Cooking with Tom

Ice Cream

There's nothing like ice cream on a bright summer day, and there's no ice cream like homemade ice cream! So creamy, so luscious, no premium ice cream from the supermarket can possibly compare.

Making ice cream is very easy. You prepare the mix - often as easy as pouring together a few ingredients and stirring in a little sugar or sweetener - place it in the ice cream machine, and wait until it is frozen. Some ice cream machines use ice and salt to chill the mix to ice cream, others use a special bowl insert which you place in your freezer until it is frozen solid. Machines which use ice and salt offer the advantage that as soon as you have completed a batch, you can clean the machine and immediately make another batch of a different flavor. In contrast, machines which use a frozen bowl insert require a separate insert for each batch you wish to make at once, but are easier and neater to use because you don't have to have ice and salt.

To make ice cream, you need ingredients for your ice cream recipe, an ice cream machine, and (if appropriate) ice and salt.

Recipes

While packaged mixes for "homemade" ice cream are sold, I believe you'll be happier if you use fresh ingredients to make your own mix.

Machines

I personally prefer a machine that uses ice and salt over one that uses a frozen bowl insert, but that's entirely a matter of preference. Both sorts of machines work very well.

Some machines have a bowl which sits on top of the motor, and have an opening at the top through which you may add ingredients such as a swirled-in syrup or chocolate chips as the ice cream is finished freezing. This is a nice convenience. (Remember to chill the syrup or freeze the chips so they won't melt their way down through the ice cream when added.)

This small Cuisinart ice cream machine is extremely popular and works very well. I gave this machine to a friend. It uses a frozen bowl insert and has an opening at the top to add ingredents.
 Here is an extra bowl insert for the Cuisinart ice cream machine which will allow you to make another flavor before the first insert (which comes with the machine) is cleaned and re-frozen.
 Here's another model with two small bowls so you can make two flavors at once.
 And of course, you can have the small Cuisinart machine in red.
This is a 4 quart machine, which is a good medium size. It uses ice cubes and salt. Being made of plastic, it's light and easily carried to a friend's party.
 At 6 quarts, this machine easily makes enough ice cream for a good size party. Imagine how delighted all your guests will be when you serve them rich creamy homemade ice cream. Again, this machine uses ice and salt.
 For the staunch traditionalist, here's a lovely 6 quart machine with wooden tub for the ice and salt.
 I have this soft serve ice cream machine.
This professional style machine doesn't require any ice or a frozen bowl insert. It has a built in freezer! Imagine the convenience of being able to make ice cream at any time without having to prepare for the freezing!

Salt

If you use a machine which requires ice and salt, the way it works is that you layer generous quantities of ice with liberal amounts of salt in the bucket around the rotating canister of ice cream mix once the machine is already started. The salt helps the ice to melt, and the melting of the ice draws out the warmth of the mix, thus freezing it into ice cream. Common table salt doesn't work too well. You can use rock salt, or I find kosher salt also works pretty well. Don't worry about the flavor of the salt - it's not supposed to get mixed into the ice cream at any point anyway.