Butter Ice

So pretty much what we've been doing since we got home last Wednesday is making gelato (well, plus a little sunbathing and tv-watching here and there). Our fourth batch (hazelnut) is steeping for one hour right now, so we thought we'd use that time to update you on what has been going on.

We decided to start off with a basic gelato recipe: gelato di crema. The only ingredients were egg yolks, milk, sugar, and a pinch of salt. Not very hard to mess up, right? Well, we mangaged to anyway. Our main problem was the ice cream maker. It wasn't quite frozen enough, but we were impatient so we poured in the base anyway. We checked it periodically for the next hour, when we finally realized that nothing much was happening and decided to just put it in the freezer. Louisa stirred it a couple of times before she went to bed and when she got up in the morning, and it finally froze, but it wasn't exactly gelato. Instead, it was very icy and very, very yellow. It had a good taste (though sometimes we thought we were eating butter ice) but the texture was just not right at all. So since then we have been trying many other recipes--and ice cream machines (Thank you to everyone who has lent us one!).

So far we have been pretty successful with our chocolate and peach flavors. They aren't perfect, but we've realized that nothing we make is ever going to be. In any case, you can try what we've made at our presentation on Friday (sorry to tempt everyone who can't come).

We've also made a trip to Staples to get materials for our book. There, we found out that in order to buy single sheets of color paper (instead of packs of 100 or more), you have to pretend you are making copies with them and then fill out a self-serve copy slip. So we made seventeen blank copies!

Next up (well, once this hazelnut is finished): straciatella!