When My Daughter and I Moved in with My Parents, Making Ice Cream Brought Us Together

This is Slow Churn, a monthly column from Pooja Makhijani on bringing three generations of family together even in times of turmoil—by making ice cream.

My mother is a master gardener. For as long as I can remember, she’s tended a square of land, carved out of her suburban New Jersey backyard, and grown herbs, and vegetables, and fruit: from holy basil, to bitter melon and pumpkins and okra, to strawberries and raspberries.

Like generations of immigrants before her, her early gardens were a means to achieve household security and economic independence; for at least six months of the year, we ate healthily and heartily from her annual harvest.

Now, it’s her year-round obsession.

During the outdoor growing season, from last frost to first frost, she nurtures a 900-square-foot plot in the largest allotment-style community gardens in the country. Her “kitchen garden” in the backyard is much smaller now, and is devoted exclusively to herb—parsley, cilantro, mint, thyme, and rosemary—and flowers for her culinary experiments. This garden comes to life in late spring, as do all manner of forest creature—rabbits, red foxes, raccoons, white-tailed deer—as my parents’ suburban subdivision abuts the woods. In winters, she prunes orchids and cultivates dwarf citrus and curry leaf trees in containers indoors. Grow lights cast their glow upon the furniture in the living and dining rooms, and make the season’s hours and hours of darkness more tolerable.

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I returned home to this veritable greenhouse in late 2016, just before we fell back into Standard Time that year. My then-husband and I separated, and I moved in with my parents so that they could help me raise my then-four-year-old daughter. Because my separation necessitated an international move, I arrived on their doorstep with three large suitcases, a carry-on, and two backpacks, all stuffed with what I deemed most precious: ultrasound images, a lock of my daughter’s hair from her first haircut, a few beloved books. I carried what I could and, over the course of settlement negotiations, I let go of reacquiring the objects that I’d lost: a vintage typewriter I picked up off a New York City street, a handful of paperback travel guides, a set of turquoise ceramic mixing bowls. I had a new space, a new life, and little desire for the material possessions that reminded me of my dissolved union.

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My mother is a master cook; this, too, is her obsession. Her entire harvest ends up on the table in some shape or form. I found incredible comfort in her kitchen after returning to the United States, and settled into a quiet domesticity that I didn’t even know I wanted or needed. I wrote down her closely-guarded recipes. We menu planned. I began to bake to mitigate my shock and sadness. I turned anxiety into cake and loss into cookies. Baking obsessively provided a no-stakes means to rebuild my confidence and competence—as I had long felt incompetent, especially in the kitchen, during my marriage. Making sweet treats allowed me to reclaim the pleasures of food. I’d forgotten its delights; I’d been eating only to (barely) survive. I experienced baking and confectionery as something that I couldn’t do without; that I couldn’t seem to stop. I baked nearly every day; it calmed my mind in a way that no other self-care activity did.

Making sweet treats allowed me to reclaim the pleasures of food. I’d forgotten its delights.

Daily baking also meant a largess of goods that neither I, nor my sugar-loving daughter or my parents, nor my neighbors or colleagues could consume entirely on our own. I began to mail biscuits and breads across the country to friends near and far: to celebrate the birth of a former classmate’s second child; to support a friend who was undone by her friend’s death by suicide; to reinforce fraying bonds with my ex-in-laws; to woo an out-of-control crush. Each parcel contained a fragment of my joy.

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Some months ago, in my parents’ basement, I unearthed an ice cream maker in its original packaging. I’d received it as a gift for my bridal shower, but had completely forgotten about it. I don’t know how this particular object that my ex-husband and I acquired together had never moved from apartment to apartment with us and lain untouched in my parents’ house since, and I recoiled from it for some time. I get very attached to things with high sentimental value, and this discovery, at first, seemed like a bad omen: an object sent to interrupt this sometimes perfect new life I had created. I pushed it into a closet.

At the time, my mother was in the midst of planning her gardens: She sketched her plots, bought seeds and seedlings, and exchanged text messages with the community garden educator. My daughter, now seven, urged me to make ice cream; “Mama, to go with the cakes and cookies!” she advised. I was keen to use my mother’s herbs and flowers and vegetables in my baked creations. I returned to the basement and stared at the box. Do other people ascribe “luck” to objects? I wondered. Wouldn’t it be far better to finally use this kitchen appliance and truly love it? So, I unboxed it, blew off quite a lot of dust, and ceremoniously washed the lid, freezer bowl and mixing arm.

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Along the perimeter of the kitchen, near large eastern-facing windows, are two containers of basil (Ocimum basilicum) that my mother has sustained indoors for nearly a year. Basil, beautiful and fragrant, grows quickly once it has germinated, and can take a little abuse, she tells me. It’s resilient even when not watered enough. Basil is one of the first herbs I remember her growing in her garden, and the first herb I choose to christen the ice cream maker. I’m drawn to its glossy, green, ruffled leaves and warm, rich, and spicy flavor; the plant is familiar and soothing. I find the perfect blueberries—also New Jersey’s official state fruit—and she plucks a handful of leaves from one of her plants. I singe cream and separate eggs and chiffonade leaves.

The machine is basic and inexpensive, and rather finicky. I make one gritty, crunchy, and icy batch and over-churn another batch, and it takes tremendous strength not to revert to old habits and label the maker as jinxed rather than acknowledge that I’m brand new at ice cream-making. But after days of troubleshooting, and making minor adjustments in my recipe, I scoop luscious, deep purple basil-blueberry-balsamic ice cream into a bowl. My mother throws a few additional sprigs of basil on top, as well as three spoons, and we taste first frozen dessert, made with our paired and shared labor, and with the help of a plant grown in the very place I have found home again.

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