double cream does not exist

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.... where I live.

So I am going to use mascarpone (plus a bit of sugar) as a sub cos the fat content makes it the nearest possible alternative.

Except, the tubs of mascapone are in mg and the recipe says ml for the double cream.

Do I just pack the mascarpone into my liquid measuring jug ? Or would 1mg =1ml anyway ?

Or maybe I should thin the mascapone with a little unwhipped whipping cream (which has the highest fat content for cream that I can get here) , make it into less of a solid and then measure it that way ?

Bloody hell, the recipe leads with how it's so simple it's not really worthy of the term "recipe" .... and already it's becoming horribly complicated, even before I gone to the supermarket let alone been let loose with a whisk.

I'm assuming you're making the 395g condensed milk, 600ml thickened/double cream ice cream recipe.

It does come out super hard. I have to leave it out of freezer for 5-10 mins before serving so it can soften a little.

In Australia, double cream is called thickened cream, and the extra thick double is called double or dollop cream. We don't have single cream.

Sherry from LIDL!!!!

HanSolo, heavy cream in the US is not double cream. It's much thinner and pours like milk. Double cream is so much denser. If you drop a dollop of double cream into a mug of hot chocolate not that I've ever done that it doesn't dissolve right away

Double cream pours like milk.
Extra think double cream can be 'dolloped'.

I'm in Canada and they don't even have heavy cream here. Whipping cream is the thickest stuff you can get, and that's only because it's got additives .

This Christmas I made gingerbread and pumpkin trifle and egg nog icecream, and for both I used half whipping cream/half mascapone in liquid measures. Oh and I added melted white chocolate in the whipped cream topping for the trifle.

I think it was all the alcohol in the icecream that stopped it setting too hard though

Is there a reason for wanting to make icecream in Italy? I'd say they already make some of the best icecream in the world. Would it be easier to buy it?

Tho comments on Delia's website suggest your mascarpone substitution is the best bet.

Oh, and 1 ml technically is only 1g for water.
But I'd just put in the number of g as recipie calls for ml. In this case the difference isn't going to matter. Officially, you need 596g of cream in a recipie calling for 600ml.

If you make custard I like to add a tsp of corn flour like delia it helps to stabilize the egg yolks and stop it scrambling.

I promise gelato is lovely here.

But I don't want gelato. I want massively creamy, decadent "non Italian" ice cream flavours. Like white chocolate and bashed biscuits. Or Ovaltine chocolate bar. Or baileys and cacao nibs. Or pecan (have finally found an accessible supply of pecans that cost less than gold per gram!) Or peanut butter.

But I'm not getting any tonight. Becuase DH & DS went to the supermarket and DS picked me out a "special" mascapone as a treat.

Gorgonzola and mascapone mixed.

It's lovely, but not quite what I had in mind for ice cream.

I'll go myself tomorrow and get normal mascapone and maybe have a look at the 90% proof alcohol they have for making limoncello at home. A glug of that in my ice cream shouldn't alter the flavour and at that strength should take some of the "rock hard" out of the result. Although... DS is only 15. Not sure the hardest spirit of all is the best thing to stick in his pudding. But I suppose per serving it'd only be a tiny amount.

Off to Google the Italian for corn flour.......

Well bugger me. 20 years of staring at mystery products in the baking section that I was too chicken to buy because I couldn't work out what they were from squinting at the teeny tiny writing on the packet and it turns out that one of them..amido di mais... is actually just plain old corn flour. So custard is a go.

Somebody should do a specialised dictionary for supermarkets, food stuff, cuts of meats and fish types. Wotshisface Carluccio helped massively with his big book of bilingual veg, but the tentative cooks amoung us (me) could do with a handy guide of everything to lug around the supermarket with her.

Guess what has just arrived today in my Esselunga (only supermarket near me that offers online shopping) . Nann Bread !

I haven't had nann bread since 1997.

There is the google translate app. Fire it up and it opens the camera on your phone, put the writing so the camera can see it and it translates on the fly.

Actually, gorgonzola would make a fab icecream, you could serve a scoop of it with walnut and pear salad, or fig and parma ham as an amazing antipasta.

Keep us updated. I am loving your adventures in cooking. Can I live vicariously through you while cooking beans on toast and having shepherds pie flung back in my face (2 yo twins going through a fussy phase)

Blimey.

Do not use 96% proof alcohol to make your ice cream soft and then accidentally lick the tablespoon you used to measure it.

It's burny.

I have luffly before picture. And now three ice creams are freezing. One biscuit and white chocolate flavour, one mango and extra glug of alcohol flavour (cos there was A LOT of mango once I'd whizzed it and I'm worried it will freeze solid) one fake snickers bar reduced to powder flavour.

DS is now cleaning the kitchen. I'm feeling slightly pissed.

I'm still feeling slightly pissed.

Maybe it evaporated a lot in my face while I was holding the bottle.

I have vague disturbing memories of Russians going blind due to almost 100% proof alcohol. I don't want to go blind.

I have no idea why this stuff is even legal. 13 euros and you can murder your liver in one fell swoop.

See this is why I don't drink. I am not a happy slightly pissed person. I am a parnoid about going blind slightly pissed person. Have horrible feeling that DH (another non drinker) is going to get absolutely slaughtered on his mango ice cream. That got a proper slug in it.

Loved reading about your Italian cooking, please let us know how the ice creams turn out

It's going quite well I think. Two are already feeling quite solid if you squeeze the container.

The mango is a bit soft. May have overdone the massively alcoholic alcohol glug.

Oh well, a mousse sort of texture is still better than rock hard.

Brilliant! Don't let your DS near the mango one then!

I'm not sure I can persuade DH near the mango one either. He hasn't drunk a thing for 3 years and one spoon of the mixture to taste has left him a little woosey and

He is in full blown "never trust the English in the kitchen!" mode

96% proof alcohol for medicinal usage only!
(and making home made vodkas )

It's mostly the sugar content which controls the softness, can you up that to counter act instead of marscapone?

But I say this as an ice cream professional, just go to the Gelateria!

Thank you for sharing the Gorgonzola mascarpone that raised a couple of smiles here.

East it makes one smile even more when it's on a cracker . I prefer just Gorgonzola on it's own, but my philosophy is never look a gift blue cheese in the mouth. I might try *Allalone's" idea. That would STUN all my mates next time I have to bring something to a barbecue.

Albus but they don't make fake pulverised snickers flavour. I swear, in the 12 years since we moved out of the city to our rural backwater, the gelataria has not added a new flavour once. It's lovely. But am bored. No wait, I tell a lie. They added Smirf ice cream. It's blue. I don't fancy it, liquidised Smirf seems cruel.

anti I'm not making vodka. I think I'll just use the rest of the bottle as the world's most expensive window cleaning and handle wiping solution. It's very ..... powerful. In the way that being punched in the throat is. Or I can give it to next door. She's superwoman. She probably knocks up limoncello in her sleep.

Right. Time to test the ice cream. Must be frozen by now.

Have you thought about selling your ideas to them? Maybe they have lost all creative thought and need a thinker such as yourself to guide them?

One idea for a years supply seems reasonable to me!

Well 2 out of three isn't bad.

DS's biscuit/white choc scoops alright. More work than supermarket soft scoop, but nothing tragic. I found it a bit in the mouth. Maybe too much white choc was what made it a bit clarty? Not even a hint of alcohol in this one.

My pulverised snickers tastes fab. Scooping is harder than DS's, but I think that is down to the sheer mass of the fake snickers powder. I want more. But it's v. rich and I don't want to feel sick. Again, no alcohol taste.

DH's mango... Oh dear. But DH valiantly tried to be nice about it... right up until I gave him my taste to finished for me, which pushed him over the edge.

I have a video of the scooping in progress, so you can see what I mean about it being a bit harder than shop bought, but still scoopy. Might take a while to load cos I've gussied it up a bit for my sister, who will laugh like a drain.

Sherry (but with Marsala not sherry) trifle should go better as long as I don't have an egg crisis. I'll do it once we've finished the ice cream.