Assistant Food Editor Hannah Lewry takes an inspired look at the latest hot summer trend: homemade artisinal ice creams.
Last week while food blog-hopping, I found a weird and wonderful recipe for ‘buttered popcorn ice cream’. How great does that sound! Promising to taste just like the movies, with just the right sweet and savoury flavour combination, it reminded me of an insanely delicious ice cream, the burnt sugar and salt ice cream we made for a TASTE Trend shoot a few years back. It's an explosion of flavours in your mouth and dangerously addictive.
After a touch of reminiscing and a little more research, I discovered just how simple a beautiful ice cream is to make. Without further ado I logged onto the Yuppie Chef website first thing this morning and purchased my very own little Krups ice-cream maker! (R745)
I am now eagerly awaiting its delivery so we can start our many adventures together. To be honest, being such a self-proclaimed ice cream freak I’m ashamed it took me this long to get one.
HAND-CHURNED VS MACHINE-CHURNED - WHICH IS THE BEST?
For the best ice cream you really have to invest in an ice cream maker. Making it by hand is tedious work and the results are never quite the same.
With a machine you pour in the custard and let it churn for half an hour, freeze and voila, you have ice cream. Doing it by hand is a laborious to-ing and fro-ing between freezer and hand churning and the results are not always guaranteed. But prove me wrong if you like!
ICE CREAMS I'M GOING TO TRY
The first ice cream I'm going to attempt is the granadilla ice cream in handmade tuile cones. The cones are surprisingly easy and great value to make. They also look gorgeous dusted with icing sugar before serving.
Being the sucker for coffee-flavoured ice cream that I am, next on my list has to be the espresso ice cream sunday with crushed nuts and chocolate curls. I think I’ll be trying mine with toasted hazelnuts.
The vanilla-soya milk ice and rose-water-pomegranate sorbet is a fabulous dessert to make for any of your lactose intolerant friends. It still gives you that rich, sweet texture that you expect from an ice cream, but without any of the dairy..jpg "Burnt sugar and salt ice cream")
For a fresher, zesty alternative try the clementine-and-lemon sorbet with balsamic cream which ticks all the right boxes for vegetarians and vegans.
Classic condensed milk Eskimo pies will get you yelps of delight from little ones who'll be more than happy to help pour over melted dark chocolate to make those moreish frosted chocolate caps.
SCIENTIFIC ICE CREAM
Another interesting fact I came across was the making of Liquid nitrogen ice cream. This is more for experimental purposes and is hugely popular in the school science labs of America. Believe it or not, it's perfectly edible and creamy too.
All you need is a basic vanilla bean gelato custard base, an ice-cream maker and the right balance of skill and nitrogen liquid. Having said that, it’s not the kind of thing to try at home without sufficient research and the necessary safety precautions. It makes for an interesting science lesson no doubt, but is best left to the foodie geeks.
TOO BUSY TO MAKE?
Woolies has a fab new range of ripple ice-creams on its way to a freezer near you.
My favourites are the caramel fudge ripple flecked with real fudge bits and the beautiful Greek yoghurt and honey ripple. Read more about them in the March issue of TASTE on shelf 22 February 2012.
Happy churning and good scooping!
Hannah
PS, what's your fave new ice cream flavour? Email me @ hannah.lewry@newmediapub.co.za
MORE ICE CREAM DELICIOUSNESS