Orange Ice Cream

A Philadelphia-style ice cream in the oldest sense: no eggs, no cooking, just cream, juice and sugar frozen together. The whole thing hinges on how you combine the acid and the dairy.

• Add the juice to the cream, not the reverse, and keep everything coldKeep everything cold when you combine them -- orange juice is acidic enough to curdle cream on contact. The recipe pours the cream into the juice; chill both to refrigerator temperature and add in a slow stream while stirring. A little graininess will still appear, and it largely churns out unnoticed.
• Thin creamPeriod "thin" or "light" cream ran roughly 18-20 percent butterfat. Light or table cream is the nearest match, half-and-half the easiest supermarket substitute; either way the two cups of juice dilute the mixture, so overall butterfat lands in the low teens.
• Sugar is not optional seasoning here"Sweeten to taste" understates its structural job. Sugar keeps the base from freezing into a solid block, so a mixture this high in water needs roughly 3/4 to 1 cup for the four cups of liquid. Dissolve it in the juice before the cream goes in.
• FreezingWritten for a hand-crank bucket packed with ice and rock salt. In a modern machine, churn the fully chilled base 20-30 minutes, then harden in the freezer at least four hours. Without a machine, freeze in a shallow pan and beat thoroughly every 30 minutes for about three hours.
• Use fresh juice, strainedTwo cups is about six to eight juicing oranges. Strain out pulp and membrane, which freeze into hard flecks. Concentrate or shelf-stable juice gives a flat, cooked flavor that the cream does nothing to hide.
• YieldAbout a quart of base before churning, serving four to six.
• ServingThe suggested canned strawberries were a standard winter storecupboard item. Any fruit crushed with sugar and left half an hour to give up its syrup does the same job.