Forget Root Beer Floats: Add Vanilla Ice Cream To This Old-School Mocktail Instead

When we think of ice cream in drinks, many of us immediately go to that childhood fave: the root beer float. With its simple combination of root beer and vanilla ice cream, it truly never disappoints. But have you considered taking this approach with one of the most beloved old-school mocktails, the Shirley Temple?

A classic Shirley Temple, the grandmother of all mocktails, named for the young film star who was the quintessential underage poster child when the drink first reportedly debuted in the 1930s, has just three ingredients: Ginger ale, grenadine syrup, and maraschino cherries. Modern recipes swap out the ginger ale for lemon-lime soda such as Sprite or 7-Up. Adding a fourth ingredient, vanilla ice cream, gives it a lovely creaminess that tempers the sweetness of the drink, while also offering depth with a hint of vanilla. It's similar to having an Italian soda and then upgrading it with cream to a cremosa. Perhaps we'll dub this the creamy Shirley or Shirley Temple à la mode.

Whether you're a drinks pro or following a beginner's guide to crafting the tastiest mocktails at home, there are a number of fun ways to upgrade your Shirley Temple drink. But right now, we love the combination of these two nostalgic drinks: a root beer float and a Shirley Temple, for an easy-to-pull-together dessert or mocktail.

To recreate a Shirley Temple float (or the Creamy Shirley if we're committing to it), simply add vanilla ice cream to a tall glass, then add an ounce of store-bought or homemade grenadine. That's about two-thirds of a standard shot glass. Top with soda -– either ginger ale or lemon-lime — and garnish with cherries. To get more experimental and take the sweetness down a notch (which Temple herself despised about the drink), try plain club soda and add fresh ginger or citrus. Or maybe even skip the maraschino garnish and use a cherry-ripple ice cream to cover both the ice cream and the cherry bases.