HOW FO FREEZE THEM

Use one part of coarse table salt to two parts of ice broken the size of a walnut. This should be firmly packed around the cream pail to the hight of the freezer. For three pints of cream, one and a half pints of water should be poured over the ice in the freezer, and for every additional quart of cream one pint of water should be added to the ice after packing. When there is no ice cream freezer convenient, ices may be frozen by putting the cream to be frozen in a tin pail with a close cover. This ice and salt for packing may be put in a larger pail - and packed firmly around the pail of cream to be frozen. Let this stand to chill for twenty or thirty minutes, then remove the cover and stir the freezing mixture within, until stiff ; then repack, cover the whole closely with a woolen cloth or carpet, and leave for an hour or two in a cool place.

For self-freezing ice cream, take one quart of rich milk, eight beaten eggs, three pints of rich, sweet cream, four cups of sugar, one vanilla bean broken in two and boiled in the custard, or five teaspoonfuls of Vanilla essence (lemon essence can be used, if preferred) ; heat the milk, pour it upon the eggs and sugar, cook (stirring steadily) fifteen minutes, or until it has thickened well ; when perfectly cold add the cream ; make the day before using and set on ice; early in the morning beat in the cream, and put all in an old-fashioned upright freezer, set in its pail ; put a block of ice within a stout sack, or between the folds of a piece of carpeting, and beat small with a hammer ; put a thick layer into the outer part, then one of rock salt ; fill the pail in this order, and before covering the freezer with ice beat the custard for five minutes with a fiat stick or ladle ; shut tightly; pack pounded ice and salt over it, and put a folded carpet over all ; in an hour and a half open the freezer, first wiping off the salt from about the top ; dislodge the frozen custard from the sides and bottom with a long knife, and beat and stir with your stick faithfully until the custard is a smooth paste ; replace the cover, let off the water, and pack more pounded ice and salt about it, completely concealing the freezer; put back the folded carpet; the cream will take care of itself for three hours and more, or you can, if you like, leave it all day, with a visit of three minutes every few hours, to let off the water and pack in more salt and ice. Do not open the freezer until you are ready for the cream. Then take it out, wipe it off, wrap a towel wrung out in hot water abo

ICES AND ICE CREAMS. 507

oftener than once in three hours ; but this seldom happens if the freezer be set in a cool cellar.

To make lemon ice cream, take one quart of cream, two lemons (the juice of one and the grated peel of one and a half) and two cups of sugar. Sweeten the cream, beat the lemon gradually into it, and put it at once mto the freezer. The freezer should be the best patent one you can procure, there being many to choose from, and all very nearly alike in merit. Freeze rapidly, or the acid will turn the milk. Use rock salt, not common salt. Orange ice cream may be made in the same way. For pineapple ice cream, take one quart of cream, one, large, ripe pine- apple, and one pound of powdered sugar. Slice the pineapple thin, and scatter the sugar between the slices; cover it, and let the fruit steep three hours. Then cut, or chop it up in the sugar, and strain it through a hair-sieve, or bag of double, coarse lace. Beat gradually into the cream, and freeze as rapidly as possible. Peach ice cream may be made in the same way, with two or three handfuls of freshly-cut bits of the fruit stirred in when the cream is half frozen.

For cocoanut cream, grate cocoanut and add to the sugar and cream just before freezing. Coffee ice cream should be thickened with arrowroot; the flavoring for almond cream should be prepared by pounding the kernels to a paste with rose-water, using arrowroot for thickening. The flavoring for chocolate cream is prepared by rubbing the chocolate smooth in a little milk.

The milk should never be heated for pineapple, strawberry or rasp- berry cream. For fruit ice creams, to every pint of fruit juice allow one pint of cream, sugar to taste. Mode — Let the fruit be well ripened ; pick off the stalks, put it into a large earthen pan ; stir it about with a wooden spoon, breaking it until it is well mashed ; then, with the back of the spoon rub through a hair sieve ; sweeten it nicely with pow- dered sugar ; whip the cream for a few minutes ; add to it the fruits, and whisk the whole again for another five minutes ; put the mixture in the freezing can and freeze.

Freeze the cream in rather a warm room — the more rapid the melt- ing of the ice, the quicker the cream freezes, always being careful that no water or salt gets into the freezer. Water ices are made from the juices of fruits, mixed with water, sweetened and frozen like cream. Be sure that in making them, they are well mixed before freezing, else the sugar will sink to the bottom, giving the mixture a sharp, unpleasant taste. The finest ices are made by making a syrup of the sugar and water, by boiling and skimming when necessary, and, when cold, adding the juice of the fruit.

The proper proportions are one pint of syrup to every pint of fruit juice. To extract the juice, select nice ripe fruit ; pick off the stalks and put it into a large earthen pan, with a little powdered sugar strewn

508 ^CES Ai\'D ICE CREAMS.

over ; stir it about with a wooden spoon until it is well broken, then rub it through a hair sieve. Make a syrup ; let it cool, add the fruit juice, mix well together, put the mixture into a freezing can and proceed as in making ice-cream.

Ices are usually served in glasses, but if molded, as they sometimes are for dessert, must have a small quantity of melted isinglass added to them to enable them to keep their shape.