The Best Birthday Gift Ever

"I love almond butter,"  I said to J. as I am licking a heaping spoonful of the stuff in our kitchen.  

"Really? I hadn't noticed," he responded sarcastically,  referring to the fact that I have been eating spoonfuls of it nearly on a daily basis.  

"You know what would be really awesome?  If they could make almond butter ice cream.  I bet it would be delicious."  

Fast-forward to this week, my birthday. 

I got home from work, and ran up the two flights of stairs to our apartment in anticipation of the birthday presents J. has for me.  I was a little out of breath when I got to the top (ask any of our guests, our stairs are steep!), but I was excited for what ever surprise J. had in store for me.  

I opened the door and find a single birthday card on the table. I ripped it out of the envelope and found...

 

At this point, I was getting skeptical about my gift! But then this message caught my eye...

I opened the freezer, and saw this!

A giant tub of almond butter ice cream!

It turns out J. went to Torico's Ice Cream, a local ice cream shop in Jersey City that is near and dear to our hearts since we personally know the family that owns the business, the Berrios family.  Torico's is well-known in Jersey City for their creamy homemade ice cream, and their unique variety of flavors.  So J. asked the Berrios's if they could make a special order of almond butter ice cream for my birthday.  He paid them for the ingredients and their efforts, of course.  

But it turns out that in order to make it with their commercial equipment, they had to make  A LOT of ice cream.  In fact, we have not just one, but two of these huge tubs of ice cream.  Here it is in our freezer to give you an idea of how big they are!

Totally worth it though, this stuff is SO GOOD! It tastes just like almond butter, only icy cold and creamier!  Plus, there are sliced almonds in their for texture.  

So instead of ordering dessert at the Lighthorse Tavern, where we went to dinner to celebrate, we came home and I made myself an almond butter banana split!

Not a bad way to celebrate! Special Thanks to J. for this awesome gift and to Torico's for making this special order.  If you are in the Jersey City area, I highly recommend stopping by for their ice cream! Unfortunately, they won't be serving almond butter ice cream, but they have a great selection of other flavors! (Suvarna took a picture of their menu in her guest post here.)  My favorites are the Banana Peanut Butter swirl and the Blueberry Cheesecake!  

(P.S. For those of you wondering, this was not the only gift J. got me for my birthday. I also got much needed gift cards to Macy's,  Another Man's Treasure, and E. Tittlemouse and Co. The last two stores are very cool vintage stores in J.C.  Time to go shopping!)