‘Auntie’s Ice Cream and Custard‘  keeps tradition alive

 By Wendella Davidson

GROWING up, Wendy Patricia July, now familiarly called `Sis Wendy’, was accustomed to seeing her mother and grandmother fussing around in the backyard of their family home at Nandy Park, East Bank Demerara on the weekends, as they made ice cream and black pudding for sale to selected customers.

As word got around about the mouth-watering homemade frozen dessert, however, this saw an increase in demand from a growing number of customers and the weekend business extended to other days of the week.

“There was always a steady order for ice cream-  either a birthday party, a post-wedding affair, a special gathering or the popular ice-cream banquet- even though the preparation of this special delicacy was time-consuming,” Sis Wendy recalled during an interview with the Pepperpot Magazine.

The making of the homemade treat, she explained with a smile, entailed preparing a custard mixture using eggs, custard powder, sugar, water, spices and essence for flavour. The water and spices are first placed on the fire and allowed to boil generously before the custard powder, the eggs, sugar to taste and essence are added. And, as the mixture thickens, it is constantly stirred to prevent it from becoming lumpy or burnt. More sugar or essence is added if required. When the desired thickness of the substance is arrived at, the mixture is taken off the fire and put to cool, the woman explained.

The custard is then placed in an aluminum tub inside a wooden ice-cream pail, after which ice was then packed in the space between the compartment and the pail and a generous amount of salt is sprinkled.

At this point, Sis Wendy said the job of her and siblings began as they took turns to continuously churn the pail until the custard is of a smooth and frozen texture. The process takes about an hour during which time more ice and salt are added, and it is these two (ice and salt) that apparently works the magic.

Family legacy
By age five, and after repeatedly observing the process, Sis Wendy’s mother started allowing her to prepare the custard for making the ice cream. So when she grew older, had her own family and began making homemade ice-cream and custard blocks for her family, and subsequently offered the finished product for sale on a small scale, it was like carrying on a family legacy, she said.

As the business expanded she invested in the purchase of an electric ice cream maker and subsequently bought an additional one.

Sis Wendy, who served in the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), the Guyana Fire Service (GFS) and the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company Limited (GT&T)- working at the latter office for 26 years before retiring- can be considered as gifted when it comes to using her hands.

Busy woman
The 61-year-old woman is also a seamstress who has outfitted several brides and has held contracts with several reputable companies sewing uniforms for their female staff, as well as, individual clients at several government ministries. She is also a caterer, so some of her weekends she are extremely busy with food preparation for weddings and other social engagements. For such occasions, she had had to recruit additional hands.

However, with Sis Wendy concentrating seriously on ministerial work at her church, Eccles Assemblies of God, where she is the head usher and also supervises the church’s feeding programme, Sis Wendy says she has somewhat scaled down on the sewing and even her personal catering business.

Meanwhile, she continues to focus on making ice cream which is marketed as ‘Auntie’s Ice Cream and Custard’, as she reiterated that she is continuing a family legacy. “Fresh homemade ice cream has a richness and smoothness that is impossible to find with a store-bought option, once you have a good ice cream maker,” she boasted
Sis Wendy delivers ice cream three to four days weekly and because of the demand, she has invested in a second, and much larger, electric churner to make her work much easier. With the churners, much more of the finished product can be made in just 30 minutes. Her many clients are at government ministries, commercial banks, private companies and persons who place individual orders.

She noted that while some of her clients crave the old-fashion custard ice cream flavour, there are others who request other flavours, and for this, she uses local fruits such as sour-sop, pineapple, passion fruit and others. “They [the clients] make a request and I try my best to please them,” she added.

Recently she has started making local yogurt using fresh cow’s milk and local fruits but for just a few customers. “People are accustomed to strawberry in yogurt. I am going local. I’m substituting the strawberry with our own local fruits. It’s an experiment and the response is encouraging,” she added.

Persons wishing to savour Sis Wendy’s homemade ice cream can contact her on 610-0279, 233-5814 or 500-3581.