Tag: Jameson Slushie

June is upon us, and with it comes the start of the fearsome Memphis summers: sweltering heat waves, thick walls of humidity, and plenty of time designated to sitting around a pool.

While true summer won’t begin for another couple of weeks, it sure feels like summer already, and an arbitrary start won’t stop anyone from seeking out early ways to beat the heat. Here at the Memphis Flyer, we asked our team for some advice on how they cool off, and our writers delivered.

Whether it’s sweet treats, canoe trips, or a jaunt to the drive-in, there’s plenty of summer fun to be had. Just don’t forget the sunblock.

Coney Island

I have this idyllic summer scenario in my head of swimming for hours on a hot day and then going to a local drive-in for a hamburger and milkshake. That scenario dates to the 1950s and ’60s for me. But I relived it the other day (except for the swimming part) when I pulled into Coney Island at 2351 Elvis Presley Boulevard.

I’ve passed this place for years and years, but I never stopped. Driving over, I suddenly realized maybe the name “Coney” was a play on ice cream “cone.”

The friendly, efficient Darious Sumlin, 19, who’s worked at Coney Island for five or six years, took my order at the window. I ordered a hamburger (double patty) and a vanilla milkshake. I asked Sumlin what Coney Island item he thinks is the most popular. He immediately said, “Everybody comes for the Chicago-style Polish sausage.”

It comes with mustard, relish, jalapeños, and grilled onions. It’s Sumlin’s favorite, too. “I just make mine different.” He gets his with just mayonnaise, peppers, and cheese. “A lot of people make it their own way. Some people get just plain meat and bread. I don’t like to eat it like that.” So, I also ordered the Polish sausage sandwich with the works.

That hamburger was great. Just like they tasted in my scenario. And that Chicago-style Polish sausage was the bomb. It was so good.

And, yes, you can get a “vanilla cone” at Coney Island.

Coney Island is open from 10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day except Sunday. — Michael Donahue

Enjoy Memphis’ Signature Cocktail

If Memphis has a civic cocktail, it’s the Jameson slushie.

Thanks to Old Dominick Distillery, the city can lay claim to a host of Memphis versions of famous drinks, like the Memphis Mule. And, yes, Wet Willie’s has been serving frozen drinks on Beale for years, but it’s a chain. Now Willie’s is even competing with another frozen drink chain — Fat Tuesday — for dominance.

But Slider Inn’s signature slushie seems to have been born, raised, and celebrated here. The cocktail’s birthday is unclear. The Memphis Flyer and The Commercial Appeal first mention the drink in 2015. But so many years on, one thing is clear: The Jameson slushie is a bona fide Memphis institution.

“The drink consists of Barritt’s Ginger Beer, house-made lemonade, delicious Jameson Irish Whiskey, and bitters,” according to a Flyer story from 2015.

First off, though — it’s coooold. Mixed in a frozen drink machine, its tiny pebbled ice grains drink like a milkshake. Yes, this is likely how the slushie first beckons hot and sweaty Memphians to Slider’s patios.

But they stay for the flavor. The lemon citrus is bright, sweet, bitter, and subtly spiced underneath with the ginger beer. While it’s clear the slushie is alcoholic (I mean, the name, right?), it’s not boozy. The Irish whiskey is present but not overpowering.

So sit a spell on a Slider patio with friends and a slushie. Jameson shows up and works some Memphis magic on the weather and your troubles. But watch yourself. One (or maybe two) is all the fuel you’ll need to get a start on a fun evening. — Toby Sells

The Drive-In: Branded Cool

Ever since my eyeballs took in the glorious scenes of Grease while parked in front of a hotel TV at 6 years old, I longed for the day I could be as cool as the 30-something-year-olds playing teenagers going to the drive-in movie. The drive-in, I imagined, would be the pinnacle of my high school experience. It wasn’t. I wouldn’t go to a drive-in until a week after my 24th birthday, just a year older than John Travolta was when he crooned about being stranded in the drive-in, being branded a fool, worrying what his classmates would say Monday at school.

At the Malco Summer Drive-In, though, there was no swing set for John Travolta to sulk on, no gossiping in the girls’ bathroom, no Pink Ladies, and no T-Birds. But there was a movie playing on the big screen and air conditioning in the car — and that was enough to make me feel pretty cool. Plus, you can bring your own snacks, and you don’t have to sit next to a stranger who chews too loudly, like in a regular (read: not cool) movie theater. Not to mention that tickets are only $25 per carload. What’s not to love?

The drive-in has movies playing pretty much every night this summer — from Evil Dead Rise to The Little Mermaid. And, of course, there’s the Time Warp Drive-In every month, where you can catch back-to-back screenings of some of your favorite films. (Time Warp’s screening on June 24th is themed “It’s War! Human vs. Aliens,” featuring Edge of Tomorrow, Starship Troopers, and The Blob [1988].) So, if you consider yourself cool, head on over to malco.com for movie times. — Abigail Morici

The Beach Within Reach

“For some Memphis summer fun, nothing beats hitting the beach!” said no one ever? Don’t forget that hidden gem, Wolf River Beach. Truth be told, some call it a sand bar, but my bare feet did not care one whit as they stepped into the sublime cool of the Wolf River’s waters. And, looking 50 yards in either direction at the other parties dotting the white sands, I thought, “This is a beach!”

It turns out that this shady getaway is hidden in plain sight, just off Germantown Parkway, South Walnut Bend Road, where signs lead you to Shelby Farms’ Gate 19, with a well-maintained road to the Germantown Trailhead of the Lucius E. Burch Jr. State Natural Area. Note that the beach itself can be elusive — and sometimes disappears completely.

Don’t be alarmed: It’s only the river submerging the sandy strip after heavy rains. Luckily, wolfriverbeach.com provides a link to the current USGS water level readings for the site, which you can check before making the trip.

Once you park you’re only a few yards from the waterside, if you bear left from the trail head. Bearing right will lead you into a few miles of wild forest — a hiker’s and birder’s paradise — before looping back to the beach. There, I said it: THE BEACH.— Alex Greene

Have a Snoball

Some of my favorite summer memories took place in the Mississippi Delta when I was growing up. My grandma would always treat me to a strawberry-daiquiri-flavored snow cone and nachos from a local food truck in our town. As I grew older, this combination became a delicacy. While there were local snow cone joints that were the envy of everyone’s Instagram stories, everything felt commercialized, and I couldn’t find that balance and innocence associated with my childhood combo.

I remember scrolling on Instagram one day and spying a snow cone with a giant piece of cheesecake in the center of it. I had heard of sweet cream, and even ice cream paired with snow cones, but this was a first. Intrigued, I clicked on the profile for Suga Mama Snoballs, and I was instantly transported back to my childhood. Not only does the shop have your basic “snoball” flavors (I tried the birthday cake with sweet cream), but the more adventurous patrons may be privy to the “Ain’t It Mane,” which comes with a piece of strawberry shortcake in the middle, or a Suga Mama Specialty.

What makes Suga Mama so special to me is that the shop also carries foods that are true fan favorites in my household but not necessarily sold in restaurants, such as Rotel tacos and Kool-Aid pickles. The shop has two locations, with one at 1717 East Holmes Road and the other at 7041 East Shelby Drive, Suite 117. — Kailynn Johnson

Canoe the Mississippi

When I thought about it, I couldn’t believe I’ve been in Memphis this long and never gone canoeing on the Mississippi. I’d been out on the river in riverboats with fake paddle wheels, but there were cocktails involved. But I had never been as close to Big Muddy as I was a few weeks ago, when I set out on a Saturday paddle with Matthew Burdine of Mississippi River Expeditions and a few colleagues from Contemporary Media, Inc.

The canoe, Burdine told us, is a modern version of the vessels Native Americans had perfected thousands of years before Columbus arrived. It would seat 20 comfortably and included a mount for a sail — although we were about to find out that on this day, the sail would have worked against us.

Burdine radiated calm as he went over the safety procedures. Then the boat full of greenhorns launched into the muddy waters. Seen from the point of view of the first people to ever navigate it, the Mississippi seems vast and unforgiving. It had stormed the night before, and at one point we saw an entire tree rushing southward on the river. Paddling did not seem super strenuous, until I imagined doing it for days on end.

Our goal was to cross the river to Robinson Crusoe Island, a game preserve directly across from the mouth of the Wolf River, where we had put in. But as we paddled into the main channel, a strong west wind whipped up, and it was obvious this boat full of novices lacked the muscle power to buck it. Instead, we paddled around the harbor, taking in the angle at which Downtown looks most fetching. After this taste of aquatic wilderness, I will definitely go back for a full day trip when the wind is a little calmer. — Chris McCoy

Kick Back at Overton Park’s Abe Goodman Clubhouse

“We could just go play Overton.”

Those words were often uttered by Memphis golfers over the past 40 years or so — “Overton,” meaning the once-scruffy little nine-hole course that wound through the Old Forest in Overton Park. For decades, it was a course of last resort, the track you went to when you couldn’t get a tee time anywhere else. Overton Park was short and funky, with tiny greens and erratic maintenance that made each round an adventure.

That’s decidedly no longer the case. In 2021, the course underwent a $4 million makeover, the result of a private/public partnership that produced a delightfully revamped course that opened last June.

It was a long time coming. The original course in Overton Park opened in 1906 and was reputedly the first public course opened in the South. Twenty years later, in 1926, Memphis businessman and philanthropist Abe Goodman donated $25,000 for the construction of a clubhouse. In those days, $25,000 went a long way. As Memphis magazine’s Vance Lauderdale put it in a 2018 article about Goodman: “The Tudor-style building featured a vaulted-ceiling dance hall, massive brick fireplace, snack bar, golf shop, and kitchen facilities on the ground floor. Downstairs, players could find showers and changing rooms. Upstairs was a cozy apartment for the resident golf pro.”

I suspect there is no longer an apartment for a resident golf pro upstairs, but the newly remodeled Abe Goodman Clubhouse is now reopened — with its 100-year-old bones nicely intact. It’s a worthy companion to the reinvented links.

And I should mention that the shady patio is an inviting spot to enjoy a cool beverage on a summer afternoon, even if you’ve never played a round. — Bruce VanWyngarden

Brain Out on a Patio

Most summers, I find myself craving a beer when the heat starts to creep in. And most times, I’ll seek out a patio to drink said beer upon. My balcony works, sure, but sometimes I need to just get outside the confines of my home space and find a new spot.

But while I’ve done plenty of drinkin’ and patio relaxin’ in my time, I have a constant need to be entertained. So with that in mind, our crew set out to find patios that could provide fun activities.

Like the nerds we are, we eventually settled on the weekly “Geeks Who Drink” trivia at Ghost River Brewing Co. that lets us chill outside (the end of South Main is quite nice and calm at dusk) and work those brains as we guzzle a Grindhouse or Riverbank Red. Trusty Mike behind the bar gives us the proverbial hat tip now that we’ve established ourselves as regulars, and then the games can begin.

There’s plenty of brainteasing trivia fun to be had around town, but the chill vibe at Ghost River gives trivia some room to breathe, with this iteration providing some truly bizarre categories. Take, for instance, a music round that requires you to identify different songs, usually with a twist. My favorite is one that replaces all vocals with the sounds of chickens clucking, or another that features iconic Darth Vader lines dropped into the middle of a song. It’s a whole lot of shenanigans, a whole lot of beer, and a whole lot of patio. An excellent summer combo. — Samuel X. Cicci