Cool Down With Ice Cream

Even though it's June, there are parts of the world where the temps are reaching 100 degrees Farenheit. The only good suggestion is to cool down with some ice cream. It's the perfect summery comfort food. It brings back memories of eating cones on the beach or sharing a gooey sundae under warm, starry skies. Ice cream always is a special treat for foodies - no matter how it's served.

Ice cream is one of the oldest foods in the world. Chinese emperors enjoyed a treat made of fruit and wine mixed with mountain ice as early as 3,000 BC. The ancient Romans also loved flavored ice and Nero always sent his slaves to the nearby mountains for snow and ice. He then had his cooks flavor it with fruits and nectar. During the 1300s the Chinese developed a way to add yak's milk to the ice for a creamier consistency. This new take on frozen dessert caught the eye of Marco Polo who brought it back to Italy. Italian chefs used cow's milk and - presto - modern ice cream was born. Catherine Medici brought the recipe with her from Northern Italy to France when she married into the French royal family. The French instantly took to it and served it at most court dinners. A century or more later Charles I had it at a French royal banquet and was so taken with it that he brought the recipe back to England.

America got its' first taste in 1700 at the dinner of Governor Bladen of Maryland. As early as 1777 New York City had its' first ice cream parlor. (you've got to wonder if General Washington stopped in to have a bowl).Ice cream parlors spread through the new nation and by the mid 1800s the first ice cream factory was born in Baltimore, Maryland (how appropriate because it was first made there). This was the era of the new improved ice cream. Machines were being built to make richer creamier ice cream at a faster rate. The French scientist, August Gaulin, invented the homogenization process which resulted in a creamier, smoother texture. Soon cones, invested by Italo Martchioni were being sold on the streets of New York.The 20th Century saw the birth of ice cream novelties such as the waffle cone, first introduced at the St Louis World's Fair, Eskimo pie and ice cream on a stick. The 1990s saw freeze dried ice cream called Dipping Dots sold at malls across the US.

The best way to have ice cream? Anyway you want. Add caramel or chocolate sauce but remember to take advantage of summer's fruit. Pair vanilla ice cream with blackberries for an extra special treat.Add strawberry slices to chocolate ice cream or better yet fresh picked raspberries. Consider putting your ice cream in a hollowed out melon or with pineapple, for a real old fashioned ice cream parlor taste. My Mom and her one cousin lived for these durng their girlhood and teen-age years.If you're lucky to own an ice cream maker now is the time to make fresh batches using all sorts of bounties, from blueberries to even lemon basil.

Ice cream is a wonderful cool summer treat It brings us sweet relief and happy memories from summers past.Have a bowl ,or cone of it when the high temps have got you down.