YIELD: About 6 cups (exact volume may vary markedly with different ice cream–maker models)
1 large vanilla bean, preferably Mexican
1 cup whole milk, preferably nonultrapasteurized and unhomogenized
2 cups light cream or rich half-and-half, preferably nonultrapasteurized and unhomogenized
1 cup heavy cream, preferably nonultrapasteurized and unhomogenized
2 large eggs, or 4 egg yolks
⅔ to ¾ cup sugar (I prefer the smaller amount)
A pinch of salt
½ to ¾ teaspoon pure vanilla extract, preferably Mexican (optional)
If necessary, put the bowl of your ice cream maker in the freezer to chill in advance.
Slit the vanilla bean lengthwise with a small, sharp knife and scrape the seeds into a small, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Pour in the milk and cream, add the halved bean, and slowly heat to just under a boil.
Whisk together the eggs or egg yolks, sugar, and salt. Slowly pour the hot cream and vanilla bean into the whisked eggs, stirring with a wooden spoon. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook over medium-low heat, stirring gently. As the mixture starts to thicken, stir more rapidly, being sure to scrape the custard from the entire pan bottom. When the pan bottom starts being exposed and the custard coats the spoon, quickly remove the pan from the heat before the eggs can curdle. Pour the custard through a medium- or fine-mesh strainer into a heatproof bowl and let cool completely, stirring several times. Taste for seasoning and if desired, stir in a little vanilla extract to reinforce the flavor. (All flavors will be muted in freezing.) Let the custard chill thoroughly in the refrigerator before freezing according to manufacturer’s directions.
OLD-FASHIONED GEAR-DRIVEN ICE CREAM FREEZER
VANILLA ICE CREAM II: PHILADELPHIA-STYLE
The quality of the cream you use is all-important here. Ultrapasteurized cream will often impart a faint sludginess to the texture, the result of the gums and thickeners used to offset a loss of viscosity that occurs in the manufacturing process. If you can find unhomogenized cream, the larger size of the fat globules will make the ice cream feel heavier and creamier on the palate—not, however, that you want the absolutely heaviest and creamiest effect possible. It will be more delicate made with a combination of heavy and light cream than with all heavy cream. For the crucial gradations, see this page.
YIELD: About 6 cups (exact volume may vary markedly with different makers’ models)
1 large vanilla bean, preferably Mexican
2 cups nonultrapasteurized light cream or rich half-and-half, preferably unhomogenized
2 cups nonultrapasteurized heavy cream, preferably unhomogenized
¾ to ⅞ cup sugar (I prefer the smaller amount)
A pinch of salt
¼ to ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract, preferably Mexican (optional)
Slit the vanilla bean lengthwise with a small, sharp knife and scrape out the seeds into a small saucepan. Add 1 cup of the light cream and the halved bean. Heat slowly to just under a boil. Let the cream cool to room temperature before proceeding.
Combine the remaining light and heavy cream with the sugar and salt. Stir until the sugar is thoroughly dissolved. Discard the vanilla bean and add the infused cream to the rest. Taste for seasoning and if desired, stir in a little vanilla extract to reinforce the flavor. (All flavors will be muted in freezing.) Let the ice cream base chill thoroughly in the refrigerator before freezing according to manufacturer’s directions.
CRÈME ANGLAISE
(STIRRED CUSTARD)
Crème anglaise, so baptized by the eighteenth-century French writer François Massialot, is about as English as Scotch tape is Scotch. Never mind. This simple stovetop custard is one of the most delicious dessert sauces ever invented—a beautiful accompaniment to fruit and an indispensable element in cake-based assemblages such as trifles.
Among egg-based custards, crème anglaise (also called “stirred custard”) is neither so fragile as hollandaise sauce nor so sturdy as baked custards. The addition of a little sugar and a lot of milk or cream enables the eggs to cook—with constant stirring—to around 180°F without curdling, though 175°F is more prudent. The consistency can be manipulated to your preference by three factors, starting with the creaminess of the liquid used. This is not an occasion for using skim milk, but either whole milk, various milk-cream combinations, or all cream will make a fine custard. The larger the proportion of cream, the faster the custard will thicken and the less likely it is to curdle. In my opinion the best results come from light cream, half-and-half, or equal parts of milk and any preferred grade of cream (nonultrapasteurized, please).
Then there is the ratio of eggs to milk. Not surprisingly, a higher proportion of eggs means a heavier, thicker sauce. But the third variable—whole eggs versus egg yolks—doesn’t work exactly as you might expect. Using both yolks and whites makes the custard set up firmer, but paradoxically with less roundness and body. Yolks alone produce not only a softer, more pourable consistency but also a more velvety richness.
In its simplicity, the sauce is like a blank slate waiting to be written on. Vanilla (preferably a whole bean, not the cruder-tasting extract) is the favorite flavoring, but various spices, herb infusions, and accents like citrus zest have their adherents. Probably the liveliest variations involve small amounts of brandy, whiskey, eau-de-vie (any preferred kind), or liqueur beaten into the partly cooled custard. I like the juice from finely grated ginger (squeeze a few drops through a garlic press).
Because crème anglaise stands up to a little more heat than other custard cousins like lemon curd or hollandaise sauce, I usually make it over direct heat. Some people prefer a double boiler for extra insurance against curdling.
YIELD: About 2 cups
1 vanilla bean
2 cups whole milk, nonultrapasteurized half-and-half, or equal parts milk and nonultrapasteurized cream
5 egg yolks, or 2 whole eggs and 1 yolk
⅓ cup sugar
A pinch of salt
Have ready a large bowl of ice, a heatproof storage bowl, and a fine-mesh strainer.
Slit the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds. Put the seeds, empty bean, and milk in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and heat to just under a boil.
Gently whisk together the egg yolks, sugar, and salt. If using whole eggs, beat more vigorously, but try to froth them as little as possible. Slowly pour the hot milk into the whisked yolks or eggs, stirring with a wooden spoon. Pour the mixture back into the pan and cook over medium-low heat, stirring gently. As it starts to thicken, stir more rapidly, being sure to scrape the custard from the entire pan bottom. When it coats the spoon and every stroke exposes a clean trail on the pan bottom, remove the pan from the heat.
At once pour the sauce through the strainer into the storage bowl, set it on ice, and whisk to partly cool it down. You can use it now if it is to be served warm. Otherwise, whisk again every few minutes until it is quite cold and refrigerate, uncovered, for an hour before covering tightly. It will set up more as it chills, but will remain loose rather than firm. Plan to use it within a day or two.
NOTE: A custard that threatens to turn grainy and “break” during cooking can usually be salvaged in acceptable condition if you instantly snatch it off the stove, pour it through a strainer as directed above, and whisk strenuously until it cools.
CAJETA MEXICANA
(MEXICAN DULCE DE LECHE)
If you take milk and sugar, cook them down thicker than heavy cream in an industrial vacuum pan, and put the result in a can, you get commercial condensed milk with an ivory-tan color and the double sweetness of two caramelized sugars (lactose and sucrose). Do the condensing yourself by boiling down a milk-sugar mixture a few steps further to a nearly taffylike consistency, and you have the world’s best caramel sauce-cum-candy, known as dulce de leche throughout Latin America and cajeta (literally, “little box”) in Mexico. Nearly all Latin countries have their own commercial brands, some
of which are sold here. I’m not crazy about any of them except for the Coronado brand cajeta from San Luis Potosí in Mexico. The rest are generally thickened with starch, which is cheaper than using more milk and boiling it down longer, but introduces something faintly stodgy into the texture.
You have to be careful about saying “cajeta.” In Mexico it historically referred to various kinds of sweet preserves cooked down to dense pastes and formerly sold in small wooden boxes. Unfortunately, the same word in some parts of Latin America is vulgar slang for the vagina, so it is a poor idea to ask for dulce de leche as cajeta in the local pan-Latin grocery. Just as unfortunately, commercial Mexican milk cajeta—also sometimes called leche quemada, or “burnt milk”—is much less widely available in the United States than brands of dulce de leche from other countries.
Mexican cajeta is often (not always) made from goats’ milk or a combination of cows’ and goats’ milk. I find that using part goats’ milk adds a lot of flavor and character to the homemade version; cows’ milk alone gives an almost cloyingly sweet blandness. In this case it doesn’t matter if the only goat’s milk you can find is ultrapasteurized. Cajeta or dulce de leche is much used for fillings and icings in Latin America, but I have to say that I never do anything with it other than either scarfing it up by the spoonful or warming it enough to pour over vanilla ice cream for the best butterscotch sundae I remember since Schrafft’s.
To make cajeta at home, prepare to stand attentively over the pot for about an hour. (It helps to have another person to switch off with.) If like me you adore all things butterscotchy, it’s worth it. But for a streamlined version, see Dulce de Leche with Canned Condensed Milk.
YIELD: About 2½ cups
1 quart whole cows’ milk
1 quart goats’ milk
2 cups sugar
¼ teaspoon baking soda
Choose a large (at least 6-quart) deep saucepan, thick enough not to start scorching on the bottom before the milk is half cooked. An enameled cast-iron pan is good; any other pan should be nonreactive and heavy-gauge. Pour the milk into the pan; dip out about ½ cup and reserve.
Add the sugar to the pan of milk, stirring to dissolve it with a wooden spoon. Bring just to a low boil. Remove the pan from the heat while you stir the baking soda into the reserved milk, then add that to the hot milk, which will froth up at once. Set it over medium heat and continue to cook, stirring frequently, for about 30 minutes. The mixture will start to look more like a syrup as the water evaporates and the temperature rises. Now you must stir constantly, gradually reducing the heat as the syrup darkens and thickens, for about another 30 minutes (less if it seems about to burn). When a stroke of the mixing spoon exposes the bottom of the pan and the syrup is slow to close in again over the track, remove the pan from the heat and let sit until the molten stuff is partly cooled but still liquid enough to pour into small containers. Let cool to room temperature before covering. It will keep for weeks at room temperature, for months in the refrigerator. It may, however, crystallize like long-stored honey. If this happens, set the container in hot water until the crystals melt.
DULCE DE LECHE WITH CANNED CONDENSED MILK
Everyone in Latin America is familiar with the convenient version of cajeta, or dulce de leche, made by immersing an unopened 14-ounce can of condensed milk in enough boiling water to cover it thoroughly, simmering it for several hours, and opening it when the contents have slowly cooled. (Not just in Latin America, either; the prison-camp inmates in Solzhenitsyn’s The First Circle knew the same trick.) The method works fairly well, and some people even prefer the result to dulce de leche from scratch. But it has been known to end in serious injury when a sealed can exploded, either because it was defective to begin with or because the forgetful cook let the water boil away so that the contents of the can became superheated. Some commercial manufacturers now provide directions for cooking the milk out of the can, which is safer. This version is based on a method suggested by the Borden Company.
YIELD: About 1½ cups
A 14-ounce can of condensed milk
Preheat the oven to 425°F. Scrape the milk into a shallow heatproof glass baking dish such as a 9-inch pie plate. Cover it snugly with several layers of aluminum foil. Place the dish in a slightly larger ovenproof vessel, put the arrangement in the oven, and carefully pour enough boiling water into the larger container to come partway up the sides of the glass dish. Bake for 1 hour, lift out, and let cool as for Cajeta Mexicana.
BATIDOS
(LATIN AMERICAN MILKSHAKES)
The mom-and-pop restaurants in mixed Hispanic neighborhoods seldom do much in the line of wine and beer. The choice of beverages usually boils down to good coffee, a few freshly squeezed juices, some bottled or canned fruit and cola drinks, and a multitude of blender specialties. In my town—which is in effect a New Jersey outpost of Miami—the blender drinks come in milk-based and milkless varieties. Cubans call the milkshake kind batidos. (I have given up trying to remember all the names used by people from different parts of the Latin tropics; licuados, refrescos, and vitaminas barely scratch the surface.)
The Miami-on-the-Hudson batidos can be made from some pretty unexpected materials, the most unexpected perhaps being puffed wheat. But most use fruit, anything from strawberries or peaches to remote Amazonian exotica. The tropical-fruit batidos are almost universally based on frozen fruit. Our local stores carry a huge array of imported fruit pulps or chunks in 14-ounce packages. These are not mediocre “convenience” ingredients; they usually have much fresher flavor than the whole fresh fruits would after being shipped from Central or South America, and they are the first thing people reach for when they want to make most batidos. Passion fruit, tamarillo, pineapple, cashew fruit, mango, guava, guanábana (soursop), cherimoya, tamarind, papaya … the list of possibilities seems to expand every year.
It is impossible to give one fixed formula, since every kind of fruit will vary in sweetness (always start with a small amount of sugar and cautiously add more to taste) and intensity. A very rough rule of thumb is about 3 or 4 cups of milk to a 14-ounce package of frozen pulp; you may want to halve this for a maiden attempt. Here is a model recipe of sorts using my favorite among the frozen tropical fruits that reach these parts, mamey sapote, which everyone except botanists calls simply “mamey.” Now and then fresh mamey sapotes in good condition briefly show up in our stores from Florida, especially at the end of summer. Seize the moment if you see this wonderful fruit. An exterior like a furry tan football conceals salmon-colored flesh with a custardy avocadolike consistency and a perfumed sweetness, so good for simply eating with a spoon that you may never get around to making a batido.
YIELD: About 3 cups
Half a 14-ounce package of frozen mamey pulp, partly thawed (or the flesh of one large fresh mamey, peeled, pitted, and roughly cubed)
2 cups whole milk, very cold
¼ cup sugar, or to taste
½ cup shaved or finely crushed ice
Combine the mamey pulp and milk in a blender with half of the sugar. Process for a few seconds and taste for sweetness. Add the ice and more sugar to taste; process to combine thoroughly. Add a little more mamey pulp to thicken it slightly, more milk to thin it. It tastes best served at once, straight up or over ice cubes.
VARIATION: Batidos are often enriched with ice cream. Omit the crushed ice and add half a scoop (or more to taste) of slightly softened vanilla ice cream to the fruit pulp and milk, reducing the amount of sugar to compensate. Process just until combined.
THAI-STYLE ICED COFFEE
Southeast Asia is among those parts of the world where “milk” as generally understood means only the canned kind, either evaporated or condensed. Introduced by French and Dutch colonists who also hoped to strike it rich with coffee plantations, canned milk became a favorite addition to coffee as drunk hot or iced in Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, and other ex-colonies of the region. Eventually American restaurant-goers fell in love with the iced version.
A somewhat different approach arose in Thailand, where coffee drinkers invented a unique preground combination of roasted coffee beans with other ingredients, usually roasted corn kernels, sesame seeds, and soybeans. This mixture, called oliang, or oleng, is commonly brewed in a “coffee sock,” a sock-shaped cotton filter on a metal rim that also happens to be much used in parts of Central America and can often be found in pan-Latin stores.
There is no substitute for oliang. But if you can’t find it, lavishly sweetened strong coffee brewed by any preferred method, combined with canned milk, and served over ice makes a refreshing drink in the right spirit.
YIELD: About 6 servings
½ cup oliang (Thai ground coffee mixture)
Sugar to taste
4 cups boiling water
Plenty of ice
Canned evaporated or condensed milk (or heavy cream—inauthentic but good) to taste
Measure the oliang into a coffee sock set over a carafe or heatproof pitcher. If you are using evaporated milk, add about 2 tablespoons sugar for a slightly sweet or 4 tablespoons for a very sweet brew. Pour the boiling water over the oliang and sugar and leave it to steep in the carafe for 8 to 10 minutes before removing the sock. If you don’t have a coffee sock, simply put the oliang and sugar in a small saucepan, pour the boiling water over them, let sit 8 to 10 minutes, and strain through a coffee filter into a carafe or pitcher. If you are using condensed milk, either omit the sugar or add only about 1 tablespoon.
Milk Page 18