Eggless Strawberry Ice-cream

I am usually surprised when someone shows no preference for strawberries over other fruits. My little girl loves fruits like papaya, banana and grapes and is not fond of strawberries. I just don't believe it, how mother and daughter can have such varying preferences... About the picture above, we found a huge strawberry in the box we purchased last month and I took this picture to show the size comparison. The strawberry was as big as the Fiji apple in length. This is the largest one I have seen.

Speaking of preferences, my daughter does love strawberry flavoured milk and ice-cream. So I decided to make this icecream for her one day. This has no eggs or gelatin and requires some simple ingredients.

Ingredients

Milk cream - 600 ml
Milk - 150 ml
Strawberry crush - 1 cup (I used Monin's)

Method

Heat the cream and milk until they come to a boil. Allow the milk and cream mix to cook down completely and then add the strawberry crush, using the hand mixer, blend the mixture well. The strawberry crush has sugar and so I did not add any sugar to this mixture.

Pour into freezer safe box and allow it to freeze for an hour. Take the box out and whip the ice-cream for about 3-4 minutes. You can see soft peaks form. Put the mix back in the freezer for an hour or so. Whip the ice-cream once again for 2-3 minutes. Allow to freeze for 4-5 hours and scoop and serve.

Verdict: Simple ingredients and extremely easy to prepare. The only time consuming part is the whipping of the ice-cream before it sets and forms icicles. If that happens, thaw the ice-cream about half-way and then whip it for 5 minutes or so until soft peaks form. Then whip every hour for a couple of more times before letting it set.

Vanilla Ice-cream

The summer heat is sweltering, even in Bangalore. Once upon a time there was no need for fans in houses in Bangalore. With rapid development of the software industry, and the volume of construction that went on in the city, fans became a must at homes. Now with high rise buildings and four-storey apartments being the norm of any locality, and the unthinking culling of trees in the city, air conditioners have become a must here. All this only adding to the power woes that the city already faces... Contrary to what most folks from hotter parts of the country think, summers are pretty bad here too. I have lived here for the last ten years and every year the summer temperature reaches an all time high, atleast two degrees up from the previous year and thus sets a record every time around.

The road side nimbu paani stalls and the mosambi juice stalls are a common sight now - on the ring road (which is supposedly a highway). Even at home ppl churn butter milk, make cucumber juice etc. to cope with the humidity and heat.

One weekend my daughter was desperate for ice-cream. I had none in the fridge and I remembered seeing some recipes for home made icecream in the blogosphere. I had plenty of whipping cream on hand and so I thought I should give it a shot. I browsed a lot of recipes and finally came up with the following, omitting the eggs and adapting to the ingredients I had on hand.

Ingredients:

Fresh Cream - 3 1/2 cups (I used Amul fresh cream)
Milk - 1 cup
Sugar - 3/4 cup
Vanilla Essence - 2 tsp

Method:

In a large saucepan, heat the cream, milk and sugar together and bring to a boil. Set it aside to cool down. Add the vanilla essence and stir well. Pour into freezer containers and store in the refrigerator. After about half an hour, pull out the container and using the hand mixer, whip up the icecream, until creamy and thick. Return to the refrigerator. Repeat the whipping for about 4-5 times every half an hour. After the last time, put it in the refrigerator and let it freeze for 4-5 hours. Viola! Rich, creamy icreceam is ready to be relished. Scoop and enjoy!

Verdict:
Although, I meant to beat the ice-cream before it froze completely, I skipped the first time for a few hours and I had to thaw it once more and then start beating it. It did not turn out as creamy as expected due to this reason. But if were to not let the ice-cream freeze completely before starting the whisking process, it would turn out very creamy.