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Ice Cream Without a Freezer

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,301 recipes. Both carry 2-nonanone, which smells fruity, floral. The science ↓

Ice Cream Without a Freezer

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Make a custard with the ingredients for Custard Ice Cream.

  2. Add the beaten egg whites, cream, and vanilla just before freezing.

  3. Chill the mixture and pour it into a pail with a tightly-fitting cover.

  4. Place the pail on a flat block of ice 2 inches thick at the bottom.

  5. Pack in pounded ice and salt in a ratio of 2 parts ice to 1 part salt.

  6. Beat the cream in the freezer for 5 minutes.

  7. Cover with a lid and thick cloths, then turn steadily until water rises.

  8. Uncover, scrape the cream from the bottom and sides, and beat until smooth and half-frozen.

  9. Cover, drain off the brine, refill with ice and salt, and repeat the process.

  10. Continue until the cream is fully frozen.

  11. Ensure the cream is higher in the center than at the sides before final covering.

  12. Cover with ice, salt, and an old thick blanket, and leave for several hours, replenishing ice and salt as needed.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cream + vanillatop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  2. Egg + vanillatop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together27,347 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,301 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the vanilla

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, egg):

  1. Vanillathe original
  2. Raspberryfits about as well
  3. Strawberryfits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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