Air In Ice Cream

Of all the ingredients that go into ice cream, air is arguably the most important. Air in ice cream - sounds crazy? Not at all. You just need to stop and think about it and you will realise why.

When I was a child (and it's not that long ago really!), ice cream was only available in one of two ways - from our weekly ice cream man in his ice cream truck or at the local grocery store where they was usually a freezer with a few rectangular cardboard boxed blocks of vanilla or raspberry ripple ice cream.

Then, suddenly, it all changed .... and soft serve ice cream was born - principally the result of adding more air into the manufacturing process. Amongst the pioneers in this field was no less than the now Baroness Margaret Thatcher. She was part of a research term in the UK who worked for a British ice cream manufacturer and whose job it was to improve the manufacturing process and make it more profitable. This they did by adding more air into it. Read more about on my Ice Cream & Political Passion blog post.

You might think that manufacturers might be tempted to put more and more air into their ice cream to make even bigger profits of course - but you would be wrong. First of all, most countries have legislation governing the maximum percentage of air allowed in ice cream - usually accepted as 50%. Secondly, the texture and taste would be so poor that people simply would not buy it. Without a doubt, the best quality ice cream in my opinion has the least air in it at about 20%. When you make your own homemade ice cream you can experiment with how much air you put into it - whether you do the mixing by hand or just control the churning time in your ice cream maker. Try and see. You'll be amazed how the volume of air makes a difference!

Hairdressing, ICT & Ice Cream

Like most people I have to get my hair cut once in a while and this week I paid one of my regular visits to see Naomi who cuts my hair for me. She's been cutting it for a couple of years now I suppose and she's very good. She's always friendly and we usually enjoy a good chat. The other day was no exception. She was explaining how the salon had just changed its range of hair colorants and how she is getting used to using them. Apparently, it's all done by numbers and she has to try and match a client's color from the previous range to the new one. We agreed it's a bit like a recipe, having to get the right balance of ingredients so that the end result is just right. That was it ... we only had to mention the word 'recipe' and I started talking about ice cream!

After that we indulged in discussing our favorite ice cream flavors. It was the end of Naomi's working day and I was the last client there so I felt at ease developing the conversation. Katie, who had just washed my hair, then joined in the discussion. We all agreed we love ice cream yet found out that it's for very different flavors.

• Naomi enjoys raspberry ripple ice cream.


• Katie prefers strawberry or mint choc chip ice cream.


• I of course like just about all of them but would have to admit to preferring good old fashioned vanilla ice cream.
  

Same thing happened when I was ordering a new handset for the office telephone system the next day. I rang Gary who had last helped me with our telephones 3 years ago. I half expected to hear that he had moved on as is so often the case with people these days. But no ... he was still there, much to my delight for Gary is a fantastic ICT (information and communications technology) field sales consultant, knowledgeable, efficient and courteous. In a matter of minutes he had sorted my problem and I said I would write about his efficiency on my ice cream blog, but only if he told me his favorite flavor. He had little hesitation in saying 'chocolate'.

Many people I've talked to over the years have told me they like chocolate ice cream. It's amazingly popular .... and it's not difficult to understand why. If you make it with a rich custard base and use real chocolate it's absolutely delicious!

So thank you Naomi, Katie and Gary for providing me with a greater insight into people's ice cream tastes. I find I can never guess what ice cream somebody is going to say they like so I enjoy finding out whenever the opportunity crops up. I wonder who's next ? :)

Ice Cream Ripple

Today of course commercial ice cream makers produce all manner of exotic flavors and combinations of ice cream to delight our palates. Yet many of us who enjoyed our childhood in the 60s remember with fondness the simple Raspberry Ripple Ice Cream when it first became available. I was reminiscing about this recently and decided to have a go at rippling my own homemade ice cream. It was great fun and not only tasted great but it made me feel like a child again!

There are 2 different ways you can do this and my web page ice cream rippling gives the details.

You also need to think about what sauce to ripple the ice cream with. Again, there's so many to choose from. After raspberry sauce (naturally!) my favorites are strawberry, toffee, chocolate and last but not least maple syrup. If you want to make your own sauce try my toffee sauce recipe (see bottom of web page link).

Don't forget, it's still National Ice Cream Month so there's no need to look for an excuse to make your own homemade ice cream - especially if you've never rippled before!