Words and Light

COLUMBIA, Mo. —

A few evenings ago, Jeff and I hightailed it out of Columbia and drove south to Jefferson City, where Central Dairy awaited.

Trucks, in the back of the dairy lot.

Jeff only buys Central Dairy milk (when he’s in Missouri), but neither of us had been to the ice cream parlor before. There’s a Central Dairy building in downtown Columbia — it’s now an appliance store — but the parlor in Jefferson City has been around since at least the 1950s.

The storefront of the Central Dairy ice cream parlor.

We ordered the banana split to share.

Two scoops each of strawberry, vanilla and chocolate ice cream, topped with marshmallow sauce, chocolate sauce and nuts.

We almost finished it — but not quite. I’ll just say that that banana boat and wax paper were full of ice cream carnage, and leave the rest to your imagination.

But it was very, very good.