This year we tried to resurrect an old family tradition. We decided to make homemade ice cream. We flew our mixer across the country, bought salt and all the ingredients, and ran into a wall. Where do you get crushed ice?
If you have tried to produce homemade ice cream with cubes you understand the problem. The distance between the container and the tub is not wide enough. The ice is constantly binding and stopping the rotation. It can be done but it adds a lot of work to the process.
I visited stores. I went on line. I talked to people. One place that sold dry ice told me the one source he knew about. I called. All they had was an answering machine. So I drove up. It was a half hour trip. When I got there I asked the guy if they had crushed ice. I was overjoyed when he said yes. I started with a 20 pound bag, dumped into my ice chest. It looked like cubes to me. Again I asked, “Crushed?” He said, “Yes.” He lied.
Fortunately the cubes were smaller than we get from our freezer. We made it work.
How can you celebrate when they don’t make crushed ice any more? Remember when you could go to a small building that dispensed ice and choose between block, cube and crushed? Progress seems to have limited our choices in ice as well as other areas. It seems to be going the same way as our second amendment rights, something we hear about but can’t seem to locate.
Maybe next year.
homo unius libri
After eating some slimy stuff a while back that called itself premium ice cream, my wife and I were talking about when our families used to make it. We both grew up on farms where the milk and cream flowed freely. Her family often used pure cream; ours used whole milk. It sure beats the guar gum and air that you pay for these days.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I must confess we used an electric mixer this year, I also think that one of the things that used to make it taste better was the work it took to crank it by hand. It is kind of like Chinese food tasting better with chop sticks.
DeleteGrace and peace.