Orange Ice
One dozen oranges, juice of two lemons, two quarts water; sugar to the taste. Rind of four oranges grated on sugar. Freeze as usual.--Mrs. G. D. L. Orange Ice.
Juice of nine oranges, juice of one lemon, one and one-quarter pounds powdered sugar, two quarts water. To be frozen.--Mrs. I. H.
Two versions of the same water ice from two contributors, printed back to back. Neither gives a churning method because every kitchen using this book had a crank freezer packed with ice and rock salt on the back porch.
- "Freeze as usual"This means a bucket freezer: the mixture goes in the canister, the canister is surrounded by crushed ice layered with rock salt (roughly 3 parts ice to 1 part salt by volume), and the crank is turned until the dasher stiffens. A modern ice cream machine does the same job in 20-30 minutes. Without a machine, freeze in a shallow pan and rake with a fork every 30 minutes for about three hours, which gives a granita texture rather than a smooth ice.
- Sugar is structure, not just sweetnessThe second version's one and one-quarter pounds of powdered sugar is about 2 3/4 cups, which in two quarts of water plus juice lands near 15 percent sugar — right for a scoopable ice. "Sugar to the taste" in the first version is the weak point: under-sugared, the ice freezes into a solid block; over-sugared, it never sets. Aim for the same weight as Mrs. I. H. gives and adjust by taste from there.
- Powdered sugarIn 1879 this meant sugar ground fine, not the cornstarch-cut confectioners' sugar sold today. Use ordinary granulated and dissolve it in a little of the water warmed first.
- Rind grated on sugarThis is the most useful instruction on the page. Rubbing or grating zest directly into sugar draws out the citrus oils and makes a fragrant syrup — the same principle as an oleo-saccharum. It gives far more orange flavour than juice alone, which is why the first version needs less sugar discipline to taste of oranges.
- Oranges have changedVarieties and sizes differed from today's navels, so juice yield from a stated number of fruit is not directly comparable; go by taste and by the sugar-to-liquid balance rather than by fruit count. Strain out the pulp and membrane or it will freeze into gritty threads.
- YieldEach version makes roughly 2 1/2 to 3 quarts, enough for 10 to 12 servings — a party quantity, which is what a hand-cranked freezer was worth the trouble for.
- ServingWater ices of this period were served between courses or as the dessert itself, in small glasses. Let the ice sit five minutes out of the freezer before scooping; a low-fat ice sets harder than custard-based ice cream.
Water ices — fruit juice, sugar and water, frozen with no dairy — reached American tables well before ice cream became a household possibility, and they stayed popular through the 19th century partly because they were cheap and partly because they were thought lighter and more suitable between rich courses. What made them practical in a Virginia kitchen was ice itself: commercial icehouses and the northern ice trade put packed ice within reach of Southern towns by mid-century, and the hand-cranked freezer patented in the 1840s did the rest. Oranges were a treat that announced both money and modern supply lines. That two contributors sent in nearly identical recipes, printed one after the other with only initials for credit, is characteristic of Housekeeping in Old Virginia (1878): Marion Cabell Tyree assembled it from some 250 housekeepers of Virginia and her sister states, and let their duplications stand.