Mom has made ice cream since I can remember. A few days ago we were browsing an edition of Family Letters from 1984-1988, and there were a couple of discussions about the ice cream of the past. Back in those days, Mom experimented with different flavors and kinds of ice cream. Of particular note in the letters were "Malt Ball" and a perfect raspberry sherbet. I have heard Mom lament many times since that she can't make her raspberry sherbet anymore because nobody sells 100% raspberry juice. I regret that I was too young then to remember now the perfect flavor of that sherbet. I do remember her making sherbet and ice cream, though. I loved ice cream days. I liked scooping the remnant ice cream off of the dasher. When I think of that process, the flavor-memory is unique because sometimes a bit of rock salt would get in my spoon, too.
Anyway, some years ago, Mom got a smaller ice cream maker, so she can make a batch of ice cream just the right size for one meal's dessert, with perhaps a little leftover. Also some years ago, she inherited a couple of her Aunt Carol's cookbooks. In one of these she found a recipe for ice cream that has now (with adaptation) become her standard, and it is very creamy and delicious and good. The cookbook in question is The Victory Binding of the American Woman's Cook Book: Wartime Edition, edited by Ruth Berolzheimer, which I imagine had a much simpler title in more peaceful times. This old blue cooktome, whose first page is a large portrait of General Douglas MacArthur, is a lot of fun to browse. Some of the recipes seem hopelessly outdated, and it's easy to dwell on how much tastes seem to have changed. But it's recipes like this one, which I am only calling "Victory" ice cream for fun, which make me realize that things haven't changed that much. Whoever made the recipe sure knew what yummy meant, even back then.
Mommy's Victory Ice Cream
2 T flour
3/4 c sugar
1 c 1% milk
2 egg yolks
1 c half & half
1 c heavy cream
1 t vanilla OR 2 t lemon extract
Stir flour in with sugar. Blend yolks with milk thoroughly with a handheld blender. Mix yolk/milk mixture with flour/sugar. Stir in half & half. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, till it reaches a boil/is thickened. Remove from heat and add the cream and flavoring of choice. Cool and freeze.
2 comments:
Mom now prefers the flavor profile of an ice cream made with arrowroot rather than flour; she describes it as "cleaner." Substitute directly, 1:1.
Arrowroot thickens at a lower temperature, so maybe the egg doesn't overc
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