Alex wrote:

> Some ice creams (such as the rose ice cream I alluded to) *must* be
> eggless.

I just looked over the recipe that Alex posted for rose ice cream, and I've
got a couple questions. For reference, here's the recipe:

Rose Ice Cream

4 cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
3 tbsp rosewater
3 tbsp sugar
9 cardamom pods

Remove the cardamom seeds from the pods and put into a spice grinder. Put
the milk in a heavy stockpot. Set over medium heat and condense, stirring
constantly, until it is noticeably thicker than when you started. Grind the
cardamom in and continue stirring and condensing until it attains the
thickness of heavy cream. Stir in the rosewater, briefly cook (about 1
minute), then stir in the sugar and remove from heat, stirring to dissolve
the sugar. Pour into your ice cream maker, then pour in the cream and
either start churning (if by hand - produces the best results) or turn on
the machine (if motorized. Not quite as fine control over the texture but
acceptable). Generally, churn until the mixture stiffens to the point of
being unchurnable (you should of course follow directions of any ice cream
maker you happen to have). Set in the freezer and allow to sit for 2 hours
minimum. It's best if it's a freezer kept only slightly below freezing, not
a real deep-freeze, long-term storage freezer. Serve. Makes approximately 1
1/2 pints.


Here's my first question: Given a big enough bowl, would a microwave oven be
a good tool to reduce the milk? It seems that in the microwave, you could
reduce the milk without constantly stirring and without worry of scorching.
(I'm thinking you'd want to start it on high power until the milk starts
boiling, then lower the power to medium or low so that the milk doesn't boil
too vigorously, and you'd still have to stir it every once in a while.)

Also, is there any reason not to cover the condensed milk mixture and chill
it before putting it into the ice cream freezer?

Bob