“Oh I do like to be beside the seaside, Oh I do like to be beside the sea” (66)

Probably at some point, we have all found ourselves, like Sir Basil Rathbone in the clip above from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes movie (1939), singing this famous seaside song. Written in 1907 by John A. Glover Kind and first performed by Mark Sheridan, this song has become the anthem of the seaside, evoking the smells, atmosphere and overall fun of the seaside whenever heard.

Opening with the lines, “Everyone delights to spend their summer’s holiday/ Down beside the side of the silvery sea” (1-2), this song captures the traditional delight of seaside holidaying. In his memoir, Toast (2003), Nigel Slater recalls his family’s annual visit to the seaside, sharing the memory of his father singing this song, during their car journey. Slater also recalls his enjoyment of eating ice cream, “at one of the open-air cafes along the beach...” (68). 

                                         

Getting Creative

With my new founded cooking confidence, following the successful making of Mrs Beeton’s vanilla ice cream, I was ready with my whisk to get making lots more. With Easter approaching and a little help from Marguerite Patten’s, Every Day Cook Book (1968), I was inspired to create Mini Lemon Surprise ice cream. However, in the excitement of my creativity I forgot to record everything I did, so have put together this recipe as best as I can remember.

Mini Lemon Surprise

Ingredients

½ lemon zest

1 bag of crushed mini eggs

¼ pint double cream

½ pint custard (See the post, let’s get Icy for Mrs Beeton’s custard recipe)  

70g caster sugar

1½ tps yellow food colouring

Method 

1.    Using a wooden rolling pin crush a sealed bag of mini eggs. 

2.    Grate half a lemon zest.

3.    Using 2x15ml custard powder, ½ pint milk and 50g caster sugar prepare the custard using Mrs Beeton’s custard recipe instructions.  

4.    While the custard is cooling, begin to gently whisk the cream. (If you are using an electric whisk, wait for the custard to cool before whisking the cream)  

5.    When the custard has cooled, combine it with the cream and the remaining sugar and whisk.  

6.    Whisk until the mixture thickens, adding the crushed mini eggs and lemon zest during this process. Add the food colouring a few whisks before turning the mixture into a freezable container.  

7.    Freeze the mixture, removing it once to whisk. This should be done as the mixture begins to set.  

8.    Place the mixture back into its container and freeze until firm. 

9. When completely frozen, serve with your favourite ice cream sauce and iceccessories(cones, wafers, flakes e.t.c).

Review

If you are not a great fan of lemon flavouring, when following this recipe you may wish to reduce the amount of zest you add to the mixture. With every mouthful of mini lemon surprise your palate is overpowered by the taste of lemon, but quickly refreshed by the coolness of the ice cream. This is followed by the sweet chocolate crunch of mini eggs, which makes every mouthful tastetastical.

What's your flavour?

Seeing as my ice cream making attempts were humorous to my family, I thought I would post this ice cream comedy sketch from The Two Ronnies. Never failing to make me laugh, I hope you enjoy it too.

Let's get Icy!

Armed with my cooking utensils and Mrs Beeton’s, Cookery for All (1982) cookbook, I was ready to brave the kitchen and tackle my culinary fears. Eager to discover if I was a natural and undiscovered talented ice cream chef, I without delay got stuck into making a basic vanilla ice cream.

To start, I had to make 500ml of plain custard.

To make this you will need:

2 x15ml spoons custard powder

500ml milk

100g caster sugar

1.    Blend the custard powder with a little of the milk.

2.    Heat the remaining milk to boiling point and pour on to the blended mixture.

3.    Return to the pan and simmer, stirring all the time, until the mixture thickens.

4.    Add the sugar, cover, and use hot or cold as required.  (331)

Having successfully made this, without even scorching my cooking pot, which is often the case when I cook, I was ready to make some vanilla ice cream!  

To make this you will need:

125ml double cream

500ml cold custard

1 x 5ml vanilla essence
6 helpings

      1.    Whip the cream until semi-stiff.

      2.    Add the cold custard and vanilla essence.

      3.  Turn into a suitable container, chill and freeze as described on p331, beating once while freezing. (332)

As I specifically choose to use this vanilla ice cream recipe from Cookery for All, due to its simplicity, I have featured these recipes as they are written in the cookbook. The only alteration I have made is to the recipes’ layouts, which are actually unnumbered and presented as small paragraphs in the book. When following these two recipes, the only problem I encountered, though perhaps trivial, was being able to refer to the recipe stages quickly. As you have probably noticed, although I do enjoy reading recipes which use language to entice us and evoke our imaginations, when it comes to cooking I am a fan of practical, straightforward recipes.

The Verdict

Having followed the freezing instructions in Cookery for All, which in summary informs the cook to let the ice cream mixture “chill until thoroughly cold” (331) before placing in a freezer, my ice cream was ready to eat the next evening. It was also ready to be scrutinised by the ice cream judging panel, which was my family.  

I am happy to say that Mrs Beeton’s vanilla ice cream was a success with the judges, particularly with my sister. My favourite judge comment, was that I (banned Bel, as my family refer to me when it comes to the kitchen) had actually made ice cream which tasted like ice cream and was edible. It made me giggle anyway. 

Through the Ice Pages: Scoop Two

Published in 1855, The Book of Ices was Mrs A.B. Marshall’s first publication. Continuing to write three other books, of which her last was Fancy Ices published in 1894, Mrs Marshall’s work on ices is considered amongst the finest. However, as the London Canal Museum also notes in an article on their website, Mrs Marshall is not as well-known today as other female cooks, such as Mrs Beeton. If you would like to find out more about Mrs A.B. Marshall, I have attached a link to the London Canal Museum’s website below.      
       

http://www.canalmuseum.org.uk/ice/marshall.htm

In The Book of Ices, there are several exquisite illustrations, which are extremely detailed and colourful. Designed using moulds, these ices would certainly tempt and amaze individuals. Accustomed to ice cream being moulded in rectangular or circular containers, when first observing these colour plates, I was intrigued to see ices moulded into such wonderful shapes and displays. Collecting my thoughts, I soon began to remember the novelty shaped jelly and ice lolly moulds of childhood cooking, which subsequently made me consider why jelly castles or rocket shaped lollies are exciting to children and adults alike. I refer to adults, as I believe that although our tastes and choices develop, generally becoming more sophisticated in adulthood, we still enjoy experiencing and reviving the fun of childhood, particularly through using food. Contemplating the reasons for our admiration of novelty shaped food, an idea which dominated by thoughts was the notion of food as art. It seems this notion was central to Vincent La Chapelle and Mrs Marshall’s work on ices.
        

In view of this idea, when studying the asparagus ice illustration from The Book of Ices, it strangely reminded me of Wall’s mint Viennetta ice cream. Consisting of chocolate layers separating a ripple of delicious vanilla ice cream, Viennetta is certainly an ice cream masterpiece which I always enjoy admiring and devouring. In Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management (1861), the idea of food as art is also communicated. When Mrs Beeton discusses the serving of ices, noting that dessert ices were typically moulded and when not were served in glasses accompanied with wafers (315), it is indicated that presentation was essential to the serving of ices and somewhat contributed towards demonstrating a successfully managed Victorian household. Today it seems the latter of these two serving options is greatly used, as ice cream served in glass dishes drizzled with chocolate or strawberry sauce and decorated with wafers, sprinkles and flakes is a design which will always tempt the taste buds of any ice cream lover. This is often demonstrated when my family and I visit the Harvester restaurant on special occasions and someone orders a Rocky Horror Ice cream. Consisting of vanilla ice cream, hot fudge cake and fudge pieces, topped with cream, this dessert is the ultimate ice cream guilty pleasure and often results in anyone who did not order a dessert, as they were to full from dinner, miraculously finding they are still a bit hungry and asking the waitress for an extra spoon. 
   

An extra topping fact

Featuring Christina cornets in her book, Fancy Ices (1894), Mrs Marshall is considered to be the founder of the ice cream cone. These cornets were frozen and filled with vanilla ice cream and dried fruits. They were also “piped with royal icing and ... dipped in chopped, blanched pistachio nuts” (35). In their work, the Weirs also discuss Margaret cornets, which were served with apple ice cream.

During my research, I came across this article written by Heston Blumenthal, which includes recipes for Mrs Marshall’s almond cornets and apple ice cream. 
 (http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2002/may/11/foodanddrink.shopping).

Heston also shares his childhood memory of eating ice cream and a vanilla ice cream recipe.

Publishing Ices

In Ice Creams, Sorbets & Gelati: The Definitive Guide, Caroline and Robin Weir acknowledge that Mrs Mary Eales, a supposed royal confectioner or confectionary supplier to Queen Anne, was the first individual to publish an ice cream recipe within an English cookery book. This book was published in 1718, entitled, Mrs Mary Eales Receipts (18). The Weir’s continue to note the publication of many cookbooks and ice cream recipes including: Vincent La Chapelle’s book, The Modern Cook (1733), which significantly discusses the decorative use of ices and moulds (18); Emy’s, L’Art de Bien Faire les Glaces d’Office (Paris, 1768), a guidebook to making ices, which was also the first publication to be entirely written on ices (20); and Mrs Agnes B. Marshall’s, The Book of Ices (UK,1885).

                                       The Book of Ices    

Through the Ice Pages

Being an absolutely awful cook, embarrassingly proven the other night when I managed to microwave a meal to an inedible state, I generally regard cookbooks as magical food bibles of pleasure and inspiration. This viewpoint may seem exaggerated, but cookbooks to me are like fairytale food stories. Describing the friendships and adventures of ingredients from the mixing bowl to the serving plate, the happy endings of recipes, being the creation of delightful and tantalising foods, are as unreal to me as the idea of a fairy godmother transforming me into Nigella Lawson, or Prince Charming rescuing me from the culinary witch’s terrible cook spell. Considering this, it is probably not surprising that I generally refrain from creatively cooking (tinned tomato puree pasta, with grated cheese being one of my cooking specialities). However, by using my imagination when reading recipes, or enjoying the food illustrations which accompany them, I still enjoy the magic of cooking. I am aware this may sound strange, but I suppose the point I am trying to make is that cooking is about enjoying the style, language and presentation of a recipe, as much as it is about enjoying the food prepared.

During my childhood, a food which I was always fond of making was Hedgehog shaped bread, a recipe which appeared in a Rosie and Jim annual we owned. Though, as you might have already guessed, my finished bread generally did not resemble a healthy looking hedgehog, despite my mum and dad praising its likeness, I always enjoyed following the recipe’s easy step-by-step guide and admiring its colourful illustrations. Another recipe I always enjoyed making with my mum was coconut ice. Assigned to adding the final ingredients to the coconut ice mixture after it had cooled, I would often whilst waiting to do my job admire the cookbook’s illustrations. The illustration which I always spent the most time observing was a photograph of sweets. Displaying, fudge, peppermint creams, chocolate coconut pyramids and other delicious confectionary, this page transported me to sweet heaven. Today, the boxed sweets which centre in the middle of the photograph remind me of the confectionary boxes which feature in the film adaptation of Roald Dahl’s novel, Matilda (1988/1996) and the movie Forrest Gump (1994).

  Photograph from,

 Marguerite Patten's Cookbook.

In Matilda, there is a scene in which Miss Honey and Matilda enter Miss Trunchbull’s home and find a chocolate box which belonged to Miss Honey’s father. Carved out of wood and decorated with an elegant gold design, there is something enchanting about this chocolate box, which presents each delicately wrapped chocolate as exquisite and magical. Just by observing these chocolates, you are able to taste and sense the pleasure of eating them.  This notion of sensing food through its presentation is greatly demonstrated in Elizabeth David’s, A Book of Mediterranean Food (1950), as the introductions, ingredients and language of recipes, evoke the appearance, smells and freshness of Mediterranean cooking. This transports the reader to an idyllic paradise, as they sense the pleasures of being on holiday. In view of the notion, that visual and linguistic representations of food can stimulate our taste buds and make food more desirable, as we seek the created pleasures of our senses and imaginations, I would like to consider further the argument I make in my opening post. This being that ice cream is highly popular due to the way it is presented to us.  

  Which ice cream would you choose?

However, to avoid making this post to long, I have decided to split it into two scoops and explore the presentation of ice cream in the second. Though this post seems to digress from my ice cream blog subject, it was actually motivated by some colour plates from Mrs A.B. Marshall’s, The Book of Ices (1885), which I purchased at the London Canal Museum. Extremely colourful and emulating the creativity of cooking, these colour plates made me think about what entices us to cook a particular recipe, or to cook from a certain cookbook. Similarly, it made me consider what seduces us to select a specific dish from the pages of a restaurant’s menu, contemplating overall the power of language and imagery. This leads to the question:

Will food which is impressively and imaginatively presented through language and imagery, generally fail the expectations of our imaginations when eaten?