What purpose does rock salt provide when making home made ice cream?

morrigan

It makes the ice melt. The brine solution then takes the heat from the mixture, and gradually forces it to thicken and harden. http://www.makeicecream.com/howdoesrocsa.html Dec 20 06, 2:03 PM

What-A-Mess

Water(ice)freezes/melts at 32 degrees f as does ice cream (roughly 32 degrees). By adding salt, the freezing point is lowered allowing the ice cream to freeze. Placing rock salt on ice on your sidewalk in the winter does the same thing. It creates an environment that can no longer sustain the state of 'frozen' and in turn melts. Dec 22 06, 3:34 AM

What-A-Mess

Water(ice)freezes/melts at 32 degrees f as does ice cream (roughly 32 degrees). By adding salt, the freezing point is lowered allowing the ice cream to freeze. Placing rock salt on ice on your sidewalk in the winter does the same thing. It creates an environment that can no longer sustain the state of 'frozen' and in turn melts. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/chemical/meltpt.html http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/chemical/meltpt.html Dec 22 06, 3:34 AM

What-A-Mess

Water(ice)freezes/melts at 32 degrees f as does ice cream (roughly 32 degrees). By adding salt, the freezing point is lowered allowing the ice cream to freeze. Placing rock salt on ice on your sidewalk in the winter does the same thing. It creates an environment that can no longer sustain the state of 'frozen' and in turn melts. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/chemical/meltpt.html http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/chemical/meltpt.html Forgot to add that pure water will not, under normal circumstances, go below 32 degrees. Even if the surrounding temp is say, -20 degrees, therefore to create a colder climate the NaCl is added to the solution creating a colder water thusly freezing the ice cream. Edit please. Dec 22 06, 3:38 AM