Newsletter #32 -Vanilla Ice Cream

Anyone who has viewed the series of images of what a commercial ice cream looked like when it melted (and still retained some shape) must have wondered what the ingredients were. The truth is that while store-bought ice cream can be delicious many commercial ice creams have compromised the quality of the ingredients and added others to improve the salability of their product.

True, commercial ice cream manufacturing has for many years had to abide by strict standards applying to minimum percentages of certain ingredients in order to be labelled “Ice Cream”.

Today, true vanilla ice cream made at home has only five ingredients – cream, milk, egg yolks, white sugar and vanilla. It is effectively a ‘custard’ that has been frozen. But it wasn’t always the case.

Lost in antiquity are stories of desserts made with ice or the assistance of ice dating back to BCE. Fruit syrups and sweetened milk were added to shaved ice or snow.  People would store ice harvested in the colder months so they could use it in the summer.

While there is evidence of similar process’s used in Syria and India as early as the 1300’s, the effect of adding salt to ice (Endothermic process) was not documented until the 1800’s. This simple process along with the development of hand-cranked ice cream churns in the 1840 led to the widespread popularity of ice cream in both the USA and the United Kingdom. Later in the 1800’s the invention of machinery capable of commercial refrigeration and freezing revolutionised the handling of perishables throughout the world.

Naturally Australia followed suit and with increased migration from Europe after WW2, specialised shops and vendors of ice cream were popular businesses, even with wartime rationing still in place.

During this period my father and his brother were mobile ice cream vendors for Lynam’s Ice Cream in Sydney. Their “territory” encompassed all of Sydney north of the Harbour, from Penrith in the West to Palm Beach in the East. As I mentioned war time rationing meant that there were restrictions on some products and ice cream was one of them. They only had one flavour – vanilla. It was only available in “bricks” and from a brick they would have offered cut ice cream for wafers or scooped for cones. They would cut and scoop the ice cream until they ran out, which didn’t take long when you considered the number of migrant hostels on their run.

Lynam’s was eventually bought by Street’s Ice Cream and the brothers moved on to the potato chip industry.

I think that ice cream is still one of the best desserts available and the vanilla flavour is easily the most popular. Today’s recipe is simple, but at the very least you will need space in your freezer to complete the process. Alternatively, you may have an attachment for stand mixer which will assist. I have an “ice cream bowl” attachment on my Breville mixer, which operates on a similar principal to the endothermic process.

Vanilla Ice Cream

5 from 1 vote

Ingredients for approximately 1500ml of ice cream:

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Course: Dessert

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

• 600 ml thickened cream
• 300 ml full cream milk
• 6 egg yolks from 60g eggs
• 150 g white sugar
• 1 ½ tsp vanilla paste
• 1 tsp vanilla essence

Method

 

Day before:

1. Find room in your freezer for your ice cream attachment or alternatively 2500/3000ml stainless steel bowl

Method for the ‘custard’:

1. Assemble your ingredients
   
2. In your stand mixer combine the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla essence.
   
3. Whisk on medium speed for 10 minutes.
   
4. Meanwhile heat the cream and milk in a saucepan to below simmering point – Do not boil
   
5. When the egg mix is pale and fluffy, remove the beater and add the hot cream mix and stir in well by hand
   
6. Into the same saucepan or a clean one pass the egg and cream mix through a fine strainer – discard any solids from the sieve.
   
7. Return the egg and cream mix to the stove over medium heat. Add vanilla paste. Stir continuously until the mixture starts to thicken – about 10 minutes. Again do not boil.
   
8. Take the mix off the heat and continue stirring for another minute on a cold surface or in a bowl of ice
   
9. Cool to room temperature
10. Cover the mix and refrigerate
    
11. The freezing process regardless of the method you choose is a combination of freezing and aeration, at the same time

Method for freezing using a stainless steel bowl and whisk

1. Give the custard mix an extra chill in your freezer for 30 minutes until the edge of the custard starts to freeze.
2. Remove the custard from the freezer and whisk by hand to incorporate and breakdown any frozen custard. Return to freezer
3. Repeat this process every 30 minutes for 5 or 6 times until the mix is frozen

Method for freezing in your mixer attachment:

1. Give the custard mix an extra chill in your freezer for 30 minutes
   
2. Make sure the ice cream bowl is completely frozen
   
3. Following the instructions supplied (on the mixer attachment) it should take about 10 minutes to freeze.
4. Transfer the finished ice cream into a freeze stable sealed container
   

Notes

Straining the hot cream and egg mix will remove any little bits of cooked egg white

The mixing process breaks down the ‘larger’ ice crystals which removes the ‘crunch” texture

Experiment with your favourite additions folded through such as berries and sweet sauces.