Ice Cream

ImageSometimes there are things in this life that you have to eat no matter what the consequences. You have to block out the nasty knowledge you have about fat and heart disease and go back to your childhood, where, in my case, you could find print ads with doctors endorsing cigarettes. Holy Smokes!

The other day, my husband took me to Williams Sonoma to buy the latest model Cuisinart. That’s for another article by the way because it is a cook’s wet dream.

What we hadn’t planned on was purchasing an ice cream maker; also made by Cuisinart. The little devil was $60 and there was a cute cookbook we bought, as well. The recipes went from labor intensive, (custard based gelato), to simple, (ice creams and sorbets). Of course, my daughter Hannah and I had to attack the custard one. I rationalized that it was about time my beautiful 15 year old learn basic custard. We chose a cinnamon and brown sugar ice cream because those were pantry staples.

The whisking and the tempering and the straining all went as planned, then Hannah lost interest and went into the living room to watch Family Guy because I’m Mother of The Year. The mixture had to sit in the refrigerator for 2 hours or overnight. Like a watched pot, I took the bowl out of the fridge after two hours exactly. Hannah had moved on to Gossip Girl because I’m a saint and should be writing parenting books.

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icecream-rasp-swirlEach week, Levi gravitates to the fresh raspberries at our local farmers market.  He insists on buying them claiming to “love them”.  He eats 2 or 3 and then he is done.  I pack them in his lunch box and a few stragglers end up coming home with him.  I can’t toss them.  So, I either eat them or throw them in a baggie and put them in the freezer.

I had just enough fresh and frozen raspberries to make David Lebovitz’s Raspberry Swirl Ice Cream.  Doesn’t that sound good?  I haven’t made any ice cream this summer and it has been on my mind.  Today, the kids are going to arrive home from camp to a very, very, sweet treat.

This recipe calls for vanilla extract.  Instead, I steeped the cream with a fresh vanilla bean.  I cut the pod in half, scraped out the seeds and threw them in the bowl of cream along with the pod.  When it came time to add the custard to the cream, I removed the pod and saved it to make some vanilla sugar.

This ice cream is a small reminder that summer is here and it is here to stay for just a little while longer.

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When was the last time you ate something that made time stop and took you back to your childhood? Berthillon  in Paris is a dreamy ice cream shop on the Isle St. Louis that will do just that...They make the World’s best hot fudge sundae, period!

There are so many choices of ice cream and sorbets, that are all freshly made in-house. The ice cream case is filled with colors and texture like a Tiffany’s jewelry case without the armed guard. Most well-heeled patrons can hardly decide, pointing, discussing and trying small spoonfuls. Not me.

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peachicecream.jpgIf anyone asks what my favorite fruit is, I always answer peaches, but not just any peach. White peaches are my absolute favorite fruit. Besides eating peaches as they are, my other favorite ways to enjoy them are in desserts. I love this peach galette, a foolproof fruit tart recipe that I rely on every summer. But I also love to make sorbets, ice creams, and sherbets. What could be a better dessert than a cooling scoop or two? This summer it's white peach sherbet all the way.

Just think of the sherbets from when you were a kid and the ones available in the supermarket. Don't you ever wonder what those fluorescent colors are actually made of? They're hardly fruit. Though as a kid I too loved eating them, but not anymore. This recipe couldn't be easier. Sherbet is unlike ice cream in that the milk or cream is not cooked. In ice cream you almost always need to make a custard from eggs and milk and simmer it until thick. Sherbet is simply puréed fruit mixed with milk and then frozen.

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ice_cream_maker_trad.jpg My husband Leo loves ice cream.  I like it, but he loves it. For a wedding present, we received a wooden ice cream maker that like the old fashioned ones, needed to be filled with ice and rock salt, but unlike the old fashioned ones, could be plugged in and churned the ice cream without the 'elbow grease.'  Once every few years, we'd pull it out and impress ourselves by making a batch of lovely vanilla ice cream, but it was always a big production for the results.  About 6 or 7 years ago, as a birthday gift for my ice cream loving husband who almost always has a quart of vanilla in the freezer, I bought a double Cuisinart automatic ice cream machine.  It consists of a motorized bottom, plastic churners and plastic covers with two metal containers which I keep in the freezer at all times.  

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