Ok, this is probably a bit off topic but it is DIY.
If you make ice lollies by freezing fruit juice in lolly moulds, you end up with a hard lump of ice on a stick. If you buy an ice lolly, the ice is much softer and you can bite off little chunks easily. Does anyone know what they do to commercial ice lollies to make them like this?
Try adding a little bit more sugar syrup or get some glycerol (decent cake supply shops will have some or see your local chemist). You need something to lower the freezing point of the solution so it will be less solidly frozen at the temp of your freezer. The trick of course is to use something that will do the job without introducing unwanted flavours. Thinking about it you could use some of the lighter flavoured non creamed honeys too, though I don't know how the waxes in it will react to the low temps.
Or make alcoholic ice lollies ;-)
Peter
Add shockingly large amount of sugar?
AFAIR, you need something very cold to freeze them more quickly, and you shouldn't store them for long once frozen. We make them in the freezer, not the fridge, and place the mould directly against the metal wall of the evaporator.
Commercial ones probably have some noxious goop in there that makes it easy.
Ah, that probably explains why frozen strong made-up squash comes out just fine. (Not the low-cal varieties, obviously. Spit.)
Spot on, they are "blast frozen" on a conveyor belt system then they need to be stored in a commercial freezer for some time to warm up enough to be saleable.
To make homemade ice lollies you need to remember that the sense of taste is diminished by cold so an ice lolly mixture needs to be *really* heavy on flavouring. Try melting a commercial lolly and tasting it. Yes, it has to be that sweet, that sticky and that strong. For orange lollies, freezing "hi-juice" orange drink stright from the bottle (no dilution) is the way to go. Costs a bit mind.
Liquid nitrogen van be used to make great icecream, can't see why you couldn't try using it for lollies too. LN is cheaper than beer !
Steve
As has been pointed out, flash freezing is a strategy. You may find that conventional ice cream making technique helps, in that as it freezes you whisk it to break up the crystals and fill it into the mould as a slurry before the final freeze. For another strategy, you might find that a sorbet mix will produce a softer lolly because of the egg white. For ice cream proper, The fat content should be high (so there goes the diet!) as this both makes the ice cream softer at minus 18, but it also has a much lower specific heat then water so that it softens faster at room temperature. Again, proper freeze-and-beat cycling helps as does entraining plenty of air. The commercial advantages of entraining air into a product sold by volume are fairly obvious.
John Schmitt
-- If you have nothing to say, or rather, something extremely stupid and obvious, say it, but in a 'plonking' tone of voice - i.e. roundly, but hollowly and dogmatically. - Stephen Potter
A shame.
John Schmitt
-- If you have nothing to say, or rather, something extremely stupid and obvious, say it, but in a 'plonking' tone of voice - i.e. roundly, but hollowly and dogmatically. - Stephen Potter
Some freezers have a "fast freeze" switch which lowers the temperature of a part of the cabinet specifically so you can freeze things better. If not, adjusting the dial so that the compressor is on continuously for a while has a similar effect. Don't forget to put it back to the normal position once everything's frozen though!
Mind you, if you've a combined unit like ours, there's only one dial and that does both fridge and freezer - separate compartments but the same compressor and radiator. Turning the dial up to lower the temperature in the freezer does the same to the fridge...
Hwyl!
M.
Exactly, which means the temperature ramps down faster after opening the door and placing something warm inside. Mechanism isn't important, only the endpoint. Which is why I have been known to throw dry ice into a
-70C freezer that was failing to maintain the temperature while a better solution arrived.
Peter
In message , Andy Dingley writes
They probably also agitate them during the freeing process
Not in my local it's not
What's the minimum quantity you can buy?
If they sold it it would be. Depending on who you are less than
20p a litre. It's a bit like the spoil from a goldmine as far as BOC are concerned. In the successive liquefaction of air, ignoring water,oxygen comes out first about 20% then the nitrogen 79% or thereabouts then there's argon about 0.9% which is the gold. Somewhere the carbon dioxide comes out, but it is basically waste as there are far easier ways to do dry ice. Finally neon and krypton and xenon which are the platinum, rubies and diamonds of the process.Probably 25 litres. You'll have to do it through a company, because nanny doesn't like people to have such dangerous toys. Your best bet is to find a local college (one with an electron microscope is a good bet) and take a thermos along and cadge some. The dewars lose a reasonable amount, so a litre here or there won't be noticed.
John Schmitt
-- If you have nothing to say, or rather, something extremely stupid and obvious, say it, but in a 'plonking' tone of voice - i.e. roundly, but hollowly and dogmatically. - Stephen Potter
Why do they cost nearly a quid apiece? It is a ridiculous price.
There is a difference in the way that ice crystals form in a fridge or a freezer. With the slow cooling capacity of a fridge the crystals formed are large. With a faster freeze the crysals are smaller. That is why the food frozen in a fridge turns to pulp.
It is a good way to produce apple juice and whatever else. Defrost, filter, chill; perhaps add a drop of glycerine to taste (or wine??) Then pop it in the freezer to make slabs of fruit ice. Or make your own wine with it. (Don't freeze that though, as the apple-jack -or whatever, alcohol will be full of a poison called fusel oil.)
We got ours from the local heat treatment company - they quench metals in it. It was free !
Steve
It applies to *any* alcoholic drink. I suspect it also applies to de-alcoholised alcoholic drinks too. I always found that the low alcohol beers made by reverse osmosis gave me a very satisfying hangover without any of that awful feeling of relaxation and well-being. Fusel oil is a relatively undefined term but is a collection of poisonous chemicals which give you a hangover. Concentrating alcohol by freezing only makes it volumetrically easier to take a "fatal" dose. It is of course illegal to concentrate alcohol by any means without an excise licence.
John Schmitt
-- If you have nothing to say, or rather, something extremely stupid and obvious, say it, but in a 'plonking' tone of voice - i.e. roundly, but hollowly and dogmatically. - Stephen Potter
/fusel oil/? Can you elaborate please? Does this apply to any frozen alcohol drink, or just apple-based ones?
I'm no expert by any means. My homebrew comes out of a can. I don't even have a fridge. But:
I believe it is produced in all fermentations but is especially prone to be present in root crop ones where there is insufficient yeast nutriment -unless you add it (ammonium phosphate I think it's called.) It is the sort of liquor extract that also produces cloudy musts (from too much pectin) although that will drop using the fridge to pulp your fruit or veg instead of boiling it.
Brewmasters know when to stop the ferment before distilling or recycle the first percentage of alcohol produced. That can't happen with freezing the cider to produce applejack. The oil and the alcohol separate from the ice formed and the drinkers get a bad head or in bad cases can go blind. Apples, like root crops don't have enough nutriment for the yeast either. I believe scrumpy gets to be so strong because of the presence of certain creatures in the windfalls.
Again this all unsupported rumour.
In message , Frank writes
Aah, but that's already been distilled, so the higher alcohols have been more or less removed. Freezing it would make little difference - as opposed to simply freezing wine or beer where the water would freeze out leaving the whole alcohol mix liquid
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