Summer brings long days, hot weather, and a symphony of seasonal sound.
Crickets. Baseball ball games. Steaks sizzling on the grill. Children
playing. And the unmistakable music of ice cream trucks. With
tinkling melodies pouring forth these motorized Pied Pipers roll
through the streets, and children come running from all directions.
Clutching fistfuls of coins, they surround the truck like honeybees
around a flower, then straggle away blissfully licking their favorite
ice cream treats.
Frozen confections come in many forms. Cones piled high with teetering
scoops. Soft slurpy swirls. Popsicles. Cookie sandwiches. Sodas and
shakes. Fruit juice bars. Gelatos and granitas. Sherbets and
sorbets. Luscious sundaes swimming in sweet sauces, dusted with
toppings and crowned in whipped cream. We can thank modern
refrigeration techniques for the myriad of choices available, but the
desire to cool off with a refreshing cold treat on a hot sweltering day
has been around since antiquity.
Ice Cream
Ice Cream
Old-Fashioned Strawberry-French Vanilla Ice Cream
Mother Nature couldn’t have planned a better time to blast us with heat and humidity. After all, July is National Ice Cream Month. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan said so. He also claimed the third Sunday of July will always be National Ice Cream Day. Thank you very much, but I don’t need to wait for a specially designated month or day to enjoy ice cream. It’s one of my favorite indulgences — any day. Or, everyday! It doesn’t have to be a hot day to scoop up a big bowl of ice cream, but it is the perfect frozen treat to bring the body temperature down.
I accidentally brought home a one-pint carton of Organic Valley French Vanilla-flavored half-and-half last week. I meant to grab a carton of the plain old stuff — my husband can’t drink coffee without it. He doesn’t like added flavor — just added fat.
So, when life hands me French vanilla half-and-half, I make ice cream. Ice cream with fresh-picked, sun-kissed, sweet strawberries. Lots of creaminess from a generous dose of fat. Don’t count the calories. Just indulge, enjoy and stay cool! There’s still a lot of ice cream month left on the calendar :)
Oh, what a great mistake I made!
Sour Cherry Sorbet
During summer, I take every opportunity to make ice cream or sorbet. (If you look in my freezer, you'll find a reserved space for the ice cream maker container.) There really is no better time to make frozen treats than on the hottest summer days. And who wants to bake anyway? (Though I still bake summer pies and cakes.) Sorbets are my favorite because they're easy to make and full of fruit flavor. And you can pretty much make sorbet out of any fruit. There's no custard to cook as with ice cream, and in most cases the fruit goes in raw—keeping the best fresh flavor.
Since sour cherries are in season right now, I couldn't help not making a sorbet out of them. I love it when sorbets are more like palate-cleansers than overly sweet icy desserts. And what fruit could do the duty better than sour cherries? Only one cup of sugar goes into taming the sour cherries' tartness, ensuring a little tang lingers. A little bit of lemon juice in the mix helps keep the color bright more than making the sorbet sour. This dessert has everything going for it flavor-wise—you really taste the cherries. It's not laden with any unpronounceable ingredients. It's just pure and natural.
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