Stretchy Ice Cream: Traditional Eastern Mediterranean Ice Cream
Image Credit: Ice cream

It's a hot summer day, you are craving for something cold and soothing, all you need is something that can satisfy your craving and mood. Despite spreading like a cheesy stick or piece of grated cheese, the ice cream preserves its smooth flavor and texture. It is denser than regular ice cream. Salep, a material used in chewing gum, lends Booza its stretchy quality, but other ingredients like milk, cream, and mastic are also included in a recipe. The thick ice cream is created by beating and scraping the ingredients. Other garnish, such as pistachios, are used. 

Then, wow! You can attempt your own handcrafted stretchable ice cream. Apart from its amusing name, what differentiates Booza from other ice cream flavors is that it is stretchy as stretching a rubber band or a mozzarella stick that has just come out of the fryer. Booza would be the dessert counterpart of yoga. Booza doesn't include any eggs, but it is generally made using regular ice cream ingredients including milk, cream, and different flavorings. But mastic and salep are combined with the base. 

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According to Michael Sadler, one of the co-orders of the Republic of Booza, "Salep is a flour typically prepared from orchids root, and mastic is a resin that comes from the mastic tree in Greece." These two components give Booza its distinctive stretch. It is comparable to Dondurma, a Turkish ice cream that is equally stretchy

Ingredients:

1. 1L (4 cups) whole milk (if using UHT milk, substitute 1 cup of milk with 1 cup of cream)

2. 200g Sugar (1 Cup)

3. 1 Tablespoon Salep powder 

4. 3-4 Pieces of mastic

Method for Preparation:

1. Use a mortar and pestle to reduce the mastic to a fine powder.

2. In a bowl, combine the salep powder, sugar, and mastic.

3. Add the milk to a heavy-bottomed saucepan and heat until it is just starting to steam.

4. Add the sugar and seasonings to the pot while the milk is heating but not boiling.

5. Stir quickly to mix, then stir for another 30 to 40 minutes.

6. Remove the mixture from the stove once it thickens and resembles condensed milk.

7. Pour the mixture out into a large bowl that will fit in your freezer.

8. Before freezing the mixture for 30 to 40 minutes, whisk it for 3 to 5 minutes in the bowl.

9. Once the mixture has been taken out of the freezer, whisk it for an additional three to five minutes, scraping down the sides as you go. Stretch the mixture upward with the whisk.

10. When the liquid has thickened and become flexible, repeat this freezing and whisking procedure four to six more times.

11. Top with some finely chopped pistachios before serving in a bowl or ice cream cones.

Booza can be a little pickier than other types of ice cream, especially when produced without artificial ingredients. Booza melts more slowly than other ice creams because to the Salep and mastic, making it ideal for long, hot days with relentless sunshine.