The Dirty Cookie - Tustin

Yes, that's a shot glass molded from a cookie. And yes, that's milk inside the shot glass. And yes, this novelty came from The Dirty Cookie, the new specialty cookie stall inside Union Market at The District in Tustin--a hip rat maze of boutiques made for those who are young or have money to burn, or both.

Like Pizza Hut's pasta bread bowl and KFC's Double Down before it, it's something no one ever asked for. But now that it exists, my duty as a food blogger dictates that I had to try it, at least once.

Was it good? Yes. It tasted as I expected it to. It had the density of concrete because it needed to be. If the cookie material was less sturdy, the thing--quite literally--would not hold water. Also, to ensure that this pastry Hoover Dam kept the mighty milk Colorado at bay, the inner wall and lip of the vessel was covered in a layer of chocolate as moisture barrier.



Now, I admit that when I first heard about it, I thought to myself, "Why is this necessary? Who is so busy that they can't have a cookie and a glass of milk?" But then, I had my first nibble of cookie and sip of milk. I realized immediately that, by golly, I was enjoying this. It was kinda fun! And what is dessert if it's not fun?

After all, the ice cream cone exists not because people are incapable of eating a waffle and a separate bowl of ice cream.

Still, the price for one of these cookie shots can seem awfully steep. The Dirty Cookie charges $4.50 for one cookie (either chocolate chip, cookies-n-cream, or red velvet), which includes a pour of milk from their taps (either vanilla cream, chocolate milk cream, traditional milk, or, for those intolerant of lactose, vanilla almond milk).

But the cookie's small frame can be deceiving. This is actually a lot of cookie. If you were to take a mallet and flatten it to normal cookie dimensions, I would guess it would make a 5-inch diameter cookie that's a quarter of an inch thick. That's a big cookie.

Also included in the price: leakage insurance. If you find that it leaks at any point during consumption, you can come back and they'll give you a new cookie, free of charge. And one of ours did spring a leak, in fact. So we got a third cookie that I took home and filled with Bailey's.

But now that I've done the cookie shot, I'm looking forward to the next food novelty. Please let it be wine in goblets made of cheese.

The Dirty Cookie
2493 Park Ave
Tustin, CA 92782
(949) 324-1574
thedirtycookieoc.com

THIS WEEK ON OC WEEKLY:
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Aguas Frescas at Cancun Juice - Santa Ana

I don't know how much money I've wasted over the years on smoothies from that national smoothie chain that rhymes with "samba shoes". I say "wasted" because every time I get one, I always realize three things:

1. It's expensive.

2. It's got a weirdly tart and artificial after-taste.

3. It harbors more calories than a Big Mac.

But now I know better. Now when I crave something cold and fruity, I get an agua fresca.

It turns out that aguas frescas are the drinks I actually wanted when I thought I wanted a smoothie. It fulfills my requirements of something fruit-juicy without just being fruit juice. And best of all, aguas frescas are cheap, finishes clean, and has slightly fewer calories than a smoothie.

My go-to place for aguas frescas right now is Cancun Juice, which has only four locations in OC, three of which happen to be where I usually am anyway.

They have a vast selection of flavors which I will list here, all of them made to order.

WATERMELON
PINEAPPLE
MANGO
CANTALOUPE
PAPAYA
LEMONADE
LIMON
STRAWBERRY
ALFALFA
HORCHATA
JAMAICA
TAMARINDO
GUAYABA
GUANABANA

The watermelon tastes, well, like watermelon. It's as if they took a couple of fresh-cut wedges and then just liquified them in a blender.

The strawberry tastes, well, like strawberries! My point is this: these are straight-up, real fruit flavors uninterrupted by the distraction of yogurt, sherbet, or whatever additive those smoothie chains dump in their drinks to make it so sickly sweet.

I'm now committed to Cancun Juice's $2 aguas frescas over smoothies as my frivolous drink purchase of choice.

Cancun Juice
2302 S. Bristol #D
Santa Ana, CA 92704
(714) 668-9588

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