Following hot and fast on the heels of my recent escapades with creating the perfect Mint Chip Ice Cream, I plunged back into the artisan ice cream world again this past weekend and ended up with a marvelously smooth, layered toasted butter pecan ice cream that's been my favorite creation to date. Just awesome.
Not all that hard to put together either. Just melt a 1/4 of butter in a pan, add 1/2 cup pecan bits (Trader Joe's sells nice bags of them) and some kosher salt. Toast until the pecans begin to darken and then drain the butter off (you can save the butter for something else though I'm still trying to figure out what but it smells great!) and allow the pecans to cool completely.
Make the basic vanilla ice cream recipe but cut back on the vanilla just a bit. Pour the mixture into the ice cream maker, let it do its thing for 20 minutes or so, then add the chilled pecans (I've taken to freezing them for a couple of minutes) and continue mixing for another 5 minutes.
Pack in containers and chill for a few hours in the freezer or dig right in and enjoy it now. The key is using good heavy cream in the mix and folding it into the milk and sugar mixture, don't blend it or you'll flatten out the resulting ice cream.
Follow up site from a post a few weeks ago about the Salmon and Cucumber Salad calling for some creme fraiche (though I wrote it then as creme fresh), a page on substitute dairy products......
Cook's Thesaurus: Cultured Milk Products
Cultured Milk Products
Saturday, December 20, 2003
Thursday, December 18, 2003
Acing the Mint Chip Ice Cream Final!
I figured it out the other day and had already gathered my ingredients for another run at the fabled Mint Chip Ice Cream Crown. I recognized my first batch mistakes and determined not to repeat them. Hey, if you're gonna screw up, screw up in a new and different way than before.
The differences were subtle but made for a much, much better product. In fact, the vanilla tasted far better than it had in the past by the simple switching of one single ingredient. Of course, when there are only four ingredients in the base mix then switching one can make for a huge difference.
I substituted an ultra pastuerized whipping cream for the heavy whipping cream I'd been using and, instead of blending it all in together. I combined the milk and the sugar with the stick blender and then folded in the cream and the vanilla. It doesn't agitate the cream so much and the whole mixture takes on a much creamier texture from the start.
Another key difference. Chilling the chips in the freezer as well as the mint extract. The colder it is when added to the whirring mixture, the better.
And the main difference that really made it all come together? Getting some Andes mint and chocolate chips at Safeway. They add just the exact right amount of mint flavor without overpowering the tastebuds.
At twenty minutes in, the ice cream had thickened to the point where it was piling up behind the scraper on the side of the bowl. I tasted it and was surprised to find that it didn't dissolve into its component parts very quickly at all. It had cohesed into ice cream and it was very, very fresh and excellent tasting. I removed just under half the vanilla ice cream and put it in a small tupperware box to chill for a few hours in the freezer. Then I started the machine back up again so I could pour in the chips to mix into the ice cream. With just a about a minute left, I pulled the mint extract out of the freezer and poured a very, very small amount into the now halved mixture. It was just the right amount to give the ice cream a minty smell but again without being too much. And it tasted absolutely perfect!
Even not fully solidified, it was the best mint chip ice cream I'd ever had. Smooth with a layering of flavors and each bite begged for more.
And that's the story of how I created the finest mint chip ice cream ever. Next up? I want to try some butter pecan and some peach in two seperate batches (of course, the beauty of this machine is that I can make both kinds at once!).
The differences were subtle but made for a much, much better product. In fact, the vanilla tasted far better than it had in the past by the simple switching of one single ingredient. Of course, when there are only four ingredients in the base mix then switching one can make for a huge difference.
I substituted an ultra pastuerized whipping cream for the heavy whipping cream I'd been using and, instead of blending it all in together. I combined the milk and the sugar with the stick blender and then folded in the cream and the vanilla. It doesn't agitate the cream so much and the whole mixture takes on a much creamier texture from the start.
Another key difference. Chilling the chips in the freezer as well as the mint extract. The colder it is when added to the whirring mixture, the better.
And the main difference that really made it all come together? Getting some Andes mint and chocolate chips at Safeway. They add just the exact right amount of mint flavor without overpowering the tastebuds.
At twenty minutes in, the ice cream had thickened to the point where it was piling up behind the scraper on the side of the bowl. I tasted it and was surprised to find that it didn't dissolve into its component parts very quickly at all. It had cohesed into ice cream and it was very, very fresh and excellent tasting. I removed just under half the vanilla ice cream and put it in a small tupperware box to chill for a few hours in the freezer. Then I started the machine back up again so I could pour in the chips to mix into the ice cream. With just a about a minute left, I pulled the mint extract out of the freezer and poured a very, very small amount into the now halved mixture. It was just the right amount to give the ice cream a minty smell but again without being too much. And it tasted absolutely perfect!
Even not fully solidified, it was the best mint chip ice cream I'd ever had. Smooth with a layering of flavors and each bite begged for more.
And that's the story of how I created the finest mint chip ice cream ever. Next up? I want to try some butter pecan and some peach in two seperate batches (of course, the beauty of this machine is that I can make both kinds at once!).
Thursday, December 11, 2003
Smoked Salmon and Cucumber Salad
Saw this on The Naked Chef last night and tried to get the recipe from the FoodTV.com website but they didn't deign to post it so I copied it as much as I could and think I've got it all. I will be trying this recipe in the next couple of days and will report back on how it scores.
Ingredients:
sliced smoked salmon
shaved cucumber in long slices, lengthwise
2 big tablespoons creme fresh with a little more than a half lemon
zest of one lemon chopped fine
fresh ground pepper
finely chopped chives
What to do with the ingredients:
lay salmon over a plate, follow with the cucumber slabs, drizzle lemony creme fresh over with dollops, follow with lemon zest, fresh ground pepper and then finish with chives and serve with bread and olive oil spiked with balsamic vinegar or serve as is.
Alternative, make salmon and cucumber rollups, secured with toothpicks, then sprinkle other ingredients over rolled up rolls.
It looked gorgeous and I think it will taste just as good as it looks because we love smoked salmon, I just have to figure out what I can substitute for creme fresh because they don't really sell it stateside. Any ideas?
Ingredients:
sliced smoked salmon
shaved cucumber in long slices, lengthwise
2 big tablespoons creme fresh with a little more than a half lemon
zest of one lemon chopped fine
fresh ground pepper
finely chopped chives
What to do with the ingredients:
lay salmon over a plate, follow with the cucumber slabs, drizzle lemony creme fresh over with dollops, follow with lemon zest, fresh ground pepper and then finish with chives and serve with bread and olive oil spiked with balsamic vinegar or serve as is.
Alternative, make salmon and cucumber rollups, secured with toothpicks, then sprinkle other ingredients over rolled up rolls.
It looked gorgeous and I think it will taste just as good as it looks because we love smoked salmon, I just have to figure out what I can substitute for creme fresh because they don't really sell it stateside. Any ideas?
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