Viewer: Ideal originated in Mexico

A story we ran on yesterday’s newscast has elicited comment from the community. No, not the shooting of an armed robber or the latest talks with Guatemala. The story I’m referring to is the one on the frozen treat known as ideal, specifically how the flavoured ice got that particular name. At the end of our report we attributed the name “ideal” to a brand of condensed milk of the same name, which was poured over crushed ice to make a flavoured snow cone. Today, however, we are reliably informed by Mr. Ramon Cervantes of Belize City that the ideal has a totally different pedigree. According to Cervantes, the first ideals in Belize were manufactured by the Valencia family. The Valencias lived in Quintana Roo, Mexico, but when that territory was levelled by Hurricane Janet in 1955, they migrated to Belize and set up their ice cream business in a small shop on New Road. That’s where they introduced the flavoured-ice-in-a-plastic-bag and gave it the same brand name that they used in Mexico, Ideal (ideyahl), in Spanish which has the same spelling and meaning of the English word: ideal. Back then an ideal sold for only five cents, but business must have been good because the Valencia family soon expanded their operation and eventually purchased the land at the corner of New Road and Queen Street, where they built the city’s most popular ice cream parlour. Again, our thanks to Mr. Cervantes for his helpful explanation.