Editor’s note: The following article is a synopsis written by staff members and volunteers of the Cary Public Library highlighting one of the suggested reading books, as determined by their staff.
It was a pleasure to see on the front page of the Houlton Pioneer Times earlier this spring of a little local girl eating ice cream outside the Houlton Farms Dairy Military Street shop, dressed in a snowsuit eating her first ice cream cone of 2014, while sitting on her snowsled! A precious Maine sight.
Ice cream has a long history of development at least from Mesopotamia about 4,000 years ago when icehouses were built to hold ice and snow from high mountains for chilling food. A little book, “Ice Cream- A Global History” by Laura B. Weiss, is now available in our Library. Heavily referenced and researched, this gem even has recipes developed over many years.
“Ice cream is exquisite” wrote Voltaire. “What a pity it isn’t illegal.”
Did you know articles have been written on the art and science of licking hard or soft ice cream? Did you know Margaret Thatcher worked as a food researcher for a leading British ice cream company in the 1950s? Are you familiar with the delicious gelato now available? And sorbets? Different countries have different, and often, puzzling words for these treats – one is Turkey’s “salepi” (page 124).
Foreign countries love somewhat distinctive flavors: green tea (in Japan), crab, sea urchin, garlic, musk melon, and local fruits; however, world-wide the biggest seller is vanilla!
Using various recipes, textures of ice cream can range from custard-like to coarse to downright chewy.
Now, where are my car keys? Suppose the dairy bars are still open? Let’s go!
The Cary Public Library is open Monday-Wednesday and Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. For more information, call 532-1302.
