Ben & Jerry's - Chubby Hubby

Chubby Hubby - Vanilla Malt Ice Cream with Peanutty Fudge-Covered Pretzels with Fudge and Peanut Buttery Swirls

Now for one of Ben & Jerry's stranger flavors: Chubby Hubby.  The origin of this flavor is actually a joke.  Two guys in York, PA convinced a co-worker that a flavor called "Chubby Hubby" existed and sent him out to find it.  While the co-worker was on his futile search, the two men decided to make up their own flavor by mixing peanut butter, fudge and pretzels into vanilla ice cream.  When the co-worker returned and tried the flavor, he loved it so much that he refused to believe it was really all a joke.  The men contacted Ben & Jerry's with their story, they tried the flavor too and liked it.  The rest is history.  Chubby Hubby has turned out to be one of their more popular flavors since it was introduced in 1994.  It has even inspired spin-off recipes for cookies, bars and other desserts using the same add-ins as the ice cream.

With that long list of ingredients, I had no idea what to expect.  Opening the pint I was greeted immediately by a fudge swirl on the top and the vanilla base was a bit darker than normal.  I did not know if this was due to the malt in the vanilla or the peanut butter swirl.  Digging into the pint, I did notice the effect of the malt in the vanilla base.  It was not as bright of a vanilla flavor as what you get in something like "Milk & Cookies" or "Americone Dream" but it was not a caramel or peanut butter flavor.  It was a subtle base meant only to serve as a vehicle for the fudge-covered peanutty pretzels.  These pretzel pieces were much bigger than I expected!  They were quite numerous as well.  More than once I was crunching a pretzel piece in my mouth for a few bites after I had swallowed the ice cream that was accompanying it on the spoon.  I think I expected the peanut butter flavor to be more noticeable, but it wasn't like I missed it with all of the pretzel pieces in there.  It was a salty pint of ice cream as well, I had to drink a bottle of water afterwards, so yes these pretzels did indeed make me thirsty.

All in all, it was a very interesting flavor.  It is certainly much different from almost all the other flavors I've tried so I'm glad I had it.  Whether or not you love this flavor would depend on how much you like pretzels and how much you like salty ice cream.