Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey

I honestly wasn't expecting to enjoy Chunky Monkey nearly as much as I ended up enjoying it, despite preference for unusual ice cream flavors and combinations. I should have realized that if a banana split, with its sweet marriage of bananas and ice cream, is such an amazing treat, then banana ice cream is basically the brilliant idea to take that idea to the next level. Previously excellent partners in marriage, bananas and ice cream truly become one in Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey, with quite pleasing and successful results.

The banana ice cream itself was the best surprise for my palette, since I wasn't expecting it to taste much different than my healthy breakfast banana protein shake.  But above and beyond the sweet and creamy banana ice cream are the large chunks of fudge and walnuts. Please note my emphasis on both of the words large and chunks.  Some Ben & Jerry's flavors have "fudge flakes," which is code for "tiny, thin pieces."  But one of my favorite things about the experience of eating Ben & Jerry's ice cream is the chunky pieces combined with the creamy texture of many of the flavors, producing a particularly pleasing "mouth feel" (a food industry term that means exactly what you would think that it means - how a food feels in your mouth, and how that contributes to your enjoyment of that food).  Sometimes I feel like the Ben & Jerry's flavors that skimp on the chunks are missing something that is quintessentially Ben & Jerry's. Somehow there are B&J's flavors that aren't truly Ben & Jerry's enough.  But that is not the case with Chunky Monkey, as the name assures.  Those large chunks of fudge and walnuts are big enpugh to satisfy even this particularly picky fan of chunky ice cream, earning this flavor a solid 4 star rating.