, he bought a zalabi and rolled the still hot pastry into a cone. When it hardened he scooped the ice cream into the zalabi and continued selling his wares.

The rest, as they say, is history. Or is it?

While the story of Menches is widely thought of as the birth of the ice cream cone, there are those that claim it came about under different circumstances.

According to the International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA), Italo Marchiony, an Italian immigrant, filed a patent in 1896 for a mold that forms small pastry cones. The patent was granted in 1903, one year before Menches was said to have created his ice cream innovation in St. Louis.

To make matters more confusing, the Syrian that was selling zalabis that day also laid claim to the invention. The IDFA states that Ernest A. Hamwi claimed that he had developed the idea of selling ice cream rolled in his pastries.

Additionally, some historians say that people had been using edible cups in England to hold ice cream for some time before 1904, although the practice wasn’t widely acknowledged. As the popularity of the ice cream cone grew in America, the debate over who invented it became became quite heated.

To this day the Menches family still insists on their family’s claim. They don’t hope to gain anything from it monetarily (Menches never patented his cone), the family simply wants to keep their name linked to the summer favorite.

While the debate about the initial inception of the ice cream cone may never be resolved, one doesn’t need to indulge in patent law in order to enjoy an ice cream cone these days.

The success of the summer sweet is indisputable. According to the IDFA, just 20 years after the 1904 world’s fair, cone production reached 245 million. As technology advanced, machines have been invented that can produce 150,000 cones over a single 24 hour period.

In Falls Church there are a wide variety of ice cream opportunities.

Frozen Dairy Bar has made its most recent home at the intersection of Annandale Rd. and Rte. 50. Located between the International House of Pancakes and the CVS, the Dairy Bar has been serving ice cream cones to northern Virginia residents and beyond for over fifty years.

Frozen Dairy Bar is not your average ice cream parlor. For one thing, it doesn’t serve ice cream. The bar serves two or three flavors of custard; vanilla, chocolate, and a flavor of the day.

Unlike ice cream, custard is made with egg, which the Frozen Dairy Folk claim makes it thicker and richer than normal ice cream. Since it is made with egg, they can’t make the mix in the store according to health code standards, but the flavoring is added and blended fresh for each batch.

As they pour the mix through the machine, the temperature drops to seventeen degrees Fahrenheit, instantly freezing the custard. Then the custard is packed air tight so no air can enter the ice cream, enhancing the thicker texture.

While they use a new machine purchased in 2001, the original machine still stands in the corner of the store. It is the same machine that was used at the original Frozen Dairy Bar in the 1950s. Around the store the signs and lettering that used to adorn the old shop hang on the walls, accentuating the tradition that Frozen Dairy Bar maintains, even as it has moved around the area.

Andrew Fisher has been working at Frozen Dairy Bar for four years. Fisher noted the unique popularity of Frozen Dairy Bar ice cream. “You can’t get tired of Frozen Dairy Bar,” he said. “People come in religiously and get the same thing, time and again,” said Fisher.

In a life surrounded by ice cream, Fisher is cognizant of the powers of ice cream and the ice cream cone.

“It’s weird the effect that ice cream has on people. They come in if they’re having a bad day, they’ll get an ice cream and leave happier,” He said.

Fisher talked about how people come from far and wide to get their ice cream. As he spoke, Robert Wells stepped to the counter to order a small chocolate custard.

Wells is a resident of Santa Barbara, California. A former Virginia resident, Wells makes sure to get ice cream from the Frozen Dairy Bar whenever he is in town visiting. “It’s one of my stops,” Wells said.

Fisher talked about the unique benefit of the ice cream cone. “You don’t have to throw anything away,” he said. He also noted that the taste of the cone adds to the overall flavor of the ice cream. Frozen Dairy Bar offers five varieties of ice cream cones, a far cry from rolled zabalis. There are sugar cones, cake cones, and three varieties of waffle cones.

Frozen Dairy Bar specializes in minimalism. With only two regular flavors and one daily special, it isn’t the place to find the latest confectionary invention. Instead Frozen Dairy Bar sticks to what it does best, vanilla, chocolate and a cone, the basics.

In contrast, across the street along Rte. 50, stands a Baskin-Robbins, its well known sign heralding the franchise’s claim of 31 flavors. Founded in 1945 by Irv Robbins, Baskin-Robbins has opened 4,500 stores in 52 countries around the world. It claims to have an unrivalled collection of 1,000 different flavors of ice cream that they rotate through their stores. For them, the sheer variety of ice cream options keep away the summer heat.

For traditional ice cream with a down-home twist, there is Stacy’s Coffee Parlor at 709 W. Broad St. (Rte. 7). Stacy’s serves a wide variety of original flavors homemade in Falls Church by Paradise Ice Cream. The flavors are unique, including an apple pie flavor. On a cone it blends the American dessert tradition with the American dessert invention.

From shop to shop the flavors and styles of ice cream differ dramatically. The thick simple flavors of custard at Frozen Dairy Bar, the extensive variety of Baskin-Robbins, and the unique home-styled creations of Stacy’s, each make an argument for customers to reach to them for refreshment. But at each of these places is the simple cone, ready to bear whatever creamy craving the customer has.

While there may be a debate on who invented them, and there may be a question on where to get them, on a hot summer day there isn’t much that can satisfy like a pastry cone and a couple cool scoops.