Coffee Ice Cream

I know it has taken a very long time for me to get my next recipe out. I have had more than a few complaints. My idea for a recipe failed miserably. That means its back to the drawing board. The flavor was based on coffee ice cream. It didn't work but I made enough ice cream to experiment with a couple of ideas. Luckily this one came out better than I could have imagined.

The coffee ice cream recipe is directly lifted from Dave Lebovitz's book called "The Perfect Scoop," so I will not post it. Buy his book, he has some great recipes. My addition is this "cookie." Use Nabisco Famous Wafers for this. There is no subsititution. One box should make just enough crumbs. You won't find them in the cookie aisle because they are almost always with the chocolate syrup and hot fudge in the ice cream aisle.

Chocolate Almond Cookie:

1.5 cups chocolate wafer crumbs
1 cup of blanched almonds, toasted
1/3 cup of sugar
6 tablespoons of butter, melted

1. Crush the cookies, sugar, and almonds in a food processor until they are a finely chopped. Put the contents in a mixing bowl.


2. Add the melted butter mix together with the crumbs until it is fully incorporated.


3. Spread the mixture into a single 1/4 inch layer on a a baking sheet.


4. Using a ramikin or small prep bowl, press on the cookie to pack it tight. This will allow it to bake and form into a hard solid mass.


5. Bake in the oven at 375 degrees for 10 minutes.


6. Remove and let completely cool.


7. Break the cookie into bite sized pieces and incorporate into the ice cream during the last minuted of freezing time.

National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day

Again, I am not a very good blogger. I am the process of moving and I have not yet set up my kitchen and one of my computers died. Shame on me. In the meantime I have had to subside on Ben and Jerry's. Although I will share with you that the Fellows had one of the best frozen dessert experiences in a long time at a restaurant in Atlanta called Aja. The dessert consisted of coconut sorbet, lemongrass sorbet and strawberry gelee was served to us in a young coconut. Absolutely outstanding. I want to track down the creator of this masterpiece and have him or her guest blog for us.

The first Saturday in February is Ice Cream for Breakfast Day. This year, it will be on Feb. 7th. Mark your calendars and plan for it. I am going to have a bowl of banana ice cream in my cereal to honor the late Mr. Robbins (of Baskin-Robins). It was his breakfast of choice.

Life gets in the way again

There seems to be no good time for me post. I was really hoping to catch up over the holidays while school was out. Instead, I bought a house and simultaneously got pneumonia. New recipes are forthcoming.

The National Ice Cream Retailers had their annual convention and gave out the following accolades:

Vanilla Ice Cream: Blue Ribbons
Ashby’s Sterling Ice Cream, Shelby Township, MI (Vanilla, Vanilla Bean & French Vanilla)
Capannari Ice Cream, Mt. Prospect, IL
Diamond Star Ventures, Inc. dba Classics Frozen Custard (Frozen Custard), Ruidoso, NM
Gifford’s Dairy Inc., Skowhegan, ME
Karen’s Kreamery, Surprise, AZ
MaggieMoo’s International, Norcross, GA
Smith Dairy, Orrville, OH
Sno Top Ltd., Manlius, NY

Vanilla Ice Cream: Red Ribbons
Anderson’s Frozen Custard, Williamsville, NY
Corn Hill Creamery, Rochester, NY
Chocolate Shopppe Ice Cream (Old Fashioned Vanilla), Madison, WI

Vanilla Ice Cream: White Ribbons
Avondale Dairy Bar, St. Catharines, ON, Canada
Smith Dairy Products Co., Orrville, OH (Organic Vanilla Bean), Orrville, OH

Strawberry Ice Cream: Blue Ribbons
Chocolate Shoppe Ice Cream, Madison, WI
Gifford’s Dairy Inc., Skowhegan, ME
Karen’s Kreamery, Surprise, AZ
Smith Dairy Products Co., Orrville, OH

Strawberry Ice Cream: Red Ribbons
Anderson’s Frozen Custard, Williamsville, NY
Ashby’s Sterling Ice Cream, Shelby Township, MI
Avondale Dairy Bar, St. Catharines, ON, Canada
Double Dip, Lebanon, OH
MaggieMoo’s International, Norcross, GA

Strawberry Ice Cream: White Ribbon
Corn Hill Creamery, Rochester, NY

If you happen to live near any of these shops please check them out. If you get a chance drop me line and let me know if they really are as good as the judges said they were.

Acai Blueberry Ice Cream with Chocolate Covered Granola

I have to admit, acai berry is not my favorite flavor. Unlike most other berries it is far from sweet. In fact to me it tastes a lot like liquid cardboard. So when my Brazilian friend gave me a bunch of frozen acai berry juice I was less than thrilled. If you don't know much about acai, here is the link to the wiki.

After talking to her and doing some research I found that there is an incredible lack of acai berry ice cream. You can find sorbet and sherbet easily, but no ice cream. So I set out to mimic the famous Rio Bowl -- vanilla yogurt, acai berry and granola. Adding the blueberry and chocolate was to help my poor palate.

The end result had a slight textural problem. It was a bit gritty, but not especially so. Maybe it would do better as frozen yogurt. My only guess is that this comes from the fruit itself. Perhaps if I had reduced the juice more the problem would go away. Of course, it could be the nature of the fruit. Like pineapple, it is possible that it contains something that doesn't react well with dairy when cooked. I am going to have to do more experimentation. This may be why we don't see it on the market in ice cream form very often.

Another problem was the color. Acai berry is a very deep purple. When added to dairy it turns the mixture an extremely unappetizing shade of grey. I had to break down and add red food coloring to make it purple again. The Fellow likes to be as natural as possible and hates using artificial ingredients. I implore you to find a natural food coloring as opposed to the artificial one available in most supermarkets.

As for the taste, this fellow found it to be as good as acai berry can be. I liked it just fine. It is easy to taste all the components in this ice cream and the acai berry isn't too strong. Although, my sister-in-law and her boyfriend also liked it, none of the tasters thought this was one my best efforts. Mrs. Fellow downright hated it. She said it tasted like "frozen nursing home." Ouch!

So I warn you now, acai berry can be a polarizing taste. Not everyone will love it. If you are into it already or want to try one of the most interesting new foods with potentially huge healing powers than give this one a go.

Acai and Blueberry Ice Cream with Chocolate Covered Granola

200 GRAMS of acai juice (sorry about the grams it seems strange to measure liquid in grams but that was what was on the package because it was frozen. Shame on me for not converting to to volume.)
1 cup blueberries
1.5 cups milk
1.5 cups cream
5 egg yolks
1 whole egg
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
Red food coloring
4.5 ounces semisweet chocolate
4 ounces granola

1. Put the blueberries and acai berry juice into a small sauce pan and cook until the berries are really soft. Puree. You will need a half of a cup of puree.


2. You should know this next part pretty well by now. Mix the yolks and whole egg with about 1/2 of the sugar, set aside. Heat the milk and cream until it is slightly steaming. Temper the eggs with the dairy, than add the eggs back into the dairy pot. Stir constantly until the mixture reaches 175 degrees F. Strain through a fine sieve.


3. Add the vanilla and half of a cup of the acai/blueberry puree. Stir in thoroughly. Taste and adjust to your liking. The color will be grey. Add the red food coloring until you find a color you like. Cool, and then chill in your refrigerator for at least four hours or overnight.


4. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Once melted, remove the chocolate from the heat and ass the granola. Mix thoroughly, then spread onto a piece of parchment or silpat to cool. Break up and large chunks into smaller pieces.


5. Freeze in your ice cream machine. Add the granola during the last minute.

Where have you been?

Life can be so inconvenient sometimes. Between finals, working, and buying a house I have not had the time I would like to spend with you. Very shortly I will hopefully have a new ice cream flavor to post -- acai berry with chocolate covered granola. In the meantime, the best thing I have to share to with you is my mini-review of Chef Richard Blaise's new restaurant FLIP.

FLIP is a burger boutique. The burgers are inventive. It had only been open four days when we went for lunch. The usual opening week glitches were present but none were insurmountable and don't warrant mentioning in detail.

The real star for ice cream lovers are the shakes. At $7 each they aren't cheap. When my sister-in-law's boyfriend saw the prices he was shocked. I was instantly reminded of the dinner scene in Pulp Fiction between Uma Thurman and John Travolta where they discuss the $5 shake. And oh yes, these bad boys are worth the price!

We had two shakes -- nutella with burnt marshmallows and Krispy Kreme. Although the Nutella one could have used a bit more Nutella flavor it was quite possibly the best chocolate shake this fellow has ever had. The marshmallows were a great addition. By far, the Krispy Kreme one was table's favorite . It tasted exactly like Krispy Kreme donuts. Words can't even begin to describe how good it was. If you like shakes and you like donuts, you will love this one.

We had a minute to talk to Chef Blais and he gave us the best news. His foie gras milkshake does make occasional appearances on the menu. This is the best shake ever. If you have the chance to try it, get one because you will never look at shakes the same way again.