How it became a favorite dessert that has been cooling and sweetening people for centuries.
The tradition of enjoying cold desserts is thousands of years old. Ice desserts were enjoyed all over the ancient world, from China to Mesopotamia.
About 4,000 years ago, the Chinese enjoyed some kind of frozen syrup. Centuries later, around 400 BC, sherbe was drunk in the Persian Empire. This drink, which was served cold, had cherry, quince or pomegranate syrup as its main ingredient, and was cooled with snow. "Sherbet", "sorbet" or "syrup" are recipes, but also words that originated from that ancient drink.
Historical reports say that Alexander the Great, who conquered the Persian Empire in 330 BC, also enjoyed cold drinks sweetened with honey. The Greeks, and later the Romans, also adopted the custom of cooling drinks. In the early years of the Roman Empire, the banquets of Emperor Nero were known for fruit juices that were sweetened with honey and cooled with snow. Centuries later, during the 1920s, Marco Polo returned from China with a recipe for "flavored ice," and some recipes included milk.
IMPORTANT INGREDIENTS
These treats, which were the forerunners of ice cream, could only be made if you were able to get snow or ice brought from cold mountainous areas or from frozen lakes and rivers. Residents living on the mountain would collect ice and pack it by covering it or covering it with straw and branches, to reduce melting, and then transport it across the mountain to urban areas.
In the mountains, snow and ice were placed in "ice houses", and different civilizations made different variations of those houses. These were mostly chambers without heat and light, and deep pits were often used, which were covered with straw or sawdust.
The procurement of ice was complex, which made it a very valuable commodity in the old world. In the Middle Ages, snow was still brought from the mountains throughout Europe. By the 17th century, many estates had private ice chambers, and from the 18th century large ice houses began to be built in the cities, and merchants sold large blocks of ice door to door. In some cities, the ice trade was regulated by the authorities, who set the price and then the penalties for illegal sales. In 1807, there were 43 "ice sellers" in Naples, who, as required by the rules, sold ice only during the summer.
The exact time of including milk in frozen desserts is difficult to determine. Some historians believe that this practice first developed in Asia, and that it was brought to Europe by Marco Polo, while other historians say that it is a myth.
To include milk and sour cream in the frozen dessert, the cooks used an endothermic procedure. They would put the ingredients in a metal container, which would then be placed in a larger bucket filled with ice and salt. It would lower the melting point of the ice, which would "pull" the heat from the creamy mixture, which would then solidify.
The first evidence of the use of this technique in Europe comes from a treatise published in 1550 by Blas de Vilafranca, a Spanish physician residing in Rome. The technique spread throughout Italy, and in 1558 the Neapolitan Giambattista della Porta described it in his work Magia naturalis: "Since the first thing people want to do at parties is drink wine as cold as ice, especially in summer, I will learn You can just cool it, even freeze it, and then sip it so coldly. it will gradually freeze. " His recipe for frozen wine also presents a way to make sorbet.
Sorbet became more popular in Naples than anywhere else in Europe, and in 1690 the first book on sorbet (by an anonymous author) was published, entitled "New and fast ways to easily make all kinds of sorbet". Judging by the ingredients used, these recipes were made in an aristocratic household. Then came the "Modern Steward" (1692-94) of Antonio Latini, who worked for the Spanish viceroy in Naples, and his book also contained a section on household management that included a section on cooking.
It is believed that the first European ice creams were made in Italy, and the recipes spread to France during the 17th century, and then to England, where they were really "received". In support of this is a detailed display of ice cream in a work of art among the many complex dishes that were served in Windsor in May 1671 on the feast of St. George. In that period, in the 1970s, the term "ice cream" first appeared.
Craze for ice cream
Making ice cream, unlike sorbet, was very hard. The ice had to be crushed by hand and sprinkled with salt, in order to fill a large "tub", in which another bowl with sour cream, milk, sugar and aromas would be placed. The contents are then mixed by hand for several hours, until ice cream is formed.
Ice cream would often be poured into imaginatively designed molds in the shape of fruits and flowers. Due to the cost of making and serving ice cream, the dessert remained inaccessible to most Europeans and was mostly enjoyed by members of high society.
Sorbet became popular in major European cities during the 18th century. Due to the middle class, which was more and more, frozen sweets became part of the offer in local stores. In addition to sorbet, there were granite (semi-frozen fruit and ice products) and sorbet with cream (the forerunner of gelatin and today's ice cream).
Royal porcelain factories, such as Sèvres near Paris, produced ice cream cups and plates for shops and houses as more modest families began to enjoy sorbet.
The earliest book of recipes entirely dedicated to making ice cream was L'Art de bien faire les glaces d'office, published in France in 1768.
Although the craze for ice cream soon spread to the North American colonies, in the 18th century it was still a luxury for them. Data from a New York merchant shows that President George Washington spent about $ 200 on ice cream in the summer of 1790 - thousands of dollars today.
In the United States, ice cream also became available to ordinary people in 1843 when New Yorker Nancy M. Johnson patented an ice cream machine that drastically shortened production time.
American companies improved the design of this machine, and in 1851, a milkman from Baltimore, Jacob Fusel, opened the first ice cream factory.
After the Civil War, the popularity of ice cream escalated across the United States.
A group of children ate ice cream on a London street in 1967.
Ice cream shops and taverns have appeared all over the world and made all people enjoy this cold treat that was once reserved only for rulers.
I remember that one of the first discoveries of popsicle sticks were accidental and by a kid who left juice on their front porch on a winter day?