Chocolate icecream is at the top of most people's list even if they don't like chocolate very much and this version from Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (1891) is delicious. Italian gelato is based on milk rather than cream and Pellegrino's dislike for too much of anything results in a healthier icecream. For 1lt of milk, you need only 100g of sugar and 200g of grated chocolate - nothing else. Artusi knew his recipe might not be liked by everyone so he also gave a variation with more sugar, plus yolks.
Hardcore chocolate fans might go for dark chocolate, as there is no mention of chocolate type in the original recipe. Perhaps it used milk chocolate, which is sweeter, and had already been invented since 1875. Until recently few cookbooks distinguished between dark and milk chocolate anyway because the standard version for kitchen use contained milk.
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| La Belle Chocolatière (Jean-Étienne Liotard, 1744-1745) |
Interestingly, chocolate sorbet recipes are made with either milk or half milk half cream or even water - the last version resulting in light chocolate gelato, not very different from Artusi's regular icecream. Frozen drinks that would remind of chocolate sorbet or Pellegrino's gelato had already been in fashion throughout Italy, as noted in Traitez nouveaux & curieux du café, du thé et du chocolate (1685) by Philippe Sylvestre Dufour: "A Livorne, & en d'autres endroites d'Italie où l'on a accoûtumé de mettre à la glace ou à la neige presque toutes les boissons, pour cherchez des tempreremens contre les excessives chaleurs qui regnent en ce païs là, on boit souvent le Chocolate à la glace [...]" p. 368. The 17th century French essay underlined the popularity of chocolate in Spain and Europe, including detailed analysis on the best ways and time for enjoying chocolate, its beneficial properties, the medical symptoms it alleviates etc.
Chocolate beverage was heavily spiced in the early days, following the Mesoamerican tradition, and there is no reason to suppose that frozen versions popular in Italy were different. Pellegrino Artusi used vanilla in moderation, having a preference for local flavorings, such as lemon zest that doesn't pair with chocolate. The absence of spice in his chocolate icecream is not a problem, however, as cook's chocolate is flavored with vanilla. The purpose of adding spice was not only to moderate the bitterness of cocoa, Dufour explained: vanilla, for example, had medicinal properties of its own. Sugar, in particular, was used as preservative because the fat in cocoa eventually spoiled the product.
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