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.

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.