Sno-ball

A sno-ball is a New Orleans confection made with finely shaved ice and flavored cane sugar syrup. Commonly confused with the snow cone, the ice of a sno-ball is fine and fluffy; while a snow cone's ice is coarse, crunchy, and granular. Moreover, in a snow cone the flavored syrup sinks to the bottom of the cup; while in a sno-ball the ice absorbs the syrup.

Sno-balls are a seasonal treat as they are generally sold only from roughly March to October. They are vended from "sno-ball stands" throughout New Orleans and in other parts of Louisiana and Mississippi.

History

Before the 1930s ice was manually scraped from a block of ice, producing a coarser, crunchier version of the sno-ball. In 1933, Ernest Hansen began work on an ice-shaving machine; and by 1934, he had invented the first motor-driven ice-shaving machine. For two years, Hansen kept the machine within his family, making sno-balls for only his children and relatives. In 1936, Ernest and his wife Mary took their machine to the streets of New Orleans and opened Hansen's Sno-Bliz. The business ran discontinuously for the following two years because Mary needed to care for her children. In 1939, they opened the shop and remained in business for the next 67 years.

Sno Balls

Sno Balls are cream-filled chocolate cakes covered with marshmallow frosting and coconut flakes formerly produced and distributed by Hostess and currently owned by private equity firms Apollo Global Management and Metropoulos & Co. Sno Balls are usually pink; however, they were also available in chocolate, lemon, white, green, blue and other colors, depending on the holiday. They come in packages of two and were sold at many convenience and grocery stores in the United States. A similar cake, called a "Snowball", is often sold at supermarkets in the United Kingdom; these cakes are typically covered in desiccated coconut, but are typically brown rather than pink, because they may have chocolate on their outside. At Halloween they come in the color green and are called Glo Balls.

History

Sno Balls were first introduced in 1947. Hostess attributes their initial popularity to Americans being released from the flour and sugar rationing during World War II. Originally, the cakes were colored white and lacked the crème filling. The crème filling was added in 1950. A little later the pink coloring was added to the shredded coconut in one of the two cakes in each package, but eventually the company decided that it was more efficient to have both cakes the same color, and they decided to color both cakes in each package pink.