The earliest existence of what we could regard as ice cream appeared in China during the Tang dynasty (A.D. 618-907). Fermented milk from cows, buffalo and goats was mixed with flour and camphor before cooling. This doesn't sound as nice as the vanilla ice cream that we serve!
     
  In the early days water was mixed with salt to help reduce it's freezing point. Temperatures below -15C could be achieved. Nowadays temperatures much lower than this are used.
     
  Sorbets are first documented in the 1660's in Naples, Florence and Paris. By 1664 ice cream using milk was being made in Naples.
     
  King Charles II was served ice cream at Windsor Castle in 1671.
     
  Ice cream used to be served in small glass known as a "penny lick".
     
  The ice cream cone appears have been an English invention and is referred to in a cookery book in 1888.
     
  Ice cream used to be served in waxed paper and was refered to as a hokey pokey. The term "hokey pokey" is thought to have derived from the Italian "ecco un poco" which means "here is a little" - a term Bennett Jannetta would recognise.
     
 

The 99 ice cream was launched in the 1930's. At this time much of the British ice cream industry was run by Italians (people close to our hearts) and it was they who chose the name for the 99. There was a legend that an Italian King had the very finest group of soldiers for his bodyguards - 99 of them in fact. This is why the number 99 represents quality.

 

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