minty fresh

mint chip ice cream sandwiches

This time I made Fresh Mint ice cream with Stracciatella, then sandwiched them between chocolate cookies. The Fresh Mint ice cream was great! As you can imagine, the flavor was totally different from commercial mint chip. It tasted just like fresh mint smells, not artificial at all. The minty milk tasted so good by itself that I wanted to just drink it before I made the custard. However, my milk never turned "emerald green" as promised by the recipe. Not even a hint of green. Perhaps I need to bruise or chop the mint leaves before steeping? Also, I skimped a little on the mint (60g instead of 80g) thinking it might be too strong. I was wrong; definitely use the whole amount.

mint steeping in milk ... decidedly not green mint chip

For the stracciatella, I was supposed to melt a bar of chocolate (I used 55% dark) and pour a thin stream into the ice cream at the end of churning, creating chocolate streaks. This was impossible. No matter how hot the chocolate was, it never got to a "thin stream" consistency. It would crawl toward the spout, then plop off in big drops. Plus it would always hit directly on the dasher, never in the ice cream, no matter what I tried with the timing. It was huge mess. Finally, I stopped the churning and just dropped in small bits and slashed it around quickly with a spatula. This worked perfectly. I just had to work quickly to prevent the chocolate from freezing into big chunks instead of thin streaks. I really liked the end result, which added the perfect complement to the mellow mint.

ramikin perfect for pressing dough balls ... cookie too thick, ice cream too thin

Lastly, I made chocolate cookies to make ice cream sandwiches. My son and I were disappointed with the end result and we've been scraping off and eating the ice cream by itself. The flavor was good, but there were many problems (most self-inflicted):

A) ice cream layer was too thin (see pic above). In retrospect, I think the ice cream should be 2-3 times as thick as the cookie layer.

B) the cookies were too thick (see pic above). The ice cream flavor was completely obscured. I made them as prescribed the recipe (I even weighed the dough to make sure each ball was exactly the same). But seeing them action, I would recommend making them half as thick (of course, reducing the baking time).

C) let the ice cream set in the freezer for an hour or so before assembling sandwiches. I assembled them immediately after churning and the ice cream started oozing all over. The ice cream needs to be pliable enough to spread but hard enough to keep its shape.

D) The cookies were not soggy (as promised by the recipe), but they didn't soften either. Some might consider this a plus, but I would prefer a softer, chewier cookie that gives a little when I bite in. These cookies were all crunch. (P.S. My husband told me to wait a few days for them to soften up and he was right. The sandwiches are much better a few days after assembly.)

All recipes are lazily abbreviated from The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz.

Fresh Mint Ice Cream

Warm 1 cup milk, 1 cup cream, 3/4 cup sugar, and pinch of salt in small saucepan. Take off heat and stir in 80g (2cups loosely packed) fresh mint leaves. Let steep for an hour. Then strain into larger saucepan where you will make the custard. Pour another 1 cup cream in a separate bowl, where you later pour the finished custard to cool. In separate bowl, whisk 5 egg yolks until combined. Warm minty milk mixture, then slowly pour into eggs, whisking constantly so they don't cook. Pour mixture back into saucepan and warm, stirring constantly until custard coats back of spatula, about 175F (77C). Pour custard through strainer into into cream bowl (from above) and place over ice bath, stirring to bring custard to room temp. Place mixture in fridge or freezer to chill completely (about 40F) before churning. Churn with ice cream machine according to instructions.

Stracciatella

Melt 5oz chocolate in double boiler until smooth. After ice cream is done churning, slowly drizzle warm chocolate into ice cream and quickly use spatula to streak chocolate, breaking up any large chunks. This can be done in the machine itself or as you layer ice cream in container.

Chocolate Sandwich cookies

coming soon

2% butterscotch ripple

my perfect scoops

Since books published in America are usually 50-200% more expensive in Europe (The Bread Bible would have cost me $51 here, as opposed to $25 in the US), I often wait for a generous and strong visitor to truck over a pounds and pounds of new reading material. But this time I couldn't wait. I paid the extra $10 and ordered The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz from Amazon.de and I am one happy cook. Besides the inspiring array of ice cream and sorbet recipes, the toppings and mix-ins recipes practically had me swooning.

I started with Butterscotch Pecan and wow, the flavor packs a punch. The texture was fantastic and I loved the butter flavor - so much more intense and real than anything I've ever had at an ice cream parlor. But something was a little off. I think perhaps it was the extra dark (practically black) brown sugar I used - a bit too molasse-y.

ice cream is even cuter on a cone ... melted cuz I was taking too many pics

In a last ditch effort to gain another 30 pounds before my baby comes in July (to match the weight of my first pregnancy), the very next day, I tried the basic Chocolate Ice Cream recipe. But I didn't let my ice cream maker freeze long enough (I knew it but I did it anyway - will I ever learn?); thus the ice cream was more like ice cream soup. Of course, this didn't stop me or my son from slurping down a couple "scoops" worth. But the flavor is very promising. So I'm freezing everything again tonight and I'm going to process it again tomorrow. I can't wait to eat it for real.

Next on my list is Fresh Mint Stracciatella (aka Mint Chip), my favorite flavor when I'm pregnant.

Butterscotch Pecan Ice Cream Recipe

Lazily abbreviated from The Perfect Scoop, by David Lebovitz

5 TB butter

3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/2 tsp coarse salt

2 cups heavy cream

3/4 cup whole milk

6 large egg yolks

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Buttered Pecans (recipe below), coarsely chopped

1. Melt butter in medium saucepan, then stir in the brown sugar and salt. Whisk in 1 cup of the cream and milk. Warm this mixture. Meanwhile, pour the remaining 1 cup cream in a separate bowl and set a mesh strainer on top.

2. In a separate bowl, whish egg yolks until combined. Slowly pour warm brown sugar mixture into egg yolks, whisking constantly (careful not to scramble them). Scrape warmed yolk back into saucepan. Stir constantly over medium heat until mixture coats the back of a spoon, about 160-175F. Pour mixture through strainer into reserved cream and stir to combine. Add vanilla, then stir over ice bath to stop cooking.

3. Cool mixture thoroughly in fridge (under 40F is best) then freeze in your ice cream machine according to the instructutions. Add pecans in the last minute of churning.

Buttered Pecans

1.5 TB butter

1.5 cups pecan halves

1/4 tsp coarse salt

Preheat over to 350F(175C). Melt butter in skillet. Toss pecans until well coated, then sprinkle with salt. Spread evenly on baking sheet and toast in oven for about 10 minutes, stirring once during baking.

mexican gelato?

To accompany my mex fest, I made gelato with Mexican chocolate. In short, Mexican chocolate is "toasted very dark...then coarsely ground over heat with sugar (and often cinnamon, almonds, and vanilla)...making a disc that more or less dissolves in milk or water, to drink" - Rick Bayless
It's my favorite hot chocolate. To make it properly, you pour hot milk over the chopped chocolate in a blender, then blend to create a thick foam. Yum yum.

As a starting point, I referenced this excellent gelato posting on The Traveler's Lunchbox. As described in this posting, the main difference between gelato and ice cream is that gelato uses only milk, not cream. This means a more intense flavor because the fat is a "flavor-blocker". You may be familiar with this principle with chocolate - e.g. hot chocolate made with water instead of milk is more intense and dissolving cocoa powder in hot water before adding to cake batter will create a more intense chocolate flavor. I digress.

So I adapted the Chocolate Gelato No. 2 on The Traveler's Lunchbox (adapted from an epicurious recipe) by substituting Mexican chocolate for the bittersweet chocolate and reducing the cocoa powder to 1/2 cup. This resulted in a hyper-chocolatey gelato that about knocked me out. I can't imagine what would happen with a full cup of cocoa. It was well-liked by all but with all this chocolatey goodness, the Mexican chocolate subtleties were practically obliterated.

So I tried again, this time eliminating the cocoa powder and got the result I wanted, basically the flavor of Mexican hot chocolate turned into a creamy, cold dessert (recipe below). It was also vaguely reminiscent of the famous Frrrozen Hot Chocolate at Serendipity3 in Manhatten (you must go if you're in town - it lives up to the hype).

Despite this, I was not completely satisfied with the texture. It was a little grainy/icy, not creamy enough. Next time I might try adding a tiny bit of vodka, recommended by a Cook's Illustrated sherbet recipe to create a smoother, more refined texture. Also, I might play around with the milk/sugar ratio. The CI recipe mentions that "...sugar makes it harder for water molecules to form ice crystals and thus lowers the freezing temperature of the mixture...sugar also reduces the size of the ice crystals, physically interfering with their growth. Smaller ice crystals translate into a less grainy texture."

Lastly, the TL recipe says to bring the custard to 160F and the epicurious one says 170F. Most of my ice cream recipes recommend at least 180F, which proved exactly right. If you don't get it to custard texture, there's no point in freezing the stuff.

Here's my final Mexican chocolate gelato recipe, adapted from The Traveler's Lunchbox:

2 ounces (4 triangles) of Mexican chocolate
1 1/2 cups whole milk
1 cup evaporated milk (whole milk is ok, too)
3/4 cup granulated sugar
4 large egg yolks

Have ready a large bowl of ice and cold water (to cool mix after cooking). Coarsely chop chocolate. In a 2-quart heavy saucepan bring milk, evaporated milk, and about half of sugar just to a simmer, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Remove pan from heat and add cocoa powder and chocolate, whisking until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth. In a bowl with an electric mixer beat yolks, remaining sugar and salt until thick and pale. Add hot chocolate mixture in a very slow stream, whisking, being careful not to cook the eggs. Then pour the mixture back into saucepan. Cook custard over moderately low heat, stirring constantly, until a thermometer registers 180°F (don't let it boil - it will cook the eggs, yuck!). Pour custard through a sieve into a metal bowl set in ice and cold water and cool. Chill custard, covered, until cold. Freeze custard in an ice-cream maker. Transfer to an airtight container and put in freezer to harden for several hours.