A Rich Ice Cream

At a small civilian living history this summer we gave making ice cream a shot.  It was so successful and tasty that I feel compelled to share it here.

It all really started with my fiancée and I getting a hand crank ice cream freezer as a wedding shower gift.  The manufacture claims that they have been making them since the early 1850’s.  Some quick research found that the first ice cream freezer or “artificial freezer” patent was in 1843 by Nancy M. Johnson. There is an image in the 1854 American Home Cook Book of another ice cream freezer.  With a little searching I can see that the models produced in recent times is a later concept in the details of the mechanics.  Each of these has differences in the inner workings with the basic concept being the same.  That being, put ingredients in one container that goes inside another, with the first being surround by ice and salt.  The contents are then stirred/paddled/scrapped and/or spun until frozen deliciousness is made.  Before the “artificial freezer” this basic concept was still done without any mechanics, just a wood spoon or something similar.

The next question was what type of ice cream to make!  Well, there is no shortage of recipes from period cookbooks on that topic.  We found ice cream directions in the Kentucky Housewife (1839), The American Home Cook Book (1854), The American Frugal Housewife (1833), and The Young Housekeeper’s Friend (1859).   Most involved some cooking such as warming the milk or working with eggs for custard.  We were prepared to do this until something came to mind, condensed milk.  The label for condensed milk from the New York Condensed Milk Co. has ice cream directions right on it.  These are very simple as you can see.  We did some online looking and decided to substitute water for milk.  Mixing 1 can of condensed milk with four cups of whole milk along with flavoring ingredients.  This would make it much easier to make the ice cream and would allow for much faster freezing since we would not be dealing with a warm mixture.  Huzzah for “modern” conveniences!  

The first flavor was an easy choice as there are multiple mature mulberry trees around the property.  Saturday late morning an expedition went out to fill a bowl with the ripe sweet purple staining berries.  Those were then washed, sorted and then smashed in some cheesecloth with a bit of sugar.  The can of condensed milk, three cups of milk, and one cup of cream was added to the freezer.  Yes, we changed the ingredients on the fly since we had cream and decided this would make a creamer and richer ice cream.  Then the sweetened mulberry juice was poured in and the crank turning began.  About 20-30 minutes later the purple ice cream was scooped into bowls as a success. 

Later in the day we choose to make one more batch since we the ingredients.  This time a receipt in The Young Housekeeper’s friend inspired us.  It read to take the juice of a dozen lemons and pour over enough sugar to absorb it and then add to three quarts of cream to make a “a rich ice-cream”.  We just about had the lemons squeezed when it hit me that it said “three quarts of cream”, that is a lot of cream!  In our heads I think we were thinking one quart.  We also realized how much lemon juice and sugar this was!  Here is why I say this inspired us!  We took the dozen lemons worth of juice and added enough sugar to make it a syrup texture.  Sorry, I didn’t measure and just poured it in till it tasted good to us.  We didn’t have that much cream so we did three cups of that with one cup of milk.  Put it all in the freezer to crank away.  The time came that it was a bright white frozen mass scooped into some bowls.  We all agreed this was one of the most refreshing ice creams we have ever had!  It was creamy, tart with some sweetness that instantly put a smile on our faces.  It turned out and is on the list to do again one day in the future!

While our ice cream freezer is not completely correct for the period we had a great time experimenting with this food in our history.  Without that compromise we would have missed out on some satisfying and guilt pleasure experimental archeology.  In that we adjusted things with what we had in ingredients compared to the receipts.  No doubt, in my mind, like they would have been doing as well.  This experience also taught us once again, like so many other things, that nothing was quick and easy back then.  Even making ice cream with then modern conveniences of an “artificial freezer” and condensed milk there would still be considerable time and labor invested.  This includes gathering the ingredients, preparing ingredients, breaking down an ice block, turning and freezing the mixture, and then the clean up.  In both of our cases it all seemed worth it!