Snow Cream

Snow for children is a dream world of special delights: no school, sledding, snowmen, and snowball fights. Then there is the treasured memory of making snow cream and shivering with its stinging on your tongue from the icy cold. It is much colder than regular ice cream.
Snow for Ono County is normally wet and heavy, just the stuff for packing into balls or rolling to produced forts and snowmen. Snow cream requires a light, dry fluffy deep snow to produced the best ice cream. For us in the southern region of the US it is a rare phenomena.
I mentioned making snow cream in an e-mail to friends and the overwhelming response was, "I haven't had that since I was little." Strange, but my spouse, who is a Yankee, had never eaten it, but quickly became a fan.
We're using the left overs for a topping on fruit salad instead of a dairy whip, though it doesn't keep well in a frost-free freezer. It rapidly develops little ice crystals, but retains its unique taste. He has also been using it to cool his coffee.
For all our Ono County fans to keep for the next time an Artic Clipper blows cold dry snow down our way this is the recipe for a beloved memory of childhood. Snow Cream without all the calories of the original.
Collect a dishpan of clean light snow, avoiding any yellow snow. Store it on the back porch until you have the base ready to use.
Beat one egg until light and foaming. Add one 5 ounce can of evaporated milk, 1 cup of fat free milk, 1 teaspoon of real vanilla and 1/2 cup of sugar. Mix until well blended.
Incorporate the snow into the base in small batches much like you'd fold in meringue until you have the smooth consistency of ice cream. It is best eaten immediately with cookies and hot chocolate. Sit back and remember when grandmother made it as you watched every dip of her arm.
The old home way to make snow cream was to beat heavy whipping cream until it was thick just before it turned to butter then fold in the snow. Two ingredients, what could be easier?
Oh yes! You might save some for the kids and create a snow memory for them. It's a treat we can only enjoy every ten years or so in our neck-of-the-woods. Who wants to grow up when such deliciousness is in the offering?

I just remembered Laura E. Wilder included another use for snow in one of the few recipes she mentioned in her books. Molasses in the Snow, I think it's in Little House in the Big Woods, but there I maybe wrong. It makes a taffy like candy.