Ice Cream Series: Part 3 Homemade Ice Cream

Homemade cherry ice cream, recipes below

The summer heat makes me think about the culinary meaning of this time of the year for my southern relatives who died long ago but my memories of them remain very alive. They migrated north to Ossining and North Tarrytown from rural North Carolina and Virginia. Long ago, rural folks would purchase a block of ice and chip off what they needed with an ice pick to make homemade ice cream. Making ice cream from scratch required lots of churning of the dasher filled ice, fresh cream, sugar, and the local fruit in season. In the South folks most often made ice cream in late June and the month of July because that was the fruit picking season when the fruit would be sweet—peaches raspberries, cherries (perhaps my favorite summer fruit), strawberries, or whatever local fruit grew in abundance where you lived. The in season fruit would be picked on say a Saturday and the ice cream made for the Sunday the evening dessert following a long hot church service and dinner on the grounds. Thus for many with southern roots, ice cream is closely associated with this time of the year, the local fruit in season, and Sunday evenings. Older relatives would tell me growing up that there is nothing better than homemade ice cream no matter who makes it. Today there are a lot of automated machines that allow you to make ice cream at home with your knowledge of what’s in it. Here are two ice cream recipe one traditional and one vegan.

Traditional Peach ice cream recipe: http://www.whats4eats.com/desserts/peach-ice-cream-recipe

Vegan strawberry ice cream video recipe: http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=jwWuL1m1T1M&feature=related