I remember making fresh banana ice cream with my grandparents when I was a little kid, so, after seeing many raves about ice cream makers on an online group, I decided to take the plunge and buy one. I figured my girls would enjoy it, making my own ice cream followed my new rule of no artificial colors, flavors or sweetners in our food, and, heck who doesn't like ice cream?
I went to Bed Bath and Beyond-20% off one item coupon and I had a $25 gift card I had received as a gift from my daughter's Daisy Scout troop for being cookie mom-hopefully the cookies don't mind me cheating on them, so the $49.99 machine wound up costing me about $18 after tax. I got the Cuisinart ICE-21.
I unpackaged the unit and washed the freezer bowl per directions. DRY it very well. Popped it in the freezer for preparation for today.
This morning I went and got the ingredients for David Lebovitz's Strawberry Sour Cream Ice Cream. I had heard his book is the bible to making ice cream and strawberries are plentiful in California now-and cheap.
I soak the strawberries in sugar and try to chase off my daughters who are hovering over them like vultures. I allow them one slice each. Once those were set, I added those and the milk/cream(I did 1/2 and 1/2) and the lemon juice to my Blendtec blender, pulsed a few times and then poured into a container for the fridge.
Then came time for ice cream making. Went to get the bowl out of the freezer I have in my garage. Oh my goodness does that thing get COLD! By the time I got into my kitchen, my fingers were numb and I was doing the "This is so cold, how can I hold it without my fingers freezing off?" dance. Put the bowl on the machine, put the cover on, turned on the machine, poured the ice cream mixture into the bowl. Ummm-OOPS! Forgot the paddle! Dumped the ice cream mixture out, stuffed the paddle in the bowl, turned on machine, repoured mixture. It is now mixing.
The sound the machine makes is that of a can opener-that keeps opening cans for 20 minutes. Would be annoying if you were watching TV in a room nearby, but I was upstairs with the girls, so not a bother at all.
The 20 minutes came and went and I went downstairs to check on progress. Obviously ice cream at this point, though soft serve. Took off the lid, pulled out the paddle. I used a rubber spatula in an attempt to get every last bit off of the paddle as to not waste any strawberry goodness, but wound up resorting to the old tongue on utensil trick. Only issue was the paddle is wider than a typical beater or spoon, so my hair got some ice cream in it. I just licked that off, too.
Getting the ice cream into the storage container wasn't the easiest thing in the world. The bowl is a bit heavy and there is no good way to hold it. No spout, so you have to control where the ice cream flows-thankfully the container I had was rather wide, though shallow, so it all worked out in the end.
I had good intentions of waiting the suggested 2+ hours to allow it to harden, but it was dinner time. We ate dinner and had soft serve instead. A true STRAWBERRY ice cream. Strong strawberry flavor. I suppose had I used all cream it would have been slightly creamier, but it was nice as is for soft serve. I'll have to update on the verdict for when it hardens up.
So my goal for all of this: Making a new ice cream/yogurt/sorbet/gelato each week for a year. I may use recipes I find online and I'll definately get creative and try things out on my own. Hopefully I come across some gems in the process.
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