A homemade ice cream journey comes full circle
Since it's hotter than hot fudge outside, I started thinking about chillin' with ice cream. Sure, I could jump in my car to get some and then considered making it at home. Ever made homemade ice cream? It's been 40 years since I made some. Here's my story.
One of our wedding gifts was a motorized ice cream maker that used ice, water, and salt around a motorized half-gallon canister with a blade inside that scraped the ice cream mixture off the sides over and over until it turned the mixture into ice cream.
Of course, I made chocolate ice cream; who wouldn't? It's been so long I've forgotten what recipe I used, but I do remember that my first batch was grainy and icy. I'd wanted smooth and creamy, like gelato.
My second try had similar results: less-than-delightful. End of homemade ice cream.
Flash forward to last week when I found an article on the epicurious.com website for 15 no-churn, ice cream recipes. No churning? Hmmm, that sounded interesting.
One of the recipes showed how to make ice cream in a Mason jar. I immediately thought, "This could be fun for kids to help make their own ice cream."
I placed a Mason jar in my freezer and headed-out for organic heavy whipping cream.
The Epicurious instructions were about as simple as they could be: add one cup of heavy whipping cream along with sugar, vanilla, and salt to the chilled jar, twist-on the top and shake for four to five minutes (that's where the kids come in). Freeze solid. Done. Substituting a natural, no-calorie sweetener would easily trim calories.
Turned out, getting the ice cream out of the jar and into a bowl was not kid-friendly. There's no way an ice cream scoop could extricate the rock-hard ice cream from a jar without risking breaking the glass. Waiting until the ice cream softened significantly made it easy to spoon it out.
There's good news, though. My vanilla ice cream, once softened, had a surprisingly decent texture (not like gelato, but OK) and a good, authentic vanilla flavor.
Mason jar out; stand mixer in. My stand mixer has always made excellent whipped cream and would give me control over when the whipped cream held soft peaks, without turning the cream into butter.
Ditching the Mason jar, I prepared my metal, 9-by-5-inch loaf pan; thinking I could quickly and less dangerously scoop my fresh ice cream. Lining my pan's bottom and sides with a single piece of plastic wrap made it easy to lift out and another piece to cover the top would keep my ice cream from getting icy.
My mixer made the perfect, soft-peaked whipped cream. Transferring the whipped cream to the loaf pan was a breeze. Off to the freezer, it went.
To make sure it was frozen solid, I waited until the next day to try this batch. Letting the pan sit on my kitchen counter allowed it to soften just enough. Instead of using a scoop, I cut my ice cream into slices; adding some fresh sliced peaches and strawberries.
A single serving delivered just a little over 200 calories, and it was sugar-free; perfect for anyone following a keto food plan.
Your kids will probably be relieved that don't have to shake a jar to make ice cream and will be pleased with the results. Now they'll know how ice cream's made. Give it a try.
• Don Mauer welcomes questions, comments and recipe makeover requests. Write to him at don@ theleanwizard.com.