Wanted: Ice cream makers, crank included.

Byline: Randi Bjornstad The Register-Guard

It seemed like a great idea when she thought of it, Eugene resident Karen Ailor says: getting upward of 175 of Oregon State University Extension Service's master gardeners to hand-crank their own ice cream for the kickoff dinner at the group's 22nd annual statewide "mini-college" get-together in Corvallis.

She even came up with the perfect flavor to go with the "Rediscovering Our Roots" theme of the four-day session, where volunteer master gardeners learn new tricks and techniques that they share with avid but less learned gardeners in their communities.

"I thought it would be perfect to make the same Rocky Trail ice cream that was developed for the Oregon Trail sesquicentennial celebration" in 1993, Ailor said. "It's a chocolate base - a group of schoolchildren voted 24-to-1 for chocolate over vanilla - and it has filberts and swirls of marionberry jam in it."

But here it is, less than two weeks before the July 20 event, and Ailor has a big problem - a serious shortage of old-fashioned ice cream freezers that could leave the master gardeners dessertless.

"A lot of people have electric ones, but that's not the same," Ailor says. "I've found three, but I need 16 or 17 of them to serve that many people."

So she's hoping there might be some ice cream lovers out there who would lend their hand-cranked ice cream makers to Ailor. She's already got a dairy willing to donate the ice cream base, and OSU/Lane County Extension's super master gardener, Nellie Oehler, has volunteered to help make the needed marionberry jam for the swirl.

`I would need to have the (freezers) by July 13 - if I don't have everything nailed down a week ahead, I'll be too nervous,' she said.

Anyone who can help with the loan of a manual ice cream maker may call 461-3767 or 729-1883.