How did they make ice cream at the turn of the 19th century?

Question

Reading our local evening news paper, article in about making ice cream in the early 1900's, was it ice cream like we know to day and how did the keep it frozen with no fridges/freezers about?

Answer 1

It was made pretty much the same way it's made today. It's done by putting the liquid into a container (originally metal), placing the container in ice, and turning a set of blades (called the "dasher") inside the "cream" to keep it from getting icy. The temperature was lowered enough to cause the cream to freeze by putting salt on the ice, which lowered the freezing point of the water as it melted. I couldn't tell you how many times I helped do this as a kid!

Nobody was able to keep it for very long unless they were lucky enough to have an ice house with an ample stock of ice saved from the previous winter. When people made ice cream, it was an occasion, and often friends and neighbors were invited over to share in the treat before it melted.

The link below shows the kind of ice cream machine we used when I was a kid in the 50s and 60s; later on, we got one that had an electric motor, which was HEAVEN as compared to turning a hand crank for ages!

Answer 2

Ice cream was made in a barrel. I suppose churned just the same way cheese was made.
My Aunt Scollie useto make icecream the old fashioned way but later in her years due to health reasons she did it a not so old fashioned way. It was still great but not as great as she use to make!
Later she sold out to R. Beatrice because of health reasons. She likely passed on by now!
She didn't sell the complete Ice cream recipe to Beatrice though but a recipe that caused Beatrice to make better ice cream than they useto. It's still not as good as my Aunt Scollie's ice cream was.
I was shown the formula but I promised never to tell anyone. I Always keep my promises except if prevent from doing so! No way that I know of that can prevent me from keeping the recipe a secret.
When I can afford to do so I may make the icecream to resell of course! I do make it myself by hand in my home but I do substitutions cause I don't always have the right ingredients in home! I use an old blender! In the olden days there was root cellars and root houses and iceboxes!
The boxes were made in a way so that water would freeze if U put it in the ice box! My Grandfather had one in is Restaurant! It was still in use when I got a refrigerator! Later The Ice Box was given to the Bible Camp!

Answer 3

ice cream has always been able to be made without electrical refrigeration..........in fact some cheap kids ice cream makers use thee same principles today using ice and salt (and what a pain it is........lol).

As for keeping it in large houses an ice house was very common from a very early period (George Washington we know ate it) and that in many US cities at the end of the 19th centuries an ice box, supplied by, the ice man, was a common non-electrical way of refrigeration.

Hope this helps

Answer 4

Ice cream was originally stored in a Ice house, as was ice blocks, it was made by turning cream, and eggs in a churn that had a double skin which was were you put the ice,to cool the churn and by turning the churn made the cream freeze, they use to use natural flavourings such as Strawberries, Raspberry's etc.

Answer 5

It is not so much how did they make ice cream, but where did they get the ice? I remember Carlo Gatti's ice warehouse in Battersea in the mid-70s - I presume he supplied ice to fishmongers etc. These two links will explain both how they made ice cream and where they got the ice.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Gatti
http://www.foodmuseum.com/xIceCream.html#history

Answer 6

in Kentucky,they went out to a rock cliff [in the winter]and got ice-cycles put the ice in a tub put milk sugar and eggs in a gallon bucket and set it in the ice and turned it to keep it mixed "that freezes the mixture into ice-cream"

Answer 7

They probably had to use a churn.