Ice Cream

Elise,

The summer project was Ice Cream.

But wait, the summer’s not over and there are weeks left for ice cream eating!

Yes, but I’m home, the ice cream maker remained in Idaho and you’ll be back in Seattle soon where it is probably not all that warm, summer or not.

We perfected one. Vanilla. It took two trials and one bold move.

I started with David Lebovitz’s  vanilla. That seems to be where everyone starts, but then they all also finish there. His recipe calls for a cup of milk, 2 cups of cream, 6 egg yolks, ¾ cup sugar, a vanilla bean and some vanilla extract. This made crème anglais ice cream. The consensus was too sweet.  I thought too custardy and yellow as well as too sweet. It might do for some things, to accompany a steamed pudding perhaps, but not for vanilla ice cream.

So on to the second trial where you played your part and we made a bold move. I thought we should make an incremental change, drop the sugar to 2/3 of a cup and see how that was. You said half a cup. You were firm. Mom backed you up.

I made the recipe again using 1/2 cup of sugar and only 4 egg yolks.  Also, because I didn’t check the milk supply before hand, I used ½ cup milk, ½ cup half and half and 2 cups of cream.

It was perfect. Just like that. Wonderful cream and vanilla flavors, creamy texture, splendid. Just like that.

Next summer—Chocolate!