Wayne Boatwright wrote:
> On Thu 08 Sep 2005 07:37:48p, wrote in rec.food.cooking:
>
> > Hi, I'm sure this topic has been addressed in one form or another on
> > the net. I've done some searching and found many threads about ice
> > cream.
>
> Yep, you're right. Ice cream has been discussed to death here, but then,
> so has everything else. :-) We just keep doing it.
>
> > The question I pose is pretty specific (in my mind) though. Does
> > anyone else remember the vanilla ice cream that little old ladies made
> > at church functions / social events? I can envision a certain taste, a
> > certain texture that I still long for to this day. It's been at least
> > 15 years since I had such an ice cream.
>
......... deleted stuff
> > I'm using a simple vanilla recipe from a Ben and Jerry's recipe book.
> > Heavy whipping cream, milk, vanilla, sugar, eggs. Very
> > straightforward, but it comes nowhere near the taste I'm looking for.
>
> A very good recipe, but most likely very wrong. It's highly doubtful that
> the ice cream you remember had any whipping cream in it, and very possibly
> no eggs. One reason was economics, as canned milk products were less
> expensive. Another is that many recipes including eggs required that they
> be cooked into a custard with milk - time consuming.
>
> More likely, those ice creams made for church socials were made with
> evaporated milk, regular whole milk, sugar, and vanilla. Also, very
> possibly, sweetened condensed milk. Remember, this wasn't gourmet ice
> cream, although it tasted pretty darned good to most folks.

Actually Wayne, I bet you are 180 degrees wrong. It's equally likely
that the church social ice cream was made with better ingredients than
he/she tried, because they were fresher. When my grandmother made ice
cream, she used fresh eggs (from her hens), and fresh milk and cream
(from her cows).

The only thing they used from cans were things they put into cans. And
cooking a custard was something done regularly, not thought of as
particularly onerous or time consuming. People used to expect to have
to take time cooking.

I suggest getting a hand cranked ice cream machine and continuing to
experiment. One thing that always gives me the "old timey" feel is the
slight taste of the rock salt in the finished product, as horrible as
that sounds.

Susan B.