What Librarians Eat! Issue 8: August 2013

What Librarians Eat! I S S U E

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A U G U S T

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INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Ice Cream

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5 Ways to Make Ice Cream

Welcome

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Tips for Making Ice Cream

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Fruity Homemade Ice Cream

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Benefits for Eating Ice Cream

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Food from around the worlds: Italy

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Banana Split

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Ask Us Something

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August is here and Summer is in full swing. Last month we showed you how to make a chocolate Nutella Ice cream ,so this month, it’s all about Ice cream. What can you do with it and how to make your own!

Ice cream is more than just a cold refreshing dessert or snack. It can have depth of flavour and can be mixed with other things to create awesome recipes.

Tell us which is your favourite ice cream or send us your own recipes so that we can feature them in the next issue.

We hope you enjoy this month’s issue and if you want to catch up on previous issues then check them out on www.issuu.com. where you can view them online and share them with family and friends.

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I scream for Ice cream

Ice cream is a frozen dessert usually made from dairy products, such as milk and cream and often combined with fruits or other ingredients and flavours. Most varieties contain sugar, although some are made with other sweeteners. In some cases, artificial flavourings and colourings are used in addition to, or instead of, the natural ingredients. The mixture of chosen ingredients is stirred slowly while cooling, in order to incorporate air and to prevent large ice crystals from forming. The result is a smoothly textured semi-solid foam that is malleable and can be scooped.

The meaning of the phrase "ice cream" varies from one country to another. Phrases such as "frozen custard", "frozen yogurt", "sorbet", "gelato" and others are used to distinguish different varieties and styles. In some countries, such as the United States, the phrase "ice cream" applies only to a specific variety, and most governments regulate the commercial use of the various terms according to the relative quantities of the main ingredients. In other countries, such as Italy and Argentina, one word is used for all variants. Analogues made from dairy alternatives, such as goat's or sheep's milk, or milk substitutes, are available for those who are lactose intolerant, allergic to dairy protein, or vegan. The most popular flavours of ice cream are vanilla and chocolate.

In the Persian Empire, people would pour grape-juice concentrate over snow, in a bowl, and eat this as a treat. This was done primarily when the weather was hot, using snow saved in the cool-keeping underground chambers known as "yakhchal", or taken from snowfall that remained at the top of mountains by the summer capital, Hagmatana, Ecbatana or Hamedan of today. In 400 BC, the Persians went further and invented a special chilled food, made of rose water and vermicelli, which was served to royalty during summers. The ice was mixed with saffron, fruits, and various other flavours.

Ancient civilizations have served ice for cold foods for thousands of years. The BBC reports that a frozen mixture of milk and rice was used in China around 200 BC. The Roman Emperor Nero (37–68) had ice brought from the mountains and combined it with fruit toppings. These were some early chilled delicacies.

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Arabs were perhaps the first to use milk as a major ingredient in the production of ice cream. They sweetened it with sugar rather than fruit juices, and perfected means of commercial production.

As early as the 10th century, ice cream was widespread among many of the Arab world's major cities, including Baghdad, Damascus, and Cairo. It was produced from milk or cream, often with some yogurt, and was flavoured with rosewater, dried fruits and nuts. It is believed that the recipe was based on older Ancient Arabian recipes, which were, it is presumed, the first and precursors to Persian faloodeh.

Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat asserts, in her History of Food, that "the Chinese may be credited with inventing a device to make sorbets and ice cream. They poured a mixture of snow and saltpetre over the exteriors of containers filled with syrup, for, in the same way as salt raises the boiling-point of water, it lowers the freezing-point to below zero. It has also been claimed that, in the Yuan Dynasty, Kublai Khan enjoyed ice cream and kept it a royal secret until Marco Polo visited China and took the technique of making ice cream to Italy.

In the sixteenth century, the Mughal emperors used relays of horsemen to bring ice from the Hindu Kush to Delhi, where it was used in fruit sorbets.

When Italian duchess Catherine de' Medici married the Duke of Orléans (Henry II of France) in 1533, she is said to have brought with her to France some Italian chefs who had recipes for flavoured ices or sorbets. One hundred years later, Charles I of England was, it was reported, so impressed by the "frozen snow" that he offered his own ice cream maker a lifetime pension in return for keeping the formula secret, so that ice cream could be a royal prerogative. There is no historical evidence to support these legends, which first appeared during the 19th century.

The first recipe in French for flavoured ices appears in 1674, in Nicholas Lemery’s Recueil de curiositéz rares et nouvelles de plus admirables effets de la nature. Recipes for sorbetti saw publication in the 1694 edition of Antonio Latini's Lo Scalco alla Moderna (The Modern Steward). Recipes for flavoured ices begin to appear in François Massialot's Nouvelle Instruction pour les Confitures, les Liqueurs, et les Fruits, starting with the 1692 edition.

Massialot's recipes result in a coarse, pebbly texture.

As you can see Ice-cream has a long history and it’s texture changed considerably through the ages. We can rest assured that it will still be a big part of our culture especially during the hot summer months.

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5 Way s To Mak e Ic e Cre am Ice cream is not hard to make, you just need to make it the right way. Here we have 5 simple ways how to make your own Ice cream really easy. First, here is a list of ingredients to make a simple flavoured ice cream.

Ingredients 1 cup of milk 1 tablespoon sugar ½ teaspoon vanilla extract (Alternate flavour: if you want chocolate ice cream, add 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder) 4-6 tablespoons salt 2 trays of ice cubes Small amount of butter 5 teaspoons flavoured syrup Now here are 5 simple methods how to prepare your Ice cream.

Freezer Bag Method 1. This is good for making individual servings of ice cream to be eaten promptly after making.

Pour in the milk, sugar, and flavouring in a quart-size bag.

2. Take roughly two quarts of ice, crushed if possible, and place it into the gallon-sized bag with rock salt (also known as coarse salt). Ideally, the gallon bag will be roughly half full with the ice and salt mixture.

3. Place the sealed quart-sized bag with the ingredients into the gallon-sized bag. Make sure the bags stay sealed. Do not allow the contents to mix at any time. If the bags don't seal sufficiently, seal the top of both bags to ensure they don't open during shaking.

4. Gently agitate, massage, and shake the bags for about fifteen to twenty minutes. In this amount of time the contents of the quart bag should start to turn into solid ice cream. It is important that you are mixing the contents of the inner bag, but you don’t want to be so aggressive that you burst the inner bag or cut it on the ice. Double-bagging should prevent this. If your hands get uncomfortably cold, use a towel or an old T-shirt to hold the bags as you massage them; the bags will be quite cold and might become slippery with accumulated condensation. Consider using gloves or massaging while holding onto the top seal if a towel or similar cloth is not available.

5. Remove the finished ice cream from the sandwich bag and serve.

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Pot-Freezer Method 1. This is how ice cream was typically made before modern refrigeration, using ice cut from lakes and ponds.

Hand-cranked ice cream machines are a variation of the sorbetière (a covered pail with a handle attached to the lid) which is a French adaptation of the pot-freezer method.

2. Put the ice cream ingredients in a bowl.

3. Put the bowl in a tub filled with ice and salt. Make sure the ice and salt mixture doesn't spill over the edges or into the bowl.

4. Mix the ingredients of the bowl vigorously. The salty ice water will absorb heat from the mixture, bringing it below the freezing point of water and turning the mixture into ice cream. [1] It's important to mix as thoroughly as you can to prevent the formation of ice crystals. If you can, use a whisk or better yet, a hand-held mixer.

5. Remove ice cream from the bowl and serve.

Freezer Method 1. This method works best with a custard-based recipe that incorporates eggs, because the result will be much smoother. Since it involves a good bit of waiting, however, it may not be the most immediately gratifying for kids.

2. Pour the ice cream mixture into a deep baking dish, or bowl made of plastic, stainless steel or something durable in the freezer.

3. Put it in the freezer for 30 minutes.

4. Check the mixture. When it starts to freeze at the edges, take it out and stir it vigorously with a spatula until all of the ice crystals are broken up. If you can, use a whisk or a hand-held mixer.

5. Check and stir every 30 minutes until the mixture turns into ice cream. This might take 2-3 hours.

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Coffee Can Method 1. This is very similar to the bag method, except instead of using two bags, you use two coffee cans, one bigger than the other.

2. Put the ice cream mixture in the smaller coffee can. Seal tightly.

3. Put the smaller coffee can in the big coffee can along with ice and rock salt. Seal the large can tightly.

4. Shake the large can vigorously for about 10 minutes. Kids can roll or throw it around, but make sure the cans are sealed well. Do this step outside, just in case. Check the smaller coffee can to see if the mixture has turned into ice cream yet. If you see ice crystals forming, stir or whisk the mixture.

5. Continue shaking, rolling, or throwing until ice cream is formed.

Ball Method This can only be done with a commercial product that mixes ice cream within a specially made ball with two chambers.

Fill the ice end with ice and 1/2 cup of rock salt (3/4 cup if using the larger size ball) and close by hand.

Standard ice cubes may not fit. You might need crushed ice.

You'll probably need at least 10 ice trays' worth of ice.

Pour the ice cream mixture into the end with a metal cylinder. Leave an inch (2.5cm) at the top for expansion and close by hand.

Shake, roll, and pass the ball around for 10-15 minutes. The ball will probably be heavier than you expect.

Open the ice cream end with the plastic wrench that comes with the ball. Scrape the sides of the cylinder with a plastic or wooden spoon (metal will damage the cylinder). Close the lid by hand.

Since the chamber is narrow and deep, stirring the ice cream might be difficult. If necessary, use the wooden handle of a spoon or spatula.

Check the ice end. Open the lid with the plastic wrench. Pour out any water and add more ice and up to 1/3 cup of rock salt. Close the lid by hand.

Shake, roll, and pass the ball around for 5–10 minutes.

Check the ice cream. Repeat the above steps as needed, or eat the ice cream as is.

When you pour the ice cream out, be careful that it doesn't spill into the raised decorative ledges and tight crevices; these may be very difficult to clean later on, especially if you use chocolate chips.

The ice cream tends to be "soupy" in the middle and solid along the edges.

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Tips for making Ice Cream Flavour combinations are almost limitless. Chocolate syrup is a basic option. Don’t be afraid to add your favourite fruits or nuts! Various flavour extracts that are available in your grocery store's baking section can lead to more exotic variations. Try combining mint extract with chocolate, or adding small chocolate chips.

If you use blueberries, crush them first. Whole blueberries will become little rocks rather than mixing nicely with the ice cream.

If you prefer a lower calorie ice cream that is not as rich, use artificial sweetener instead of sugar. You can also experiment with other types of milk.

For large groups, mix several quarts of ice cream mix and divide it into bags, rather than having each individual child mix their own (that gets messy).

If you can, use larger salt crystals (e.g. rock salt). Larger salt crystals take more time to dissolve in the water around the ice, which allows for even cooling of the ice cream.

Make sure the ice and salt aren't together; it it can burn your hand!

When you use the mixer that has the removable canister, put the canister in the freezer overnight. Then put it straight into the mixer, and the mix into the canister while it is still very cold. This cuts down on ice crystals, and produces a smoother ice cream.

Make sure you have gloves or protective gear on while whisking or throwing the mixture.

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Fruity Homemade Ice Cream This recipe is the perfect homemade low fat, low sugar ice cream which only takes 45 second to make. This is also one of Jamie Oliver’s Favourite!

Ingredients

500g frozen strawberries 500g yoghurt 1 nice tbsp of honey If using fresh strawberries you are going to need some crushed ice or if you are not going to serve it right away you have to let it set in a freezer for about 3 hours.

Optional and only for adults, you can also add a dash of your favourite liquor in the mix to give it that extra kick.

Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.

Serve immediately or freeze.

Can be served in cones, cups, with grated or shaved chocolate, or placed between some fruits for a quick dessert.

Ideal for Lunch

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In this month’s issue we will try to convince to have ice cream for lunch. Since you can’t really prepare an ice cream based lunch recipe we have found a list of benefits for eating ice cream. We obviously do not mean having ice cream for lunch everyday, but every once in a while, it might even change your mood for the better.

Benefits for eating Ice Cream 1. Strengthen your bones

Ice cream is made largely from milk. Milk contains a lot of calcium whose function is to strengthen our bones.

Calcium is a very important mineral for the body.

2. Loose weight with ice cream

Yes, you heard right. When you eat an ice cream, it causes your body temperature to drop and to fight that drop in temperature, your body has to burn calories. Pretty nice huh!

3. Heal your body

Ice cream has the benefit of containing protein which is an important ingredient for healing and building muscles.

4. De-stress

Ice-cream stimulates the production of thrombotonin (the happiness hormone) in the body which makes us happy and helps to remove stress.

5. Low fat levels

Many of people are afraid to eat ice creams when they think of the fat that it might contain. However, it is important to note that the fat comes the milk that is used. It is therefore wrong to think that ice cream contain excessively high levels of fat.

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FOOD FROM AROUND THE WORLD: ITALY

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This month is a special month because we are focusing on ice creams, and, to our knowledge, one of the best countries for ice creams is Italy. Here is some knowledge about their Ice creams and let us not forget their granite.

Gelato Gelato is the Italian word for ice cream, derived from the Latin word "gelÄ tus." (meaning frozen). Gelato is made with milk, cream, various sugars, and flavouring such as fresh fruit and nut purees.

Gelato is defined in English as a soft ice cream containing little or no air. The sugar content in homemade gelato, as in traditional ice cream, is balanced with the water content to act as an anti-freeze to prevent it from freezing solid. Types of sugar used include sucrose, dextrose, and inverted sugar to control apparent sweetness. Typically, gelato like any other ice cream needs a stabilizing base. Egg yolks are used in yellow custard-based gelato flavours, including zabaione and crème caramel, and non-fat milk solids are also added to gelato to stabilize the base. Starches and gums, especially corn starch, are sometimes also used to thicken and stabilize the mix.

By statute, gelato in Italy must have at least 3.5% butterfat, with no upper limit established.

History The history of gelato dates back to frozen desserts in Sicily, ancient Rome and Egypt made from snow and ice brought down from mountaintops and preserved below ground.

Later, frozen desserts appeared during banquets at the Medici court in Florence. In fact, the Florentine architect Bernardo Buontalenti is said to have invented modern ice cream in 1565, as he presented his recipe and his innovative refrigerating techniques to Catherine de' Medici.

She in turn brought the novelty to France, where in 1686 the Sicilian fisherman Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli perfected the first ice cream machine. The popularity of gelato among larger shares of the population, however, only increased in the 1920s–1930s in the northern Italian city of Varese, where the first gelato cart was developed. Italy is the only country where the market share of handmade gelato versus industrial one is over 55%. Currently, over 5,000 Italian gelaterie, or gelato shops, all over the world occupy more than 15,000 gelatai, or gelato vendors.

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FOOD FROM AROUND THE WORLD: ITALY

Italian Granita Granita (in Italian also granita siciliana) is a semi-frozen dessert made from sugar, water and various flavourings. Originally from Sicily, although available all over Italy (but granita in Sicily is somewhat different from the rest of Italy), it is related to sorbet and Italian ice. However, in most of Sicily, it has a coarser, more crystalline texture. Food writer Jeffrey Steingarten says that "the desired texture seems to vary from city to city" on the island; on the west coast and in Palermo, it is at its chunkiest, and in the east it is nearly as smooth as sorbet.

This is largely the result of different freezing techniques: the smoother types are produced in a gelato machine, while the coarser varieties are frozen with only occasional agitation, then scraped or shaved to produce separated crystals.

Although its texture varies from coarse to smooth, it is always different from the one of an ice cream which is creamier, and from the one of a sorbet, which is more compact; this makes granita distinct and unique.

Common and traditional flavouring ingredients include lemon juice, mandarin oranges, jasmine, coffee, almonds, mint, and when in season wild strawberries and black mulberries. Chocolate granitas have a tradition in the city of Catania and, according to Steingarten, nowhere else in Sicily. The nuances of the Sicilian ingredients are important to the flavour of the finished granita: Sicilian lemons are a less acidic, more floral variety similar to Meyer lemons, while the almonds used contain some number of bitter almonds, crucial to the signature almond flavour.

Granita with coffee is very common in the city of Messina, while granita with almonds is popular in the city of Catania. Granita in combination with a yeast pastry called brioche is a common breakfast in summer time. (The Sicilian brioche is generally flatter and wider than the French version.)

Granita is often found served as a slush-type drink rather than a dessert, in a paper or plastic cup with a plastic lid and a straw (often a spoon straw).

Granita, made with savoury ingredients or less sugar than the dessert, is often served between courses of a meal as a palate cleanser.

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Classic Banana Split There is some debate about what the "traditional" split consists of. This seems to be the most consistently "traditional" split served, even though some have marshmallow, peanuts, crushed cherries and more. We prefer hot fudge over the chocolate syrup.

Ingredients:

1 scoop vanilla ice cream 1 scoop chocolate ice cream 1 scoop strawberry ice cream

Line up ice cream scoops next to each other in an oval deep dish or a banana boat.

Cut the ends of the banana off (about 1/4 inch) while still in the peel.

Slice in half long ways.

1 large ripe banana 2 tablespoons chocolate syrup (or Hot Fudge) 2 tablespoons strawberry ice cream topping (or fresh strawberries) 2 tablespoons crushed pineapple 2 tablespoons walnuts as topping whipped cream cherries

Pop each half of the banana out of the peel onto each side of the ice cream row, pressing down and in a little so it'll stay put.

Top the vanilla ice cream with the pineapple, the chocolate with the chocolate syrup and the strawberry with the strawberry sauce.

Spoon the wet walnuts over all three scoops of ice cream.

Top each scoop with some whipped cream and a cherry for each.

“Ask Us Something!”

A Special way to eat ice cream is in a cone but sometimes an ice cream is so great that you feel the cone holding it should also be tasty. Here we figured up some ways on how to turn the boring wafer cone into something magical.

Using simple ideas you can create amazing textures and flavour to go with your ice cream.

For example melting some chocolate and dipping the top half of the cone in it. Then let it set in the fridge so that when the time for ice cream comes you have your chocolate coated cone ready.

An other extra bit would be to sprinkle some colourful toppings to set with the chocolate.

One can also add fruit or other goodies in the cone so while eating the ice cream some of it melts and everything gets mixed up in a tasteful explosion of the senses.

What do you think about our ideas?

Do you like them? Do you have your own? Tell us!

“Forget art. Put your trust in ice cream.” ― Charles Baxter, The Feast of Love