SC - Ice Cream in Period (not)

[rudin at okway.okstate.edu]

I got a book for Christmas on the history of food in Sicily.  I do remember 
reading something about a frozen dessert made with snow from the nearby 
mountains.  I'll try to remember to bring the book to work with me tomorrow and 
post a reference.

Mercedes
rudin at okway.okstate.edu

______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: SC - Ice Cream in Period (not) 
Author:  <sca-cooks at Ansteorra.ORG > at SMTP
Date:    12/31/97 10:39 AM


     
>
>     (Grin) Oh, I'm sure we can come up with *something*........... ;-) ;-) 
>;-) For what it's worth, *my* big passion is chocolate--at least licorice is 
>period! Now a question for the list--what about ice cream? I'm fairly sure 
>I've heard that the Romans made ices, but I don't have anything indicating 
>that the frozen custard concept existed. Anyone know for sure?
>
>      Ldy Diana
     
I spent some time studying this one, since I was actually served an 
ice-cream at an event long ago. Ignorantly, I continued to believe it was 
period, simply because someone had included it in their menu!
     
I have discovered the following facts:
     
Several cultures had fruit "ices", including the Maya. This consisted of a 
fruit syrup possibly sweetned with honey, poured over specially imported 
snow (from near-by mountains).
     
Ice cream makes its first truly historical appearance (is given leterary 
mention)at the table of Mrs. Martha Washington (NOT the woman who 
owned/added to the M.W. Cookbook , but the 1st American President's Wife). 
It seems her inclusion of icecream was a big novelty, and one she imported 
from Europe, being a new invention. This, naturally, happened after the 
American Revolution, which took place OOP for us.
     
We know that the Tudors had cold "Banquet" houses (basically a semi-buried 
ice-house, tarted up nice for visitors), where they served cold dessert type 
foods to the favored amongst their guests after the big celebrations. We 
know ice was in there, but we do not know that cream was poured over fruit, 
sugar, etc, and churned in a cold area to produce "Iced Cream". The likliest 
possibility is that sorbet is within our period. Other dishes served would 
have included custards, gelatin moulds, etc.
     
If you think about it, you can see the progression from the "refrigerated" 
dishes of the Tudor period to the experimentation with cooking cold dishes 
(sorbet, custards, sweet gelatines, etc), once keeping ice houses became 
popular. From there we have a jump to the relative cheapness of sugar and 
then the discovery of the properties of sweetened frozen cream. That 
evolution would have taken a little while.
     
So no, it does not appear that Iced Cream was period. Does anyone have 
documentation for Sorbet?
     
     
Aoife   
     
============================================================================
     
To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to 
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".
     
============================================================================
     


============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================