Ice Cream Cake + A Memory

Growing up, summer time meant spending time on Balboa Island.  Some summers, we would rent a house.  Sometimes with another family, yet most summer's we just rented our own home. We participated in many daily activities; fishing in the bay, riding around the island in a small motor boat, and riding our bikes until the moon was our only light source.  The most important daily activity was eating a "bal bar".  A bal bar is basically a brick of ice cream with a stick in it.  Then it is dipped in the most amazing chocolate sauce and covered in either nuts or jimmies.  I always went for the nuts (see original ice cream here).

This dessert reminds me of my childhood. For me, it's all about the nuts. The original bal bar didn't have cake in it.  However,  topping this dessert off with roasted, salted peanuts brought back some darn good memories!

Brown Butter Pound Cake
yield 1 - 8 1/2 x 4 1/2" loaf
adapted from here

ingredients:
2 1/4(9 oz.) sticks unsalted butter
2 cups sifted cake flour (before measuring)
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
4 large eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

instructions:
• preheat oven to 325*.  butter and flour an 8 1/2 x 4 1/2" loaf pan
• heat butter in a 10" skillet over medium heat until milk solids on bottom are dark chocolate brown (don't walk away, it burns super fast).  transfer to a shallow bowl and chill in freezer until congealed, 15 minutes.
• whisk flour, baking powder, and salt.
• in a mixer, beat sugars and brown butter until fluffy (the smell at this point is intoxicating).  add eggs, one at a time.  add vanilla.
• mix in flour mixture until just incorporated.
• transfer to prepared pan. bake until golden brown and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, 60 to 75 minutes.  cool in pan for 1 hour, then invert onto cake rack to cool completely.
• once cooled, stick in the fridge for an hour(this makes it easier to cut).
• this pound cake can stand on it's own.  it is delicious!

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream w/Cookie Dough
adapted from David Lebovitz
yield 4 cups ( you will need three cups for this recipe)

ingredients:
1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy cream
pinch of salt
1 vanilla bean, split in half, lengthwise
6 large egg whites
3/4 tsp. vanilla

instructions:
• warm the milk, sugar, 1 cup of cream, and salt in a medium saucepan.
• scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the warm milk and add the bean as well.
• cover, remove from heat, and let steep at room temperature for 30 minutes.
• pour the remaining 1 cup into a large bowl and set a mesh strainer on top.
• in a separate medium bowl, whisk the egg yolks. slowly pour the warm mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly, then scrape the warmed egg yolks back into the saucepan.
• stir the mixture, constantly, over medium heat with a heatproof spatula, scraping the bottom as you stir until the mixture thickens and coats the back of the spatula.
• pour the custard through the strainer and stir it into the cream.
• put the vanilla bean into the custard, add the vanilla extract and stir until cool, over an ice bath.
• chill the mixture in the fridge for about 3 hours.
• when ready to churn, remove the vanilla bean, rinsing and reserving (I make vanilla sugar with it).  freeze the mixture in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.
• before transferring to a plastic container, mix in your favorite cookie dough(it is best if your cookie dough chunks have been previously frozen).
• freeze in an air tight container.

Glaze

ingredients
1/2 cup whipping cream
1/4 cup light corn syrup
6 oz. bittersweet chocolate chopped

instructions
• bring the cream + corn syrup to a boil in a heavy saucepan.  remove from heat.
• pour cream mixture over chocolate and whisk until melted and smooth. let stand about an hour,
but still pourable.

Assembly:
• cut the cake in half, lengthwise.  Then cut it again.  You will end up with 4 parts, all about 1" thick.
• freeze the four pieces on a sheet pan for about an hour.
• 15 minutes before taking the cakes out of the freezer, let ice cream rest on your kitchen counter.  you want your ice cream spreadable.
• line a 9" x 9" square baking pan with plastic wrap.  make sure there is enough overhang to wrap the cake tightly.
• take two of your cake pieces and lay them on the bottom of prepared pan.
• spread a little of  your glaze on the surface of the cake. freeze for 15 minutes
• spread your ice cream ( 3 cups) over the cake.  smooth with an off set spatula.
• lay the other two pieces of cake directly over the ice cream layer.  press gently to get the cake to stick to the ice cream.
• wrap the cake with the plastic wrap(the overhang of your pan). wrap a 2nd layer of plastic wrap around the entire pan.
• freeze over night.
• remove the cake from the pan.  discard the plastic wrap.  cut off the uneven ends(my kids made good use of the rejected ends), creating a 7 1/2" x 7 1/2" square. cut into desired size squares(I did 1 3/4" squares).
• put the squares on a wire rack set over a sheet pan.  quickly, spoon your glaze over the cake squares. sprinkle each mini cake with nuts, jimmies, m+m's, what ever strikes your fancy.  Set in the freezer until ready to eat!

There are so many variations one could do with this idea.  Although it was a laborious task, I would certainly do it again.  However, may wait until next Spring.  At the moment, I am kind of relishing all the seasonal fruits I am finding at the local farmer's market!  Be on the look out for lots of tarts, stewed fruits and galettes!

Raspberry Swirl Ice Cream

Each 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.

Raspberry Swirl Ice Cream
adapted from David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop
yield: 1 1/2 quarts

ingredients:
ice cream
1 cup whole milk
2/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
5 egg yolks
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract (I replaced this with a 1/2 of a vanilla bean, beans scraped from the pod)

raspberry swirl
1 1/2 cups raspberries, fresh or frozen
3 Tbls. sugar
1 Tbls. vodka

instructions:
to make the ice cream: 
• warm the milk, sugar and salt in a saucepan.  pour the cream (this is when I added my vanilla bean and pod) into a large bowl.  set a mesh strainer over the top.
• in a separate bowl whisk the egg yolks.  set aside.  slowly pour the warm milk into the egg yolks.  i add the milk 1/4 of a cup at a time in order to temper the egg yolks.  otherwise you may cook the egg yolks and then you would have to start all over again.  scrape the warm egg/milk mixture back into the saucepan.
• stir the mixture over medium heat until heated and the custard coats the back of your heatproof spatula.
• take the vanilla bean pod ( if using ) out of the cream and set aside.  pour the warm custard through the strainer into the vanilla infused cream.  if not using the vanilla bean, add your vanilla extract here.
• cool over an ice bath.  when cool, chill thoroughly in the fridge.

to make the raspberry swirl:
• mash the raspberries together with the sugar and the vodka.  after mashing, i strained the mixture into a bowl and then re-mashed the fruit.  once finely mashed i added the fruit to the liquid.  chill in the fridge until ready to use.

• churn the cooled custard in your ice cream maker for about 20-30 minutes.  as you remove it from the machine, layer it in your container with spoonfuls of chilled raspberry swirl.  do not mix.
• freeze for several hours before serving.

Coffee - Chocolate Milk Shakes

I was in Cost Plus today and found these fun, cute straws.  I had to buy them.  My kids like to use their straws.  Yet, these are just too fun to waste.  They deserved a special after school snack.

Both Eli and Isaac had friends over after school today.  I put the straws to the test.  I made coffee - chocolate chip malts.  Growing up, my dad loved making malts for me and my friends.  He never measured anything and just threw stuff into the blender.  My personal favorite was his coffee malt.  I loved malt powder.  I remember eating it with a spoon right out of the glass jar.  Couldn't imagine doing that today, however when you are 12, why the check not?  What I also remember are Horlicks Tablets.  They were similiar to a malted milk ball, but without the chocolate coating, they were flat and they were much more dense.  I can still feel the way they felt when I bit into them.  They were so addicting.  I ate them like candy.  I just read on Wikipedia that they promoted sleep.  Wish I had a jar of those today for little Levi!

For our shake today, I chopped some good bittersweet chocolate (callebaut) and threw it into the blender after everything was combined and smooth.  Blended until just combined.  Then poured into glasses topped off with this festive straw.  Too bad we are all not on lounge chairs on  a beach in Kona.

Everyone was joyful!

Coffee Malts

ingredients:

• coffee ice cream

• organic whole milk

• 1-2 Tbls. malted milk powder

• a little splash of chocolate syrup

• 2-3 oz. of good bittersweet chocolate chopped

directions:

• put desired amount of ice cream in the blender.  add milk (about 1/4- 1/3 the amount of ice cream).  blend to smooth - you may have to add a dash more milk.

• when smooth add your malt powder + chocolate syrup

• add chopped chocolate, blend

• pour into desired glasses

Levi needed 2 straws

Coffee Ice Cream

I have so many egg yolks crowding my fridge at the moment.  Between the macaroons and my scrambled egg whites in the mornings, I probably have about 14 yolks on hand.

The best way to use lonely egg yolks is to make ice cream.  Eli choose coffee and Isaac choose mint chip ( I have to get some more fresh mint).

For this recipe, I had to seep the coffee beans with the milk, sugar and some of the cream for an hour.  My house smelt like Peet's!  I am not a coffee drinker, but there is something about the smell of fresh coffee beans that is so intoxicating

This recipe is from my guy, David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop.  I love this book.  The photos are perfect, the paper is perfect and the recipes are so friendly.  I often search the internet for ice cream recipes, but none are as concise as his.  Plus, his writing is brilliant.  If you haven't visited his blog, you must.

This is the creamiest, lightest coffee ice cream you will ever eat.  I am not a lover of ice cream (would rather eat a hunk of chocolate), but...this was spoon lick'n good!

A little history on my Yogi Bear spoon.  I have had it my whole life.  I love this little spoon.  He had a friend, a Huckleberry Hound spoon.  The other day, I was telling Isaac the story of how much I loved this spoon as a child and how he had a mate.  When I was packing up my mom's house last year, I couldn't find Huckleberry.  Isaac confessed that on one of his many sleepovers at Nana's house he made a an experiment.  He told me that he froze the spoon in some ice concoction and when he tried to pull the spoon out of the experiment, the spoon cracked in half. He had no idea how sentimental I was about both of these spoons.  The way he told the story was so endearing that the only thing I could do in that very moment was hug him.  I will miss my Huckleberry spoon, but I am grateful that Yogi has lasted as long has he has!

Salted Caramel Ice cream

After reading the August issue of Gourmet Mag, I wanted to make ALL the ice creams in that issue. As you all know (for the 4 of you whom read this blog), I love caramel anything. So the idea of making my own caramel for homemade ice cream was exciting.

It has been so hot this week and with the unbearable weather, I haven't been motivated to cook. I procrastinated all day. I felt I had to check off at least one item on my "to do" list, otherwise I would have felt like a total loser. I enlisted Eli to be my assistant. Because it was ice cream, he willingly said yes.

The caramel for this Salted Caramel Ice Cream is so unbelievably good that I am surprised it was still around when it was time to combine the caramel with the custard.

The ice cream was really good. But what won my heart is the caramel itself. In the past I had always made a "wet" caramel. A wet caramel is when you combine a few ingredients and cook over the stove. This is what is called a "dry" caramel. To melt the sugar in a dry pan is the only process I will use to make caramel in the future. Homemade caramel will forever be a staple in my fridge. It will sit on the shelf right next to the homemade fudge sauce.

WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM

We are really into ice cream over here at the Salzman house. My kids have been requesting "mint chip ice cream" and I simply had to honor their request.

We were having an impromptu, spur of the moment dinner with some friends (lots of kids) which gave me a good excuse to make more ice cream.

I really didn't want to use the recipe from the Cuisinart manual, so I surfed the net. I found a recipe on Food Network.com and although the ingredients were a little different than the previous ice cream attempts, I thought how bad can half and half, sugar and eggs be?

I went with a recipe by Alton Brown, the crazy guy on the food network. The only thing I changed was I substituted mini chocolate chips for bittersweet chocolate chunks. Everyone agreed that this was a winning recipe.

Profiteroles...More ways to use up the yummy ice cream

I love Profiteroles. The first time I had them, was probably back in 1981 (a junior at U.C. Berkeley), at some yummy restaurant in San Francisco and I fell hard for them then and I still feel the same way about them today. Probably one of my all time favorite desserts. There is something about the combo of the light pastry, the dense, rich ice cream and the velvety, chocolate sauce. Mmmm, Mmmm Good!

I turned my little culinary prodigy, Eli, onto them a while back (he fell hard as well) and felt it only fair that we make them at home. I had been wanting to challenge myself for some time and making Choux Pastry ( The Secrets of Baking by Sherry Yard)was something I had to gear up for. I don't know why I was so intimidated, easy - peasy! And so fun! Hence, I haven't mastered the pastry bag as of yet, but I am working on it. With that said, my little pillows of goodness came out pretty darn good.

I had originally made so many that I ended up freezing most of them. So last week, when we were in an ice cream making extravaganza, our little cream puffs came in handy. We took a few out of the freezer, slapped on some of our homemade vanilla bean ice cream (see blog post 8/3/09 ). The only missing ingredient was the chocolate sauce. So I turned to Baking with Julia, knowing that I would find the perfect chocolate sauce. And I did! It was a perfect trio.

There is nothing more satisfying than an 8pm snack with Eli, lover of almost all food, and an episode of So You Think You Can Dance! It was a good night.

Ice Cream, Ice Cream & More Ice Cream

Eli has been bugging me to get an ice cream maker for EVER! I researched a little and came to the the conclusion that the simple Cuisinart machine was the best one for our culinary purpose.

I brought it home, cleaned it and immediately started experimenting. I started with a strawberry recipe from the August issue of Gourmet Magazine. I had tons of strawberry's. Usually, when I have too many strawberry's I freeze them for morning smoothies. Using pantry items for our first attempt at ice cream was super satisfying.

Ice cream has always seemed intimidating. Ice cream is my new found crush. I can't get enough of it and it is all I think about. And to be honest with you, I don't particularly love ice cream. It is not my go to dessert when I need something sweet. Yet, a little taste, straight from the ice cream maker is pretty darn goooood!

After the successful attempt at the strawberry ice cream, I decided to make the Vanilla Bean from the Cuisinart booklet. This was a good test for me as I really didn't get the full usage of the ice cream maker with the first go around. I really wanted to watch the machine do its magic. This recipe allowed me to full fill my fantasy. At first, this ice cream tasted a little too "eggy". However, once frozen it was good, not great. Need way more vanilla beans! I have researched a few other vanilla bean recipes. I am dying to make the vanilla bean from Sherry Yard, however the recipe calls for SEVEN, yes SEVEN vanilla beans. If I were to make this particular recipe, which I won't, I will have to invest approximately $77.00 in vanilla beans! I'd rather have a new pair of yoga pants for 77.00 bucks!

Next stop was Sherry Yard's coffee ice cream. Pure perfection. This was so amazingly good. It may have to become a staple in our freezer! Everyone in my house voted on what was their favorite. Coffee won by a landslide. Eli and Isaac are requesting Mint Chip. With all the cream and milk I have in the fridge their wish could come true. Be on the lookout for our next ice cream adventure!

Using the snickerdoodles that I had made the day before, the kids and their friends enjoyed homemade ice cream sandwiches!