13 Egg Vanilla

Unlucky thirteen. Actually, thirteen is very lucky for your mouth in this ice cream.

Before we get too far into this let me address one important issue - use of vanilla beans. This fellow is not abandoning his philosophy that vanilla extract is all that is necessary for great vanilla ice cream. If you recall from one of my earliest posts, I talked about the value of vanilla extract and how it is the real flavoring behind nearly every vanilla ice cream you will ever eat. I stand by that statement. There really isn't a need to ever use vanilla beans when making ice cream; however, I had some sitting around, so I put them to work.

This recipe is an adaptation from Ann Amernick's "The Art of Dessert." With the exception of the eggs and flavorings, Ms. Amernick's recipe uses the base that I favor the most - 2 cups of milk and cream and 3/4 cup of sugar. When it comes to eggs, she asks for 225 grams of egg yolks, which she says is 11 - 12 eggs. In order to get there, I needed 13 yolks. I suggest you use the same amount and forget about the scale. There is no reason to really measure to the gram. She is pastry chef and is used to working in metric volumes because baking is science and requires a degree of precision that is not necessary in ice cream. So please use your baker's dozen of egg yolks and enjoy the most unctuous of vanilla ice cream.

Her book is fantastic, Ms. Amernick is certainly an artisan to be admired. I made the complete recipe for the Apple Marmalade Sandwiches with Cranberry Coulis and Vanilla Caramel Ice Cream. The results were well received, although Mrs. Fellow thought it too orangey for her taste. I would make it again in a second. Unfortunately, something about her methodology for making ice cream prevented me from completely following her recipe.

Her recipe calls for the cream and milk to be brought to a boil, then removed from the heat. The eggs are tempered and whisked into the milk and cream. From what I have read and my own experiences, when the milk and cream comes to a boil, the fat separates from the liquid and cannot be reincorporated. The result is bad. So I opted to follow my usual method of heating.

I won't go into the details of this recipe too much. the ingredient list is as follows:

2 cups whole milk
2 cups cream
13 egg yolks
3/4 cup of sugar
1 vanilla bean
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

If you read my blog regularly, than you know how to make custard. If not, refer to my vanilla ice cream post. The main difference in the methodology is that the vanilla bean is split and scraped, then added to the milk and cream. Leave the bean in the ice cream until it is strained through the sieve.

Fixing cinnamon ice cream woes

I want to tell you about a great trick I discovered to resolve the problem with using ground cinnamon in ice cream. I have always had problems with the cinnamon clumping when I added the milk and cream. Previously, I had suggested making a slurry with just enough milk before adding the it to the base. Although it worked, it was not a great solution. This time, I mixed the cinnamon with the sugar that is mixed with the eggs. You do this step before adding the eggs. When the eggs go in, the cinnamon is well distributed and does not clump at all.

Butternut Squash with Cranberry Swirl

Admittedly, this recipe might be slightly inspired by the Top Chef finale. Still the squash is different and the swirl is all me.

Cranberry and squash are two classic fall flavors and make this recipe taste like it belongs as part of Thanksgiving dinner.

I cheated a bit. Usually, I prefer to do as much from scratch as possible, but I used frozen squash puree. Shame on me, but the result is more than adequate. The butter and brown sugar bring out the sweetness of the squash nicely and adds a bit of a foil for the cranberry sauce which can be quite tart, even frozen.

If you want, sterilize some jars and preserve the cranberry sauce. This recipe makes a lot more than you need and it is delicious on its own.

One more note, I am guessing a bit at the ice cream proportions. I made my usual base using 2 cups milk, 2 cups cream, 3/4c of sugar and 5 eggs. Unfortunately, I did not buy enough squash for this so I only used about 2 1/2 cups of the base with the squash. Everything should work out fine, but be forewarned you may need to adjust this a bit to your taste.

Butternut Squash Ice Cream with Cranberry-Clementine Swirl

Cranberry-Clementine Swirl

16 oz cranberries
1 cup water
1.5 cups sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
pinch of slat
zest of 1.5 clementines
1 tsp clementine juice

1. Put the water, sugar, cinnamon, salt in a saucepan. Bring to a boil.


2. Add the cranberries, zest, juice. Cook for ten minutes until the berries have popped and become very soft.


3. Cool to room temperature, and refrigerate.

Butternut Squash Ice Cream:

12oz frozen, pureed butternut squash
1 TBL brown sugar
1/4 ounce unsalted butter
1.25 cups whole milk
1.25 cups cream
3/4 cups sugar
4 egg yolks
Salt to taste

1. Microwave the squash until hot. Add the butter, brown sugar and salt. Set aside.


2. Mix the egg yolks with 1/4 cup of sugar and a pinch of salt.


3. Put the cream, milk, and 1/2 cup of the sugar in a saucepan. Heat until bubbles just begin to form around the edges of the liquid.


4. Add about 1/3 cup of the heated liquid to the eggs slowly while stirring the eggs the entire time.


5. Add the egg mixture into the liquid. Stir constantly until the temperature exceeds 175 degrees F.


6. Remove the liquid from the heat, strain into a bowl. Add the squash, stir to incorporate.


7. At this point, taste and correct the seasoning. When you are satisfied with the flavor, cool to room temperature, then refrigerate overnight to let the flavors mature.


8. Freeze in your ice cream maker. Swirl in the cranberry-clementine mixture at the very end of the freezing process.

Here is a picture of me

Here is a picture of me taking the first bite of a Mickey Mouse Ice Cream at Disney World from earlier this month. It was a great treat considering the abnormally hot and sticky weather.

I am still stumped by the chocolate curry ice cream. I am still soliciting opinions. Truthfully, I have been a little too busy to work on anything too. I will be revisiting my pumpkin ice cream today. Check it out for a fun fall treat.

Blueberry Fig Sauce

I had a house full of extra fruit on the verge of going bad so I thought it wise to use it up in a sauce. In general, this is a great way to use up old fruit. Cooking it down into a sauce to spoon over or add into a basic sweet cream or vanilla ice cream base is a great way to not waste food. It would certainly make your mother and all those starving kids in Africa very happy to know you didn't waste your fruit.

I always find it difficult to specify the amount of sugar you should use. Your fruit may be more or less sweet than mine. In my case, I used a little more than 1/4 cup of sugar. The figs were ripe, but the blueberries were a bit tart. My only comment is that between the maple syrup and the sweetness of the fruit, you should be careful not to over sweeten the sauce with sugar. You can always taste and add more sugar in after a while if it is not sweet enough. Use extra fine sugar and stir it into the still warm sauce, or rewarm the sauce to incorporate the sugar.

I think this will be great either swirled into or served warm over vanilla ice cream. If you cook it a little longer you can cook down into fresh jam.

Blueberry Fig Sauce:

1 pint fresh blueberries
16 ounces fresh figs (I used both green and mission varieties)
8 ounces maple syrup
Sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice
Zest of one lemon
Pinch of salt

1. Depending on their size, halve or quarter the figs.


2. Put all the ingredients into a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and cook, stirring frequently, until the blueberries are practically melted into nothing.


3. Remove from the heat, cool to room temperature, then refrigerate.