I’d like to try making some homemade ice cream. I’ve read it’s much better than anything you can buy. However, I don’t want to invest in a special machine which I will probably only use a few times a year. So is there a way to do it using the regular items I already have in my kitchen (blender, mixer, etc.)?
Take a big plastic bag, add ice cubes, some sort of salt (CHECK in a book or on the web!!) then take a smaller bag, add… OH SH*T, I forgot! OOPS! There is a way to do it with plastic bags. Small bag has the ice cream ingredients and big bag has the ice and salt. I know you can find a recipe on the web. Get the right stuff, and shake your bag for a couple minutes. It works. Sorry I can’t remember the actual recipe, I don’t “cook”. :S
The science behind ice cream is always fun to explain:
I’m not a physicist so I can only describe it in 2nd grade layman’s terms…
To make ice cream freeze your easiest way is to surround it with ice. The ice melts. This requires energy. The energy to melt is taken from the environment around the ice. Think of the ice as a kind of Jonny Quest energy-vampire, it sucks the energy out of what ever it’s in contact with, air, water, cream, whatever. So, when the ice melts it sucks the warmth out of what it’s in contact with (same process as my wife’s feet at 2a.m.). By adding salt you are forcing the ice to melt quicker, because you are lowering the (chemical thingee-something scientific sounding…) thus, the cream freezes faster. Stirring the cream around ensures (insures? I don’t know) uniform cooling and a smooth texture.
Ice cream machines are good at this but you can also acheive this effect by placing your cream mixture in a tupperware bowl in the freezer and stirring it every 30 minutes or so until frozen. Or you can place cream in small bag tightly sealed, place in larger bag with ice and lots of salt (any salt will do, but it’s a waste of Lawry’s Seasoned Salt, trust me) and shake it around. The kids did this once and only one had a sealant breach causing iced-salted cream. Not the family favorite.
Standard ice cream recipe:
2 cups whole milk
2 cups heavy cream
3 eggs
1 cup sugar (not powdered sugar dammit!!!)
3 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract from Madagascar or Mexico
Place cream, sugar and eggs in large saucepan and cook slowly on low heat while constantly whipping until mixture is smooth and sticks to spoon like warm phlegm (sorry)
Add milk and vanilla
Place in 'fridge to cool.
make Ice Cream
Add chips, mint, fudge whatever you like. Play with this recipe. I’ve been making it for years.
Don’t be cheap with the ingredients, if you use 2% milk or artificial vanilla you may as well go to McDonald’s and get a frozen corn-starch desert or buy your favorite flavor of ice-chalk-white-lard garbage at the grocery store. That’s only for toddler’s birthday parties.
“I scream for ice cream!”
Give this a shot, I tried it and thought it was yummy with a great texture. Got the recipe from the Eagle Brand website. This has applesauce in it because it’s an apple icecream, I used cooked apple chunks in mine. I think you can safely switch that out with something else, even milk, and it would still work, so you’d get any flavor you want.
I froze mine in a stainless steel bowl then just packed it into another container, worked like a charm. The whipped cream stayed whipped so the stuff didn’t freeze like a block.
Garage sales. Anything you think might not be worth owning was probably bought by someone else who now feels the same way.
You will need:
Liquid ice cream (milk, sugar, etc, look above)
liquid nitrogen
a wok, for stirring
Pour milk mixture into wok.
WHILE STIRRING, slowly pour in the liquid nitrogen.
Continue stirring and pouring until the ice cream is firm.
Dig in.
Thomas Jefferson is often credited with recording the first ice cream recipe in the United States. I am pretty sure you can access the recipe at the Library of Congress website. I am certain it calls for 2 cups of “good cream”, 6 yolks of egg, and 1/2 a pound of sugar. He would boil the cream, add a stick of vanilla, then stir in the other ingredients. Next, boil again. Finally put on ice for an hour before it is to be served. This won’t taste much like what we call ice cream today, but I thought it someone might be interested.
moejuck–self-proclaimed ice cream expert
I’ve made it with two different sized coffee cans – put the ingredients in the small one, seal it, put it in the big one, add ice & salt to the big can, then seal it. Then roll the big can back and forth for a while. IIRC, I added choclate chips to the small can about half-way through the process.
I’ve made it with two different sized coffee cans – put the ingredients in the small one, seal it, put it in the big one, add ice & salt to the big can, then seal it. Then roll the big can back and forth for a while. IIRC, I added choclate chips to the small can about half-way through the process.
I seem to remember making ice cream in Girl Scouts-we used coffee cans and rolled it back and forth between us. Be sure and use gloves if you can-those cans get super cold-so cold they burn.
moejuck, if you use the right technique, your recipe should taste like the very finest premium icecream!
“Boil” the first time = bring to boiling point, let real vanilla infuse while it cools.
“Boil” the second time = very carefully bring it up to the custard setting point, do not let really boil or it will go lumpy.
Then let cool completely.
Then churn it over ice & serve up right away - hence the specification of an hour before serving - assuming you don’t have a freezer to keep it in. Try the salt and ice in a bag or coffee can method if you have no churn.
OR in general, use a simple classical method. Put it in the freezer. Take it out and beat it madly evey 20 minutes.
A favorite recipe of mine involves a prop-driven bomber.
Traditionally, a B-17 was used, although I’ve heard of the trick being accomplished in other bombers, notably the B-24, B-28 and the Lancaster.
One simply obtained a tightly sealed canister, and put the ingredients in it. Don’t bother with the ice.
Place the canister in an out-of-the-way place aboard the bomber; the tail was generally considered good. Often the canister was placed in an exterior access hatch, so no one would trip over the thing, and so it would not become unsecured.
Then, simply fly a bombing raid over Germany.
The cold of the altitude, I’m told, along with the agitation of the engines, diving, and occasional flak hits, would mean the crew would have ice cream to celebrate their homecoming upon landing…
cajela,
Good call. I have made this before, and it does taste very good. I just meant that most people in the U.S. aren’t used to this sort of taste in their ice cream. It is my understanding that the people of Australia and New Zealand take their ice cream very seriously, so I am sure that you are an expert yourself.
Couldn’t you just put the mix in a blender, put that on slow & put the blender in your freezer for 20 minutes? You don’t want to do it too long, of course, so check every 5 minutes.
Well, i do own an icecream maker. And I love premium icecream and can’t be bothered with the supermarket standard. Ben & Jerry’s is about my minimum. But I’m not sure about the national differences - I’ve seen plenty of premium icecream in the US - Haagen Dasz and B&J… Someone must be eating them other than visting Aussies 
The other good thing about making your own is sorbets. For those of use trying to lose weight, that litre of cream and dozen egg yolks seems like a really bad idea for anything less than a major special occasion. Like Christmas. But a fersh berry or watermelon or lemon sorbet is a great summer dessert.
You’re kidding, right?
How big is your freezer? Mine barely has room to hold the ice cream, let alone a blender.
“How big is your freezer?”
Mine is big enough for one… I once bought an ice cream maker that you could do this idea with.
Here’s a great recipe. I made it last weekend, without a machine, and it’s quite yummy. I made it with Reese’s mini-pb cups. One note, though: it’s too sweet, even though I halved the sugar. I recommend not adding any sugar. I started around 10:00 Monday morning (day off, of course), and stirred every two hours, and it was ready by… 4:00? Maybe 6:00, I can’t remember. I had it for dessert that night, though. Enjoy!
When I was a kid, we used the “rolling coffee can” method mentioned above, only we used a five-gallon plastic bucket as the outer container and a one galllon glass jar as the inner container. Great for a party with a lot of kids who are willing to help push the bucket around!
I have a freezer big enough for handy’s idea–but, how do you keep the freezer shut and the blender plugged in at the same time?