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Ben & Jerry's Launches "Lin-Sanity" Ice Cream, Immediately Removes "Fortune Cookie Pieces"
By
Ben Yakas
Published Feb 24, 2012
Modified Feb 24, 2012
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Feb 24, 2012
Modified Feb 24, 2012
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Never one to sit on the sidelines, Ben & Jerry's grabbed the zeitgeist by the horns and launched a limited edition "Taste The Lin-Sanity" flavored ice cream last week in honor of rising Knicks star Jeremy Lin. And of course, controversy followed almost immediately: days after selling the flavor at its Harvard Square location, they had to replace the first batches of it that included "fortune cookie pieces" in it. "There seemed to be a bit of an initial backlash about it, but we obviously weren't looking to offend anybody and the majority of the feedback about it has been positive," Ryan Midden, Ben & Jerry's general manager for Boston and Cambridge, told Boston.com.
Initially, the flavor was a mix of vanilla frozen yogurt, lychee honey swirls and the fortune cookie pieces—those have since been replaced by waffle cookies, a decision which Midden says was made because "a couple of [pints] got returned because the cookies got so soggy." But in the wake of the ESPN "chink in the armor" headline controversy, the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) released a handy guide to the media advising them not to use certain kinds of language or make certain connections with Lin just for the easy puns. Regarding food, they wrote: "Is there a compelling reason to draw a connection between Lin and fortune cookies, takeout boxes or similar imagery? In the majority of news coverage, the answer will be no."
Midden says the Linspired ice cream will only be available for a limited time, and only at the Harvard Square branch, which brings up another point of contention: how could they have the nerve to release this ice cream favor in Cambridge, Mass. and not NYC?
Tagged
basketball
ben & jerry's
fortune cookie pieces
ice cream
jeremy lin
knicks
linsanity
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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