LIN Artisan Ice Cream: Frozen in Less than 5 minutes

I guess the first simplest thing that I love about LIN Artisan Ice Cream is the fact that you can walk in anytime of the day to have your own little teenie tiny experience of Molecular Gastronomy. Though it's old news to some other countries, Molecular Gastronomy still sounded peculiar to most of Indonesians' ears. Remembering that there is only one Indonesian MolGas chef in Indonesia, it is still considered pretty new.

How many Indonesian people that you know have tried MolGas dishes? Mine was less than 10. I, myself, find it difficult and also, expensive, to have a MolGas experience (Though I have tasted a plate of MolGas dessert by Chef Bodin for free ;p). The most troublesome problem, according to me, is that you can't just have a walk in for a full dining experience. You have to arrange a group reservation for the chef to serve you.

But once again, that's not how it goes in LIN Artisan Ice Cream cafe. The first Indonesian cafe that uses liquid nitrogen to freeze their ice cream. Not only it is made fresh by order, you get to watch the freezing process, which took less than 5 minutes..

That little corner is where all the scientific magic happens!

Minimalist furniture with an industrial urban touch to it..

The outdoor space is definitely more masculine compared to the indoor area.

See? I still think it's a bit cute and chic inside...

Now, now.. Let's get to business. The process :

1. Blend all the natural ingredients into a batter. This one below was the banana sorbet and they really use fresh bananas.

2. LIN is the short form of Liquid Nitrogen. It is basically way cooler than ice. It freezes at -210 degrees and boils at -196 degrees Celsius, how about that? It was kept inside this tank because as soon as it's released to open air, it will immediately boil and evaporate. 

3. The earlier batter was later put in this food processor and in go the liquid nitrogen while the machine is still on. All that smoke is actually the liquid nitro evaporating due the room temperature. Less than 2 minutes later, it has frozen completely. They only have to make sure that it's all mixed together and repeat the process for a little bit while.

"My formula is soon to be perfect.. MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

The banana sorbet(36k). No food coloring so it's not yellow. It really tasted and smelled like real bananas. Although this one is supposed to be a sorbet, it tasted a bit creamy. 

Lemon Sorbet (36k) with little bit of lemon zest. Compared to the banana flavor, this tasted more like a sorbet. Better hurry gobble this one up cause it melts easily!

Smiley Baileys (69k). If you are a fan of baileys, well here you go. It's creamy, dense, and the best part, it has that baileys scent and after taste! 

All of the ice creams were much smoother compared to traditional ice creams, as liquid nitro makes smaller crystallization process. It contains less air than the store bought ice cream which definitely makes it more dense, squishy in a way, a little more chewy I guess. It's a no wonder that the price is significantly different if you compared the store bought ones with these. Also the fact that they use real fresh ingredients for each flavors. I just hope they make new flavors to come!

Note on safety issues : As long as the vapor is gone, it's safe to be eaten. However, I happened to feel a little frostbite sensation on my tongue. It's like having the sensation of drinking soda, but only concentrated on one focused area. I believed that it was resulted from a part of the ice cream which was not properly mixed. I remembered it was a little bit paler compared to the other parts. It was gone after a while and my tongue was unharmed. This means :

I will definitely come back to try out the other flavors. I am very intrigued with Vanilla Choc Rice, Frozen Expresso and the Beer Pong flavors! At least this can be my start before having Heston Blumenthal's bacon ice cream. (Yeah, right *roll eyes for my wishful thinking*)

Flashback :
Remember 10 years ago, when mobile phones were as thick as soap bars? When the only way connecting to the internet was through the phone line? When having a box of floppy disc actually meant something?

Present time:
Now look at what we have. Smart phones with touch screen features in different shape and sizes, WiFi in cafes is a must, and that little teenie tiny SD card which can store up a few gigs of data. It took only 10 years for us to make such vast progresses and human's continuous inventions never stop us from being awed.

This has a lot more to do with not just technology, but also other subject such as MolGas itself. I guess human's curiosity won't just limit themselves to stop there. For another 10 years ahead, for another 10 years of innovation, for another 10 years of food appreciation!

Lin Artisan Ice Cream
Jl. Taman Kemang 1 No. 6
021-71794393
Opening hrs : 11.00-23.00
www.linicecream.com
@linicecream