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Junket Ice Cream with Peaches
4 cups lukewarm milk 1 cup heavy cream 1 1/4 cups sugar 1/8 teaspoon salt 1 1/2 Junket Tablets 1 tablespoon cold water 1 tablespoon vanilla 1 teaspoon almond extract Green Coloring 1 can peaches Mix first four ingredients, and add junket tablets dissolved in cold water. Turn into a pudding-dish and let stand until set. Add flavoring and coloring. Freeze, mould, and serve garnished with halves of peaches, filling cavities with halves of blanched almonds. Turn peaches into a saucepan, add one-third cup sugar, and cook slowly until syrup is thick. Cool before garnishing ice cream.
A rennet-set ice cream from the era when junket tablets sat beside the baking powder in most pantries. The method is unusual: the milk is clabbered into a soft custard-like set first, then churned.
- Junket tabletsThese are rennet tablets, still sold as Junket brand rennet in some groceries and widely online; vegetarian rennet tablets may set slightly softer. Package directions for rennet tablets generally run about one tablet to a quart of milk, so 1 1/2 tablets to 4 cups is a firmer-than-usual dose rather than a standard proportion. Do not substitute liquid animal rennet by count of drops without checking strength on the package.
- Lukewarm means lukewarmThe hinge of the recipe. Rennet works best around 100-110F and is largely destroyed above about 140F; milk that is too cool will set very slowly or not at all. Warm to just barely body temperature and no further.
- Do not stir once set is startingTurn the mixture into the dish and leave it undisturbed for 10-15 minutes. Agitating a setting rennet curd breaks it into whey and grain and the finished cream will be watery.
- Flavoring after settingAs written, the vanilla, almond extract and coloring go in after the set, which means stirring the curd anyway. Adding them to the lukewarm milk before the rennet gives a smoother result and does not interfere with setting.
- Freezing"Freeze, mould" assumes a hand-crank churn and a mould packed in ice and salt. A domestic ice cream machine takes 20-30 minutes; chill the set mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator first, since it will be at room temperature after standing.
- Green coloringGreen tinting alongside almond extract was a familiar stand-in for pistachio in this period. Purely decorative here and safely omitted.
- The peachesCanned peach halves. Simmer slowly with the one-third cup sugar until the syrup thickens, judging by the syrup rather than the clock. Cool fully before they touch the ice cream.
- YieldAbout 1 1/2 quarts, serving 8 to 10 with the peach garnish.