Tim

Kay, I'm Back

... and tired, and I had fun and took lots of blog fodder pix. Here's one:

This was part of the mural at the place we went for ice cream last night. I think it represents the best of all possible worlds.

PS: All the packing was worth it and I wish I'd packed more- specifically, my bicycle.

PSS: I finished reading Twilight. That was fun- thanks, Julie!

PSSS: Also picked up a true crime paperback at a garage sale so I have something new to start.

Ice Cream Done Right

October 1940. Caswell County, North Carolina. "Children making ice cream to be sold for the benefit of the church at a meeting of ministers and deacons near Yanceyville." 35mm negative by Marion Post Wolcott.

Breyers Update

Ok, I just called them and harassed a very nice customer service representative. Everything was going fine until she said that the tara gum has been in the product for almost two years. She had me there. I didn't catch on early enough to the gum injection, and so my consumer leverage was greatly reduced.

I did score points with my bird crap analogy. (It's natural, but you wouldn't put it in the ice cream.) All Natural is a pretty meaningless descriptor. What does it mean? From the Earth? Not imaginary? Who the heck knows.

Nevertheless, we are getting a coupon in the mail for some free ice cream. I expect we'll get a letter like this guy:

Ice Cream Rage!!!

I sent this off to the Unilever people today. Sections are repeats from an earlier post, but I'm not sure if they read the blog, so I had to include it.
-----------------------------------------
Dear Unilever,

Well, I see that you are now including tara gum in your ice cream. I used to buy Breyers because it was composed of all natural ingredients. Now I won't be buying your ice cream anymore.

Breyers used to have a wonderful light and crumbly texture that melted on your tongue like weightless deliciousness. Now it feels like some kind of petrochemical goo, or possibly cold shampoo.

Don't give me any guff about tara gum being "natural". Yeah, it comes from the Earth, but it's NOT NATURAL to put it in ice cream. Bird crap is also all natural, but you don't put THAT in your ice cream do you?

I mean seriously, did your grandmother's ice cream recipe call for "gum" of any kind? I think not, and I rest my case. Here's a real ice cream recipe, since you seem to have forgotten how to make proper ice cream:


* eggs
* sugar
* salt
* vanilla extract
* cream
* milk
* chipped ice
* rock salt

And that's all.



Seriously, I am so pissed off at you guys right now. You had the one good real traditional ice cream on the market, and you ruined it.

Guar Gum, What is it?

Guar gum, also called guaran, is a galactomannan. It is primarily the ground endosperm of guar beans. The guar seeds are dehusked, milled and screened to obtain the guar gum. It is typically produced as a free flowing, pale, off-white colored, coarse to fine ground powder.

Just like Grandma used to make.

I remember lots of lazy Summer afternoons, laying around in the guar gum patch, counting clouds while Grandma and the adults went down to the lab to prepare anhydrous reaction conditions at relatively low temperature (4060 degrees Celsius), with solid sodium hydrogen carbonate (NaHCO3) used as the catalyst, being a milder base than NaOH and therefore reducing any pH-induced degradation reactions.

Using this method the Grandma was able to prepare acetate, succinate and octenylsuccinate derivatives of galactomannans. Guar gum is also used in:

• Textile industry – sizing, finishing and printing
• Paper industry – improved sheet formation, folding and denser surface for printing
• Explosives industry – as waterproofing agent mixed with ammonium nitrate, nitroglycerin etc.
• Pharmaceutical industry – as binder or as disintegrator in tablets
• Cosmetics and toiletries industries – thickener in toothpastes, conditioner in shampoos (usually in a chemically modified version)
• Oil and gas drilling, hydraulic fracturing
• Mining
• Hydroseeding – formation of seed bearing "guar tack"^[7]

Yeah, it's pretty clear, my Grandma is a badass. She single-handedly ruined the ice cream industry.

No Gum, Please

UPDATE
Breyer's Ice Cream Has Tara Gum
But it used to not have any gum. All those years I was eating real non-gummed ice cream, and they had to go and change it. Breyers, you caved, you spineless corporate drones. If only a small independent dairy could have the guts to stand up to Big Gum and say no to bastardized ice cream and chocolate milk recipes.

I mean seriously, did your grandmother's ice cream recipe call for "gum" of any kind? I think not, and I rest my case. Oh, and for the texturally challenged palettes out there, here's a real ice cream recipe:

• eggs
• sugar
• salt
• vanilla extract
• cream
• milk
• chipped ice
• rock salt

And that's all.

Recipe: Chocolate Sledgehammer

Ingredients:
Breyers Chocolate Ice Cream.
I've said this before and I'll say it again. No substitutions. Sure you can drive over to Stewart's if you want to get some of that rock-hard gooey nonsense filled with guar gum. Or if you really despise easily-served frozen confections and you like the sugar/cream ratios in your desserts all farked up, pick yourself up some Häagen-Dazs and microwave it like an idiot. I like my ice cream the old fashioned way, the way our founding fathers intended it to be. Soft and melty.

Frozen Hershey's Nuggets.
I'm pretty sure you can use any chocolate you want here, but the Nuggets are important as they are large and blocky. They are hard to break with a spoon, thus forcing you to eat them whole.

Directions:
1. Fill medium size bowl with ice cream.
2. Add betwen 1 and ten frozen nuggets.
3. Enjoy!

And don't try breaking the candy bars up into little pieces. They're frozen for a reason.

Typical eating experience:
mmm ice cream, mmm ice cream, mmm ice cream, WHAM, MASSIVE CHOCOLATE BAR! (repeat) That's why it's called The Sledgehammer.

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