We now have two ice cream makers, and that is a wonderful thing.
You see, with our first, we could make only one quart at a time, which was fine for just the two of us. Now, though, there are three of us, and our third seems the type to eat far more than her share (when she is old enough). So, for his birthday, my husband was given a four-quart ice cream maker (from my parents–go figure!).
Our one-quart maker is a lazy man’s ice cream dream. You keep the bowl in the freezer until you’re ready to use it then assemble the three pieces, pour in the ingredients, plug it in, and you’re off! In the time it takes to eat an afternoon or evening meal with the basics of mealtime etiquette, the ice cream is essentially ready for dessert.
The new machine is a little more complicated. This one requires ice and salt, as do the old-fashioned styles. Thankfully, though, this one does not need any hand cranking! It plugs in, and a little motor does the cranking for us. We haven’t yet used it, but it sure will be nice to have more than just a couple bowls at a time, especially if we ever make ice cream when we have company. Only problem is that we have to be sure we have the salt. With a built-in ice maker in our freezer, we’re fine on that front, as long as we remember to stockpile a bit, in case the machine and salt melt the ice faster than the freezer can freeze it.
We also need to find some recipes for ice cream that doesn’t freeze solid in the freezer. The last couple we tried got pretty hard when we didn’t finish it the night we made it. One thing we did discover is that the heavier the cream, the creamier the ice cream and the less likely it is to freeze so solid. Good to know…. The sorbet we tried, for example, became a quart-container-shaped lemon ice cube. Sadly, we had made it with the last of our Splenda, too, and it sure tasted like it! I think that’s why so much of it ended up in the freezer.
So now, we’re set. With the pair of ice cream makers, we can stock our freezer with all the flavors that most appeal to us. We can make the more exotic recipes with the one-quart, just in case nobody really likes it. It will be a great test machine. Then, we can make the good old standbys that are sure to be good in the four-quart–recipes like the Frosty copycat that our neighbor down the hill used to make every Fourth of July for the neighborhood ice cream potluck we would have while we enjoyed the neighborhood kids’ collection of fire crackers.
We look forward to sharing this delight with our daughter, letting her help us mix up the recipe and watch the mixture freeze. It will be really nice to have someone else to keep track of the ice and the salt.
