Lorna Wing's Sachertorte with Vanilla Ice Cream

Don't ask me how much weight I've gained after studying abroad in the U.S....

I've been extremly busy since the time at the begining of the semester, keeping working on weekly homework one by one. The only way I can get rid of my stress is eating food with high calorie, expecially ice cream and chocolate. I could even finish two pints of ice cream in a sudden.

After eating various flavor ice cream of different brands, my consumption begin to fix on pure vanilla ice cream. I'm eager to enjoy the ice cream with rich flavor of milk. Since I have a bunch of quality vanilla bean, I start to make my own pure vanilla ice cream~



I chose Alton Brown's serious vanilla ice cream and changed the recipe a little bit. It is really nice, pure and rich with overwhelming vanilla.

Aside from that, I made Lorna Wing's Sachertorte from Green & Black. It is the version that only has almond flour in it. I like the texure. It is soft but not spongy, compact but not dense, delicious!

They fulfill my desirement, and recover my exhusted heart.

Dried Apricot-Pistachio Ice Cream

It's from "The Perfect Scoop" again!!

I have been excited to make this ice cream. Since I've made the rye bread with dried apricots and pistachio nuts, I knew they are good to be put together.

Because I didn't have half and half on hand, I use whole milk and Greek yogurt to substitute it. It still tasted good as I expected, fresh and tangy with nutty flavor. I'm glad I made it, it is another unique experience of tasting ice cream that I've never have before.

I enjoyed it with my "Italian Chocolate Torte", and they were my perfect afternoon tea!



Italian Chocolate Torte (with orange peel) (for 4-inch round)

Ingredients:
- 10 g hazelnut flour, toasted
- 10 g almond, chopped
- 28 g unsweetened chocolate(Michel Cluizel 99%)
- 12 g maple powder
- 15 g sugar (6+9)
- 1 egg white
- candied orange peel

Dried Apricot-Pistachio Ice Cream

Adapted from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop

5 oz. (150 g )dried California apricots – quartered and then cut into chunks
3/4 c (180 ml) dry or sweet white wine (I chose Vigonier)
1/2 c (70 g) shelled unsalted pistachio nuts – coarsely chopped
2/3 c (130 g) sugar
2 c (250ml) half and half
Few drops of freshly squeezed lemon juice

Pour the wine in a small saucepan and warm the apricots pieces in the liquid. Simmer for 5 minutes, cover and then remove from heat. Allow this to steep for 1 hour.

Purée the apricots in a blender with the sugar, half and half, and lemon juice until smooth

Chill the mixture thoroughly. Freeze it in your ice-cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. During the last few minutes of churning, add the chopped pistachio nuts.

Peanut Butter Ice cream

This one is easy and super delicious if you use quality peanut butter!
The recipe is adapted from David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop".

Panforte Ice Cream

I lose my scooper, so I couldn't have "the perfect scoop" for taking the picture.T_T

I'm crazy for the book "The Perfect Scoop" recently. Owning the book is just like owning a whole amazing ice cream store. I love ice cream, and I love to try on any possibility of ice cream. I would love to experience something unexpected rather than having something classic. Some unusual or abnormal flavors taste weired at first bite, but I might get used to them and then fall in love with their unique taste. Elisen Lebkuchen is one of the examples.








The panforte has similar ingredients as Lebkuchen. I like spice and candied peel, so I've planned to try this recipe for a while.

I followed the original recipe to make my first batch of ice cream. OMG...I was astonished again by the genius, Davis Lebovitz. I love the smelling which is explode when I bit the toasted almond and chewed my homemade candied peel...amazing!


And soon I made a variation for another batch. I used yogurt instead of cream and muscovado instead of white sugar. The flavor of ice cream is dominated by muscovado and yogurt which I felt odd at the begining. However, it made me want to have one bite from another. Although it didn't taste creamy as the original one, it tasted fresh and light. I like them, both.

Pineapple Frozen Yogurt

Easy, Fast, creamy and delicious! All the ingredients you need are yogurt and quality preserves.

I just bought pineapple preserves from Red On Tree. The whole thing is very thick, it is full of pineapple pieces and tastes sweet and chewy. Unlike any other preserves, it is more like candied fruits in the syrup which is not suitable to spread on the bread. Thus, I used to swirl in the yogurt to make "pineapple yogurt spread". Yesterday, I just want to have some frozen yogurt, so I mix the preserves in the strained yogurt then thrown the mixture into the ice cream maker. Done! I enjoyed the rich and creamy pineapple frozen yogurt after about 30 minutes! And I ate the rest of it just now, it was still soft and creamy.

Chocolate Chip Ice cream

I know this is not an attractive picture, but it is delicious. I made this ice cream for an coincidence.

Lately, I wanted to have some pure-milky-flavor ice cream to accompany my sweet chocolate sorbet, banana chocolate ice cream and coffee ice cream. I made "Crema Ice Cream" adapted from "Pure Dessert" at first. It was nice, rich, creamy and not too sweet. However, the flavor of milk seems to be covered by egg yolk a little bit. Thus, I search some other recipes that don't have egg yolk in it.

I saw "Milk Ice Cream" which is from Giorgio Locatelli's Made In Italy, wondering that it might be the one I've been looking for.

Boy, it is totally what I want, fresh and milky and good to serve with something rich, chocolately or overly sweet. When I finished my chocolate ice cream, I chopped the chocolate, Manjari with Orange, and added in the milk ice cream. (yeah..I know that it's a kind of waste to have Valrhona's chocolate, but the orange nuggets are too sweet for me.) I was suprised that the milky flavor is intensified by the chocolate chip and the sweetness of the ice cream is just right for me with the orange nuggets. I took this picture when I almost finished the whole thing...

Chocolate and Banana Ice Cream

I've finally made this frozen dessert which is adapted from David Lebovitz's "Ready for Dessert". Because there is large amount of alcohol in it, the ice cream seems never be firm. It is very pliable even when it just came out from the freezer, however, it melt quickly.


Beside from the texure, the flavor is good, but I can't eat lots of it at once. It seems like a little bit overly sweet and alcoholic for me...Maybe I shouldn't use Marie Brizard's 'Framboise' instead of Baileys liquor.




I use strained yogurt instead of milk because I like the combination of yogurt and banana better than milk and banana and the result didn't disapoint me at all.

Ingredients:

- 55 g bittersweet chocolate
- 80 ml whole fat yogurt
- 50 ml Marie Brizard - Framboise
- 1 medium-sized ripe banana
- 15 ml dark rum









*There is no need to use the machine, you won't get any differentce because it couldn't be firm when you churn it in the ice cream maker.

Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream

I've been addicted to make ice cream recently.

Unlike the US, Taiwan has limited variaty of ice cream in the market. Moreover, it is more expensive here to get a scoop of "nice quality" ice cream. For persuing somthing new, I decide to make it on my own. It's very exciting because the possible is infinity. Different ingredients and combinations make different flavors, and there is always somhting unexpected coming to you.

I was astonished to the recipe "chocolate sorbet" last time, I can't wait to give a try to another recipe in "The Perfect Scoop"! There are two coffee-flavor ice creams in it, I picked "Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream" since I wanted to eat it as fast as possible.

I found that it seems has two different versions of "Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream". The recipe in the book I bought which is published in 2010 calls for half and half, but the recipe I found in other's blog only involves condensed milk, coffee and whole milk. Since I just had all the ingredients that the second recipe calls for, I made it right away!

It is delicious and rich in coffee-flavor, but melts quickly since it has lower fat within it. Maybe that's why the recipe has been modified in the latest version of the book. Next time I will try the more-fat Vietnamese coffee ice cream.

"Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream"

Ingredients:
- 1 cup condensed milk
- 3/4 cup water
- 1/4 cup ground coffee (Trung Nguyen Legendee Weasel Coffee)
- 1/6 cup whole milk
- 兩瓶蓋咖啡酒

Method:
1. Brew a very strong coffee with 3/4 cup of water and 1/4 cup of ground coffee.
2.Whisk together the condensed milk, espresso, milk and ground coffee. Chill the mixture thoroughly, then freeze it in your ice cream machine according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

P.S. It is perfect to serve with chopped pecan!

Chocolate Sorbet - Candied Orange Peel - Cream Scone

I miss Haagen-Dazs dark orange chocolate ice cream so much...I don't know why they won't sell anymore. There is a interesting recipe, chocolate sorbet, which is non-dairy but everyone who has made it said that it is creamy because of cocoa butter. Being a chocoholic, I must give it a try. I added some candied orange peel to fit my appetite, and I almost had half of all at one time. I used Trader Joe's chocolate and Valrhona cocoa powder that gave the sorbet super rich flavor. It is bitter but also super sweet, I can't help myself have one bite from another!


Chocolate Sorbet
adapted from "The Perfect Scoop"
(I added some orange peel in it and top with some chopped pecan, it tastes heavenly ^O^)

Candied Orange Peel
adapted from "Ready for Dessert"

Cream Scones
From Dorie Greenspan’s Baking: From My Home to Yours

1 large egg
2/3 cup cold heavy cream
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and chilled

I'll definitely get fat...

Soft Serve

I love soft serve more than any other ice dessert, expecially in deep and rich milk flavor(without vanilla).
The smelling of vanilla is great, but I like the soft serve which is with purist milk flavor more. And because of the soft texure, I usually enjoy it with the way that lip it at the begining and then gradually pressing the cream into deep inside the cone with my tongue so that later every bite of the cone would accompany cream...
Besides the flavor and texure, One of the reasons that I'm crazy for soft serve is its appearance, it just look irrisistable for me.

I used to use icecream maker to make soft serve (or maybe I should call it sobert?), and the best timing to have it is the time it has just been done. It tastes soft, creamy and airy...However, after storing in the freezer, it can't be avoided that part of sobert might be crystallization. Thus, I usually use it to make icecream sandwich.

Blueberry Ice Cream Sandwich

Although it looks not pretty at all, it is really tasty! It tasted not too sweet and have a little bit sour flavor, it's good to eat in summer time! The only fly in the ointment is the texture of blueberry frozen yogurt - the texure was not creamy at all because of using not enough yogurt, it was more like sobert.

Ingredients:

for chocolate cake

- egg yolks 8
- chocolate 40 g
- milk 2 tsp
--
- egg whites 8
- sugar 70 g
- cocoa powder 40 g

Beat egg yolks until it gets pale and thick. Melt chocolate with milk, add into egg yolks and make the mixure well-combined and thick, set aside. Beat egg whites and sugar until soft peak, then mixing with cocoa powder. Mix mixure of egg yolks and egg whites. 170 degree C / water bath / 15~40 min(depend on how thick the cake you want to bake).


for blueberry frozen yogurt

- frozen blueberry 100g
- yogurt 75 g (next time I will try to increase to 1/2~2/3 cup)
- rum 1/2 T
-----
- egg whites 2
- sugar 35 g
- water 35 g

Smash the blueberry. Make meringue. Fold blueberry in meringue and then fold the mixure in to yogurt. Pour in to ice cream maker.
(Next time I will add gelatin to blueberry first, like the process to make mousse, see if it would come out better result.)