Danny’s Market: Home of the Screamer (spoiler: not really)

The spelling change makes sense, because Mr. G is not the only place you can buy a s-c-r-e-a-m-e-r Screamer. A quick bit of research online finds they are sold in Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton, Victoria, and numerous other cities, mostly in western Canada (though I was informed Quebec also has the drink, sold under the name Mont-Blanc). This lends credence to the idea that the Screamer has its origins in Canada, and most likely the west, though it also makes it less likely it is a Prince George invention. For that, multiple people pointed me toward a Richmond-based business officially named Danny’s Market but better known as Danny’s Screamers.

Numerous blog posts and Facebook fans, as well as the official Twitter account for Richmond’s tourism operators, designate Danny’s as the origin point of the Screamer. So I called them up and was greeted on the phone by Danny himself, who quickly told me the ice cream/slushie mix was a drink of his own invention.

Born in Pakistan, Danny Khataw told me that as a child he would regularly combine his ice cream with pop. Upon taking ownership of Danny’s Market in 1999, he had access to his own slushie and soft-serve ice cream machines, and decided to start selling them mixed. “Lots of people copy us,” he says, “But lots of people tell us ‘your product is the best, number one’.” As others find success making their own screamers, he has plans to expand his reach with new locations in the Lower Mainland.

Danny’s on Yelp

And while there is no shortage of people who will attest to Danny’s Screamers’ quality, there is a problem with the timeline. Danny tells me he invented the Screamer seventeen years ago, putting its origins in 1999, but plenty of people have told me they were drinking them in the early nineties. When I ask him about this, he doesn’t deny it.

“Two years after I open it I’ve been hearing that there is Screamer in Prince George or Terrace, somewhere, in a small town, I’ve been hearing that. In a gas station somewhere?”

“Mr. G?” I ask.

“Mr. G, yes, yes,” he says. “But I’ve never tried their quality, so I don’t know.”