Aside from dragging my mom out to the Chapel Hills mall, reopening Contempo Casuals, popping a babydoll dress and doc martens on me, and having “Heaven is a Place on Earth” blasting, there are very few things that could take me back to my awkward tweens more than the sweet, sweet frothy pleasure of a strawberry Orange Julius. Just like the once mighty Z. Cavaricci, it's an empire that's faded with time and higher standards and you'd be hard pressed to find a store to fulfill this nostalgic treat.

Tinton Falls (which I once described in great detail on this very blog) is one of the recent malls still sporting the chain. And while the option of “extra egg whites” is no longer on the menu and the fact that, like a recently divorced dad it has to share a pad with Dairy Queen, the Julius was as tasty as those adolescent days where every living idiot boy was a vague (and eventually disappointing) romance waiting to happen, notebooks were littered with doodles and heartfelt poetry, and gossiping on the school's front lawn with your closest girlfriends was the center of your entire week.