Now that I've got your attention, I'll come clean. I did not lose 30 pounds eating ice cream, are you kidding me??? While you don't know me, both I and my husband are well aware of the fact that I'm still carrying around about 16 additional pounds since our trip to Thailand last fall (how do you resist two weeks of panang curry? Come on!). But-- stick with me here-- I actually believe that owning an ice cream maker will be good for us. Seriously!
Making your own ice cream at home isn't just a self indulgent way to blow another 30 bucks on a kitchen appliance and a good excuse to always have heavy cream in the refrigerator! Making your own ice cream allows you to have a lot more control over what's going in your freezer and eventually you. For low-carb fans, homemade ice cream is a bastion of guilt-free indulgence: heavy cream is lower in carbs than most other dairy products, and you can easily replace the sugar in your recipe with Splenda or another sugar-free sweetener. Fresh fruit sorbets and other creative tricks can help you come up with a way to still indulge but not rocket the bathroom scale to the basement! Check back with me in another 30 days and I'll let you know how THAT's going. In the meantime, let's talk GINGER ICE CREAM.
I will shortly be dedicating another blog post to the 2nd Annual 7th Avenue Cocktail Competition. For now, I'll refer to one of the winning entries of 2012: the 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise, which made it as one of our top entries because of the creative rim: a glass swiped with fresh lime juice, and dipped in a blend of finely chopped coconut and crystallized ginger. WOW! I decided to take it to the next level and treat our friends to the 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream in its honor. Special thanks to our friends at www.epicurious.com for the base inspiration for this custardy-frozen delight.
7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream
Ingredients:
1/2 C sugar
1/4 C finely chopped fresh ginger root *note 1
2 T water
2 C half and half
1 C heavy cream
1 vanilla bean, split and seeded *note 2
1/2 C + chopped crystallized ginger *note 1
4 extra large egg yolks
Finely chopped coconut flakes
- Place the sugar, ginger root, and water in a medium-sized saucepan. Bring to a low boil over medium high heat; basically you are making an intense gingery-syrup for your custard. Add the half and half and cream. Depending on how thick, silky, and gelato-like you want your ice cream, you can play with these amounts. More cream, more gelato-like in characteristics. Most people don't know that gelato is actually much higher in fat than ice cream. But I don't see any Italians complaining! They also live on a diet based on carbs, bread, cheese and wine. Life is unfair, but I digress.
- Allow the half and half, cream and ginger syrup to come to a low simmer. Meanwhile, separate out your eggs and give them a quick whisk. Once your cream and syrup mixture is simmering, slowly poor it into your eggs while whisking vigorously. If you add it slowly enough and whisk fast enough, you won't end up with scrambled eggs or curdling. But if it curdles a bit, you'll still be okay. Hang tight.
- Return the whole batch back into your sauce pan (the ginger will clump weirdly both going into the eggs and back in the pan, but don't worry about it). Now, pull out a thermometer you would use if you were steaming milk, and slowly bring your mixture up to about 170 degrees. Don't allow it to boil, and stir almost constantly to keep it from clumping or sticking.
- Strain your custard through a seive into a large bowl. Remember when you were worried about scrambled eggs? If anything curdled, it will get caught now, along with all of the fresh ginger and the stringy bits that go with that. After straining, gently stir in your vanilla bean seeds or extract. Don't go crazy, it will all get mixed up in your ice cream machine!
- Chill your custard. Cover it with plastic wrap-- layer the wrap directly on the liquid, so you don't develop a skin on the top. Let it sit in the back of the fridge (mine nestled in comfortably between some nice feta and a chilled bottle of champagne) for anywhere from 3 hours to overnight. Once it's chilled completely, put it into your ice cream maker and let it go wild. Add as much or as little of the crystallized ginger as you like about 5 minutes before you finish mixing, and reserve additional for yourself and your friends to sprinkle on top (yes, I'm sorry, you will need to share).
- Garnish with the remaining chopped crystallized ginger mixed with your chopped coconut. An homage to our friend whose cocktail inspired an ice cream!
I'll be heading out in another hour or two to enjoy some of our 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream on our patio; nothing goes better with a sunset than a post dinner, homemade ice cream. Cheers to summer!
Note 1
The Savory Spice Shop in downtown Denver is my source for the crystallized ginger. They have two types-- one is darker and much spicier than the lighter yellow one. I used the lighter yellow one for this recipe, however my mind does wander in thinking about an application for a darker, spicier ginger ice cream. Perhaps over a nice pumpkin tart? Will explore in the fall. On the fresh ginger root, don't worry about getting it too thin or two thick while grating-- I grated mine very coarsely and put it through my mini food processor to get it a little smaller, but it will all be strained out before turning to custard, anyway.
Note 2
When I travel, I love picking up local ingredients. While in Tahiti a while back, I bought a ton of vanilla beans. These have kept exceptionally well in a sealed spice jar and add a great bit of interest in baked goods and ice creams because of the pretty little black flecks. If you don't want the expense of using fresh vanilla beans, use 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, instead.
Making your own ice cream at home isn't just a self indulgent way to blow another 30 bucks on a kitchen appliance and a good excuse to always have heavy cream in the refrigerator! Making your own ice cream allows you to have a lot more control over what's going in your freezer and eventually you. For low-carb fans, homemade ice cream is a bastion of guilt-free indulgence: heavy cream is lower in carbs than most other dairy products, and you can easily replace the sugar in your recipe with Splenda or another sugar-free sweetener. Fresh fruit sorbets and other creative tricks can help you come up with a way to still indulge but not rocket the bathroom scale to the basement! Check back with me in another 30 days and I'll let you know how THAT's going. In the meantime, let's talk GINGER ICE CREAM.
I will shortly be dedicating another blog post to the 2nd Annual 7th Avenue Cocktail Competition. For now, I'll refer to one of the winning entries of 2012: the 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise, which made it as one of our top entries because of the creative rim: a glass swiped with fresh lime juice, and dipped in a blend of finely chopped coconut and crystallized ginger. WOW! I decided to take it to the next level and treat our friends to the 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream in its honor. Special thanks to our friends at www.epicurious.com for the base inspiration for this custardy-frozen delight.
7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream
 |
| Fresh and Crystallized Ginger |
1/2 C sugar
1/4 C finely chopped fresh ginger root *note 1
2 T water
2 C half and half
1 C heavy cream
1 vanilla bean, split and seeded *note 2
1/2 C + chopped crystallized ginger *note 1
4 extra large egg yolks
Finely chopped coconut flakes
- Place the sugar, ginger root, and water in a medium-sized saucepan. Bring to a low boil over medium high heat; basically you are making an intense gingery-syrup for your custard. Add the half and half and cream. Depending on how thick, silky, and gelato-like you want your ice cream, you can play with these amounts. More cream, more gelato-like in characteristics. Most people don't know that gelato is actually much higher in fat than ice cream. But I don't see any Italians complaining! They also live on a diet based on carbs, bread, cheese and wine. Life is unfair, but I digress.
- Allow the half and half, cream and ginger syrup to come to a low simmer. Meanwhile, separate out your eggs and give them a quick whisk. Once your cream and syrup mixture is simmering, slowly poor it into your eggs while whisking vigorously. If you add it slowly enough and whisk fast enough, you won't end up with scrambled eggs or curdling. But if it curdles a bit, you'll still be okay. Hang tight.
- Return the whole batch back into your sauce pan (the ginger will clump weirdly both going into the eggs and back in the pan, but don't worry about it). Now, pull out a thermometer you would use if you were steaming milk, and slowly bring your mixture up to about 170 degrees. Don't allow it to boil, and stir almost constantly to keep it from clumping or sticking.
- Strain your custard through a seive into a large bowl. Remember when you were worried about scrambled eggs? If anything curdled, it will get caught now, along with all of the fresh ginger and the stringy bits that go with that. After straining, gently stir in your vanilla bean seeds or extract. Don't go crazy, it will all get mixed up in your ice cream machine!
- Chill your custard. Cover it with plastic wrap-- layer the wrap directly on the liquid, so you don't develop a skin on the top. Let it sit in the back of the fridge (mine nestled in comfortably between some nice feta and a chilled bottle of champagne) for anywhere from 3 hours to overnight. Once it's chilled completely, put it into your ice cream maker and let it go wild. Add as much or as little of the crystallized ginger as you like about 5 minutes before you finish mixing, and reserve additional for yourself and your friends to sprinkle on top (yes, I'm sorry, you will need to share).
- Garnish with the remaining chopped crystallized ginger mixed with your chopped coconut. An homage to our friend whose cocktail inspired an ice cream!
I'll be heading out in another hour or two to enjoy some of our 7th Avenue Ginger Surprise Ice Cream on our patio; nothing goes better with a sunset than a post dinner, homemade ice cream. Cheers to summer!
Note 1
The Savory Spice Shop in downtown Denver is my source for the crystallized ginger. They have two types-- one is darker and much spicier than the lighter yellow one. I used the lighter yellow one for this recipe, however my mind does wander in thinking about an application for a darker, spicier ginger ice cream. Perhaps over a nice pumpkin tart? Will explore in the fall. On the fresh ginger root, don't worry about getting it too thin or two thick while grating-- I grated mine very coarsely and put it through my mini food processor to get it a little smaller, but it will all be strained out before turning to custard, anyway.
Note 2
When I travel, I love picking up local ingredients. While in Tahiti a while back, I bought a ton of vanilla beans. These have kept exceptionally well in a sealed spice jar and add a great bit of interest in baked goods and ice creams because of the pretty little black flecks. If you don't want the expense of using fresh vanilla beans, use 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, instead.
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