Nectarine sorbet

Ohhh, fresh ripe nectarines. Nectarines and peaches are divine this time of year: but there's nothing so disappointing as a hard, tasteless, out-of-season peach.

I got some nectarines that were super-ripe, and made this sorbet with them. It's amazing to eat cold, sweet nectarine sorbet after a long, sweaty night at work.

6 ripe nectarines
2/3 cup water
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

Cut the unpeeled nectarines in chunks (discarding the pits) and cook with the water over medium heat until the fruit is soft and cooked through, about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and add the sugar. Let cool to room temperature and puree until smooth. Add the lemon juice. Chill thoroughly, then mix in your ice cream maker.

Saffron ice cream

I used up the rest of the saffron!

Note: saffron is expensive. For most recipes (maybe not this one), you can usually substitute turmeric.

1/2 cup whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup sugar
Scant 1/2 teaspoon saffron threads
3 large egg yolks

Warm the milk, sugar and cream in a small saucepan. Remove from the heat and add the saffron. Let steep in the fridge for 4 hours. Strain that into a medium saucepan, reserving the saffron. Rewarm the cream mixture. Whisk together the egg yolks in a separate bowl. Slow pour the warm cream mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly, then scrape back into the saucepan.

Stir the mixture constantly over medium heat until it thickens and coats the spatula. Pour through the strainer and add the saffron threads back in. Chill thoroughly, and make according to your ice cream maker's instructions.

Blueberry frozen yogurt

Pardon the lateness of this post, I spent all morning drinking beer on a sailboat in the sun. Awesomeness factor = 11.

1 1/2 cups plain whole milk yogurt
3/4 cup sugar
3 cups blueberries
1 teaspoon kirsch
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

Puree the yogurt, sugar and blueberries together, then press through a fine sieve to separate out the blueberry seeds and skins. Add the kirsch and lemon juice, and chill. Freeze in your ice cream maker.

Cheap desserts edition!

In preparation for a bunch of kids this weekend, I spent yesterday morning using up the last of my sugar.

I made chocolate chip cookies, fudge, pecan pralines, vanilla ice cream, and juice popsicles (orange-mango juice poured into popsicle molds).

Total cost: minimal, since I already had all the ingredients on hand.

If I want to get crazy, I can make ice cream sandwiches with the cookies and the ice cream, or milkshakes.

Fresh cold homemade vanilla milkshake

Doesn't that sound like the most awesome thing ever?

I was making vanilla ice cream the other day, when a milkshake suddenly materialized in my brain. I don't know why that never occurred to me before.

Anyway, I let some of the vanilla ice cream sit out and get soft. Then I added whole milk, shook it really hard, and drank it.

So. Delicious.

Dried apricot and pistachio ice cream

Warning: if you use a sweet wine with this, it will be super sweet. Use a dry white wine, and if the final result is still too sweet, use salted pistachios at the end.

From The Perfect Scoop:

5 ounces dried pricots, quartered
3/4 cup white wine, dry or sweet
1/2 cup shelled unsalted pistachio nuts –
2/3 cup sugar
2 cups half-and-half – you can use 1 cup milk, 1 cup cream
A few drops freshly squeezed lemon juice

In a small saucepan, warm the apricot pieces in the wine. Simmer for 5 minutes, cover, remove from the heat, and let stand for 1 hour. Coarsely chop the pistachio nuts.

Puree the apricots with the wine in a blender with the sugar, half-and-half, and lemon juice until smooth.

Chill the mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. During the last few minutes of churning, add the chopped pistachio nuts.

Pear-caramel ice cream

This is officially the best way to use up overripe pears ever.

Taken from The Perfect Scoop:

3 medium-sized ripe pears, peeled and cored
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy cream
1/8 teaspooon coarse salt
a few drops of fresh lemon juice

Dice the pears into 1/4-inch pieces. Spread the sugar in a large, heavy saucepan. Cook over medium heat, carefully watching and stirring occasionally with a heatproof spatula until melted.

When the sugar is a deep amber, stir in the pears. The caramel will seize, that's okay. Continue cooking and stirring occasionally (again with a heat-proof spatula – caramel will burn heck out of you) for ten minutes. The sugar will have dissolved. Remove from the heat and stir in 1/2 cup of the cream, then mix in the rest of the cream, salt, and lemon juice. Cool to room temp, puree until smooth, press through a strainer. Chill according to your ice-cream maker manufacturer's instructions.

Lavender-honey ice cream

So, the other night I was watching It's Complicated with Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin. Don't judge me, it had Steve Martin in it.

Anyway, there's one scene where she mentions lavender ice cream, and I thought, "Ooooooooh!"

So I made some lavender-honey ice cream.

It's not nearly as floral as you think it would be--it's really good, although I'm not sure you could eat a whole lot in one sitting. This is definitely a few-spoonfuls-at-a-time ice cream.

From David Lebovitz:

1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup dried lavender flowers
1 1/2 cups whole milk
1/4 cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
5 egg yolks

Heat the honey and 2 tablespoons of lavendar gently. Once warm, remove from the heat and let steep at room temperature for 1 hour.

Warm the milk, sugar and salt in a medium saucepan. Pour the cream into a large bowl and set a mesh strainer on top. Pour the lavender honey through the strainer (to strain out the lavender), then discard the lavender and put the strainer back on the bowl.

Whisk together the egg yolks, and slowly pour the warm mixture into the egg, whisking constantly. Scrape the whole thing back into the saucepan, and stir constantly over medium heat until the mixture thickens and coats the spoon/spatula. Pour the custard through the strainer, and stir into the cream. Add the remaining lavender, and chill overnight in the fridge.

Discard the lavender, and make in your ice cream maker.

Vanilla ice cream

Good ol' plain-jane vanilla ice cream. Once you've tasted homemade, you'll never go back to store-bought.

Note: if you still don't have an ice cream maker, please go get one. I like the Cuisinart one.

From David Lebovitz:

3 cups heavy cream, or 2 cups heavy cream and 1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Heat 1 cup cream in a saucepan with the sugar and salt. Scrape the vanilla seeds into the mixture, add the pod. Warm over medium heat, stirring til sugar is dissolved. Remove from the heat and add the remaining cream/milk and vanilla extract. Chill thoroughly in the fridge. Remove the vanilla pod before mixing in your ice cream maker. (Note: the vanilla pod can be rinsed and re-used for homemade vanilla extract.)

Butterscotch pecan ice cream

OK, I know you're going to hate me for saying this, but the more I make my own ice cream, the more store-bought ice cream tastes like the bottom of a shoe. Flavors I never really liked in store-bought incarnations, I suddenly adore when I make them myself.

Case in point: butter pecan ice cream. This tastes SO much better than any pecan ice cream I ever had before. And note, please, this version is butterscotch pecan ice cream, thanks to the addition of a very tasty shot of scotch.

Also, I wouldn't judge you if you served it with a shot of scotch poured over top.

From David Lebovitz:

5 tablespoons butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups heavy cream
3/4 cup milk
6 egg yolks
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon scotch

Melt the butter in medium saucepan, stir in brown sugar and salt. Whisk in the milk and 1 cup of the cream. Once warmed, pour a little into the beaten egg yolks while whisking, then pour the eggs into the pan. Stir over medium heat until the mixture thickens and coats the spoon. Pour the remaining 1 cup cream into a bowl and set a mesh strainer on top. Pour the custard through the strainer, and add the vanilla and scotch. Cool completely.

Make in your ice cream maker; at the last minute, add these buttered pecans:

1 1/2 tablespoons butter
1 1/2 cups pecan halves
salt

Melt the butter in a pan, remove from heat and toss the pecans with the butter until well-coated. Spread on a baking sheet, sprinkle with salt, and bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes. Let cool completely.

Mint-chocolate chip ice cream (with fresh mint!)

I harvested my very first mint the other day!

So I made mint-chocolate chip ice cream, courtesy of David Lebovitz: (reprinted below)

For the mint ice cream:

1 cup (250 ml) whole milk
3/4 cup (150 g) sugar
2 cups (500 ml) heavy cream
pinch of salt
2 cups packed (80 gr) fresh mint leaves
5 large egg yolks

For the chocolate chips:
5 ounces (140 gr) bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped

1. In a medium saucepan, warm the milk, sugar, 1 cup (250 ml) heavy cream, salt, and mint.

2. Once the mixture is hot and steaming, remove from heat, cover, and let stand for an hour to infuse the mint flavor.

3. Remove the mint with a strainer, then press down with a spatula firmly to extract as much mint flavor and color as possible. (You can also use well-washed hands to do it as well, making sure the mixture isn’t too hot to safely handle.) Once the flavor is squeezed out, discard the mint.

4. Pour the remaining heavy cream into a large bowl and set the strainer over the top.

5. Rewarm the infused milk. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, then slowly pour some of the warm mint mixture into the yolks, whisking constantly, then scrape the warmed yolks back into the saucepan.

6. Cook the custard, stirring constantly with a heatproof spatula, until the mixture thickens and coats the spatula. If using an instant read thermometer, it should read around 170ºF (77ºC).

7. Immediately strain the mixture into the cream, then stir the mixture over an ice bath until cool.

8. Refrigerate the mixture thoroughly, preferably overnight, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

While the mixture is freezing, melt the chocolate in a small bowl over a pot of simmering water, or in a microwave oven on low power, stirring until smooth. Place a storage container in the freezer.

9. When the ice cream in the machine is ready, scribble some of the chocolate into the container, then add a layer of the just-churned ice cream to the container. Scribble melted chocolate over the top of the ice cream, then quickly stir it in, breaking up the chocolate into irregular pieces. Continue layering the ice cream, scribbling more chocolate and stirring as you go.

When finished, cover and freeze until firm.

Notes: I skipped the chocolate melting stage and just dropped in chocolate chips. It's better to melt the chocolate. Also, this ice cream is MINTY. Store-bought mint ice cream is much subtler in its mintiness. This is not a bad thing, it's just, you know, MINTY.

Lime sherbet

I had a whole bunch of limes about to go bad, so I made a batch of lime sherbet.

Note: real lime sherbet is not green. It's off-white. If you're eating green lime sherbet, that means it's full of dye.


Adapted from David Lebovitz:

3 cups whole milk
3/4 cups sugar
zest of 1 lime
6 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice

Heat the milk and sugar until the sugar dissolves, and add the lime zest. Chill completely in fridge. Add lime juice, then pour into your ice cream maker and follow instructions.

Grapefruit-Campari sorbet

Last night's dinner party was a smashing success. I'll post more about it later in the week, including the menu and the rest of the recipes.

For now, I'll leave you with this: grapefruit-Campari sorbet.

Isn't it a gorgeous color?

And despite being made from two very bitter ingredients, it was sweet enough to be refreshing, and still bitter enough to be identifiably grapefruit and Campari-based. An excellent palate cleanser at the end of our meal--and, I imagine, a very refreshing treat on a really hot day.

Plus, you only need three ingredients.

Adapted from David Lebovitz:

3 cups fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice (I squeezed four big grapefruits and two oranges, since I didn't have quite enough grapefruits)
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup Campari

Heat the sugar with one cup of grapefruit juice, stirring, until the sugar is dissolved. Add rest, chill thoroughly, and follow the directions for your ice cream maker.

Chocolate ice cream

I don't like chocolate ice cream.

There, I said it.

I never have. Even as a kid. And I felt the pain of being the only kid who didn't like chocolate ice cream acutely, believe me.

It's the combination of dairy and chocolate that gets me. I don't like chocolate milk, either. Or milk chocolate (and especially not white chocolate). I like my chocolate the darker, the better, and unadulterated by gross dairy products.

So I decided to make chocolate ice cream only as a concession to the houseful of kids I had this past weekend--my stepson is visiting for spring break, and we invited the neighbors and their three boys over for pizza and games.

The pizza was excellent, and I made a batch of vanilla ice cream, as well. So pizza and two kinds of ice cream: every kid's dream meal, right?

Only I discovered that I LIKED my own chocolate ice cream.

It actually tastes like chocolate, and not like the nasty chocolate-milk-chemicals store version I always hated.

It even tastes like GOOD chocolate.

Adapted from Salty Sweets:

2 cups heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
9 ounces bittersweet chocolate (I used a little less than 2 bars of Ghirardelli 60%), broken up
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon sea salt

Heat the cream and milk together until bubbling around the edges but not boiling. Pour the hot milk mixture over the chocolate (in a heat-proof bowl) and let stand for five minutes or so to melt the chocolate. Whisk together, with sugar and salt, until smooth. Refrigerate until completely cooled. Make in your ice cream maker.

Fudge ripple ice cream

This recipe is courtesy of David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop. (There's a new version coming out soon; check out my review of the old version here.) Warning: you will eat this all in one sitting.

Vanilla ice cream:

1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy cream
pinch of salt
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
6 large egg yolks
Splash of vanilla extract

Warm the milk, 1 cup of the cream, sugar and salt in medium saucepan. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the mixture, and add the rest of the bean. Cover, remove from the heat, and let steep for 30 minutes.

Pour the remaining 1 cup of cream into a large bowl, and set a mesh strainer on top. Whisk the egg yolks together; slowly pour the warm mixture into the yolks and whisk together, then pour everything back into the saucepan and stir constantly over medium heat until the mixture thickens. Pour it through the strainer, put the vanilla bean back in, and add the vanilla extract.

Cover and let chill thoroughly in the fridge. Then put it in your ice cream maker, and follow the manufacturer's instructions.

Fudge ripple:

1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup light corn syrup
1/2 cup water
6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whisk everything except the vanilla together over medium heat, whisking constantly until it begins to bubble. Continue until it reaches a low boil, and cook for one minute. Remove from heat, add vanilla, and let chill thoroughly in the fridge before using.

Don't mix the two together in the ice cream machine. Wait until the vanilla ice cream is complete, then in the container you're going to put the ice cream into, add a layer of fudge ripple. Then a layer of ice cream. Then a layer of fudge ripple. And so on, in the Tupperware (or whatever). Put it in the freezer to set.

Like I said, you will eat this all in one setting, and it will taste so much more vanilla-y and fudge-y than the stuff you get in the store.

Orange sherbet!

I've got spring fever. I'm totally over this winter, but it's not quite springtime yet.

So when I got a bunch of oranges in my CSA box, I decided to make a very spring-y dish: fresh orange sherbet.

1/3 cup sugar
Grated zest of one orange
Pinch of salt
Fresh squeezed orange juice, from 6-7 oranges
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups cold whole milk

Mix everything together except for the milk. Whisk until the sugar is dissolved, about one minute. Whisk in the milk. Cover bowl and chill for 1-2 hours. Pour into your ice cream makes and process until it's the consistency of soft-serve. Put that in a lidded container and freeze until firm, around 3 hours.

So orangey and delicious!

Thanksgiving ice creams

Oh yes. Ice creams. Why be predictable and serve pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving this year, when you could serve one of these? Plus, you can make it ahead!

Rum Butternut Squash Ice Cream
Sweet Potato Ice Cream
Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream with Pecan Praline
Cranberry Sorbet
Maple Pecan Ice Cream

and the pièce de résistance... wait for it...

Butterscotch and Bourbon Ice Cream with Bacon and Butter Toffee Chips

I think that last one is worth buying an ice cream maker for, if you don't have one already. I'm totally hauling mine out this weekend.

Lemon buttermilk sherbet

More fun with buttermilk! (You'll need an ice cream machine for this recipe...apologies.)

1/3 cup water
2/3 cup sugar
zest of one lemon
2 cups buttermilk
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

Combine the water and sugar with the lemon zest in a saucepan over medium heat. Heat, stirring, until the sugar is dissolved. Let cool to room temperature, then chill thoroughly in the refrigerator. Whisk in the buttermilk and the lemon juice, and prepare in your ice cream machine.

This would be awesome with fresh fruit, or a fruit sauce, or warm caramel sauce.