Ice-Cream... Summer’s Frozen Food

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 840, 7 December 1929, Page 21

Ice-Cream... Summer’s Frozen Food

Popular Delicacy Invented by Frenchman in 16th Century . . . An Industry That Has Swept the Globe ... Auckland Consumes 100,000 Gallons a Year

(Written for THE SUX by

M. H. WYBERT.)

BTRANGE blossoms are sometimes of the commoncream, although to be but a popular — innovation, is touched by the hand of history. France, the home of feminine fashion, must be proclaimed the originator of other equally ornamental and useful things. Historians may declare the Bourbon regime effete, but we must regard it as the ne plus ultra of taste, for it is to that supercilious age—a period of airy autocracy—that we owe many of our epicurean marvels. Kver seeking fresh diversions to satisfy its jaded tastes this brilliant, pleasure-wearied Court traversed every held of human . experience. Dictator of fashion, connoisseur of taste, and the most sybaritic court in Kurope ... it invented a dish which should help to render it immortal. To France we must, ascribe the glory of ice-cream! Ancient records indicate that frozen desserts had been used in France as early as the fifteenth century. Until comparatively recent years, however, the manufacturing cost was so high that they were regarded as luxuries to be indulged in only on rare occasions. It Is said that the first advertisement for ice-cream appeared in a New York paper “The Post Boy” in 1786. Nevertheless it was not until about 1851 that an attempt was made to manufacture it in wholesale quantities. Manufactured in America The manufacture of ice-cream is reputed to have been first practised in America by one Fussell, whose name

although enshrouded in doubtful obscurity, is according to popular opinion worthy to take its place among the benefactors of mankind. We can well imagine the mortification of George 111. who, if he had been gifted with the powers of divination. , would have seen that, through his | blundering statesmanship, he lost for

England a manufacturing process that has revolutionised the epicurean world. It is said that this “Farmer George” was distinguished by his superb gluttony, and we cannot help but wonder how infinite his scope would have been in this new field of endeavour, but enough of misguided kings.

Fussell was a milk dealer in Baltimore iu the early fifties. He became interested in ice-cream in an effort to find profitable outlet for the surplus sweet cream he had on hand from time to time. Its manufacture was undertaken as a side-line that proved so lucrative that Fussell disposed of his milk business and confined his attention to the new enterprise. He sub-

sequently established factories in Washington, Boston and New York. It is inevitable in all branches of human endeavour that the original thinker should be succeeded by an even greater genius, and this instance is no exception to the rule. Parry Brazleton of Mount Pleasant, Indiana, first studied the wholesale ice-cream business in FusselFs plant at Washington. Being of an assimilative and enterprising mind he quickly mastered its Intricacies and returned West to establish' a factory in St. Louis. Later followed factories in Cincinnati and Chicago. These were the earliest ice-cream establishments operating on wholesale lines. Growth in Business From that day to this there has been a steady growth in this branch of industry. The most rapid expansions and the greatest improvements have,

naturally, taken place during the last twenty years. The remarkable development in the industry has no doubt been expedited by the improvements made in mechanical refrigeration and by the perfecting of ice-cream machinery. The production of ice-cream at the present day is conducted upon highly hygienic lines, and may safely be regarded as one of the cleanest and healthiest occupations in the world. It is estimated that the annual output of ice-cream in the U.S.A. is about 800,000,000 gallons. At the present time the annual sales are no doubt in excess of £80,000,000. The profits from the manufacture and sale of this commodity are clearly brought out by the following quotation.

One hundred pounds of 18 per cent, cream are equal to 12 gallons, which with 66 per cent, overrun (swell) will produce 20 gallons of ice-cream, and if sold for 10s a gallon will amount to £lO. It may surprise many to learn that the most successful ice-cream producers are imbued with a strong artistic spirit and what is more, tliiis

is strongly evidenced in their work. Original ideas and designs will always command a premium where there is any market for fancy ice-cream. And fancy ice-cream is certainly a popular vogue among present-day hostesses. The ice-cream maker who can give these little suggestions is sure of success, but it requires the exercise of good taste. His artistic leanings should be polychromatic. A full knowledge of the Correggio colour schemes will be Invaluable to him, as he reproduces his ideas in his daily work.

Ah! what is a Socrates, a Pascal, or a Hume, with all their philosophy compared with a man whose masterpiece has been the production of icecream? To the average perso.n the philosophical abstractions of these benign figures are as remote and obscure as their names. But the sixpenny Ice-cream of Fussell is not only

a tangible reality, but in the words of the poet, a joy for ever. From Palm Beach to the Lido, from the Lido to Sydney, from Sydney to Auckland, the fame and popularity of this heat palliative has been sung. The joy of small boys’ hearts, the delight of flappers, and the secret weakness of age, it is assured of immortality. Auckland Likes Ice-Cream Auckland," populated with the most suu-worshipping people in New Zealand, is the largest ice-cream manufacturing city in the Dominion. The yearly production is calculated to be somewhere in the region of 126,000

gallons. Approximately two-thirds of that aggregate is sold in Queen Street du ing the summer mouths. One large retail firm operating in Queen Street consumes one ton and a half of fresh fruit during the five hottest months, and produces icecream at the rate of 125 gallons a day. which, although comparing unfavourably with the 60 tons a day produced

by Lyons in London, is great enough to impress us with the immensity of this industry. The Queen City can boast of two icecream factories operating on the wholesale basis, while there are many minor retail concerns. How It Is Made Most people are sublimely ignorant as to the amount of labour necessary for the production of the threepenny ice-cream they enjoy so complacently on the sun-scorched sands. Many have vague, and rather uncertain, ideas about hefty navvies, impervious to cold, hauling large portions of ice here and there, dumping them in gallons of milk, and leaving the rest to chance.

Such a conception, however, is utterly erroneous and a brief survey of what actually does take place will tend to disabuse their minds. The interior of au ice-cream factory is large, decidedly cool, and crowded with st range-looking devices which bear the appearance of huge baths con forming to the dictates of a new

fashion. These weird contraptions play a most important part iu the production of the commodity that contributes so largely to the pleasure of our summer existence. Let us follow the process of manufacture through its Various phases—from the embryo stage to that of final completion. The milk is first placed into a large tank and sucked through au elongated pipe into a pasteurising vat, which consists of two glass partitions shaped like a bath and steam-heated to a temperature of 150 deg. It is allowed

to remain standing in this temperature for half an hour. The steam Is then shut off and the milk cools to 120 deg., after which it is passed into a viscoliser. From the viscoliser it is forced through a needle valve working at the pressure of 2,500 lbs. a square inch, the intense force of which succeeds in breaking up and pulverising all particles of butter fat. Its next receptacle is the cooling vats which are encircled with ammonia pipes. There it remains until cooled to 40 deg.

It leaves the vats to pass down into the freezers which are kept at 30 deg. below zero. To attain this temperature they are connected with tubes

leading from a cork-lined chamber, which is kept in a perpetual state of intense cold. It is then discharged from the freezers in a semi-liquid form into metal casks that are placed in the ice-rooms, for 36 hours, to mature. At the conclusion of these proceedings the ice-cream is considered to be ready for consumption. That in short is a description of a manufacturing process of which so many of us have remained in sublime ignorance.

Value as a Food

To declare that ice-cream possesses more body-building properties than ordinary milk sounds very much like rank heresy, but it is a statement that is by no means idle, for it is substantiated by the opinions of prominent medical practitioners. Thousands of doctors recommend its use after illness.

One w-oman, well known in Auckland society and obviously opposed to the modern cult of slenderness, is reputed to visit daily, the establishment of an ice-cream vendor in Queen Street and to consume a half-pint of ice-cream.

after which she stands coyly on the weight-testing scales and surveys the dial. Needless to say she has a waist line considerably in excess of the required silhouette slim.

Another statement which may astound the average person is that tn America there are Chairs at the University for this branch of industry. It is no longer a trade but has been elevated to the status of a profession. The numbei of ice-creams guaranteed to excite and intrigue young people are as varied as the cloaks of Sardanapalus. The names are both weird and wonderful, and their inventors evidently have a decided ear for euphony.

For lovers of light opera we have the “Merry Widow,” while the popular song has been made more definite with the title of “Sunny Jim.” The mysterious charm of summer nights is brought very near to us with “Moonlight,” and the “Rangitoto” really infers something mountainously special in the w-ay of ice-creams.

It Is said that the anticipation of a pleasure is as keen as the pleasure itself, and certainly the inventors of these harmonious names have exercised their ingenuity to please. One could, with all due modesty, suggest even fresh additions to lha already extensive list—something say, with a dash of local colour. Locality always has charm and these suggestions should be eagerly adopted—“Takapuna Tasty,” “Birkenhead Beauty,” “Devonport Delicious’—but then one could go on for ever composing titles that would illuminate the local ice-cream world. An interesting process is the manufacture of cones and wafers, which are of course the latural concomitants of ice-cream. Probably the most famous firm in this respect is Peak Frean, the London manufacturers, who, it is alleged, pay their departmental chief £1,500 a year.

All the making is done by highlyspecialised machinery which ensures absolute hygienic production. The presiding genius of this concern lectured extensively in America upon “Cones and their Production” or if not that, some equally esoteric subject. He was received with enthusiasm by a people with whom ice-cream is a fetish.

In this enlightened age, whose proud boast is that education is disseminated among tho mass, it is to be hoped that the erroneous ideas current regarding the harm caused by eating ice-cream will be eradicated.

One may reason upon the futility of life and long for the freedom of the animal world. But one is not disposed to envy the bird for its liberty, no- the male for its ease when one recollects that their existence is an ice-creamless one—barren and desolate.