Peanut Butter Fudge Ripple Ice Cream

Another winning David Lebovitz ice cream recipe!  Rich, creamy peanut butter ice cream with fudge ripple swirled through... plus I tossed in some roughly chopped Reese's Peanut Butter Cups to put it over the top. 

Both the ice cream and fudge ripple recipes are from The Perfect Scoop, my go-to ice cream bible, but you can find the peanut butter ice cream recipe online here and the fudge ripple recipe here.  I love that the ice cream doesn't require eggs, making it much faster and less labor intensive than other custard-based ice creams. 

Jeni's Salted Caramel Ice Cream: Meh

Hmm... while this ice cream looks kinda awesome, it was unfortunately, meh.  The recipe receives the thumbs up from neither Tim nor I.

I have successfully made salted butter caramel ice cream before and loved the recipe (from my fav, David Lebovitz), and yet I found myself tempted to try this recipe for salted caramel ice cream that I stumbled upon on The Bitten Word.  The methodology differs from the Lebovitz way in that it does not acquire its thickness from an eggy custard, but from an intriguing combination of cream cheese, corn starch and corn syrup.  Plus the internet is full of raves about Jeni's ice cream, a popular ice cream shop in Ohio and Tennessee.

It wasn't very hard to pull together, but we just plain did not like the results.  Too bitter (maybe I prefer the larger amount of sugar called for in the Lebovitz recipe?), too weirdly cheesecakey from the cream cheese (it's hard to believe that "cheesecakey" could be a bad thing, but here it is), strangely sour (maybe from boiling the milk?).  Sad...

We tried to jazz it up with some caramel sauce (Simply Recipes' version), but to no avail.  Oh well... live, learn, stick to the tried-and-true basics when it comes to ice cream.

Peppermint Ice Cream

I have been going a little bit Christmas crazy in my head for some reason this year... purposefully listening to Christmas music (not something I normally do), repeatedly viewing this gem featuring Jimmy Fallon, Mariah Carey and the Roots (love it), craving cookies (trying not to eat them), trying to convince Tim to sit on Indonesian Santa's lap for a photo opp at our local mall (unsuccessfully)...  not sure what it is.  Perhaps the anticipation of being in the U.S. for the first time in 14 months?

Anywho, I've been craving creamy pink, pepperminty, candy caney ice cream- the kind with the little candy bits in it. I found some candy canes here in Jakarta, have some peppermint extract that Meghan and Liz brought me back when they visited, and found a recipe from sources I trust (Simply Recipes using a David Lebovitz technique), so I had a go at it.  

Peppermint cce cream: success. Creamy, minty and awesome with chocolate sauce.  Can't wait to try it sandwiched between some chewy chocolate cookies.

Candy canes: FAIL.  Like many "western" things here in Jakarta, those candy canes were Not Quite Right (NQR, my most frequently used acronym these days).  Luckily I tasted them before adding them to the ice cream, because they were most definitely not peppermint flavored, despite their peppermint look.  Strawberry, perhaps?  Whatever flavor, it was gross, so these will be show candy canes, never to be eaten.  Sigh.

Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream

Coffee ice cream has been and always will be my favorite.  This Vietnamese coffee ice cream, made with sweetened condensed milk and very strongly brewed coffee, is extra special. 

I used David Lebovitz's eggless and super easy recipe from The Perfect Scoop.  I used some Trung Nguyen coffee that Tim brought back from Vietnam.  So good.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Ice Cream

I can't believe I haven't posted this ice cream flavor before... it's the first recipe I made from David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop" cookbook way back when I got it, and it's my quick go-to, crowd-pleasing, and easily-made-because-it-doesn't-involve-tempering-egg-yolks ice cream.
 

Chocolate and peanut butter, so you can't go wrong.  Creamy, rich and delicious.... the peanut butter gives it a bit of a mousse texture.  Even more indulgent if you add Reese's peanut butter cups, but we don't get many of those in Indonesia (wah wah).  It calls for half and half, but I used half heavy cream, half milk and it worked quite well.

Lemon Basil Ice Cream

While looking for mint, basil and cilantro at our local grocery store (to use in my grilled veggie salad), Tim and I unknowingly stumbled upon a new (to us) herb: lemon basil. 

 

I saw a bundle of it it tucked in the greens section, which is a tangle of some familiar and some unknown greens marked haphazardly in English, Bahasa Indonesia and Japanese.  It looked basil-esque, so I picked it up and gave it a sniff, only to inhale an awesomely fragrant lemony scent.  Once the produce guy (who is my new BFF, as I ask him the name of a new veggie or herb every time I shop there and he obligingly informs me of the name in at least 4 different languages) rang it up, I saw that it was called "daun kemangi."  Apparently it's used pretty regularly in Indonesian cooking and, since it's local, it's dirt cheap: a massive bundle for 2590 rupiah, which is the equivalent of 27 U.S. cents.

Anywho, I dropped some of it in the salad,  and then had a ton left over.  David Lebovitz and "The Perfect Scoop" to the rescue, yet again.  He had a recipe for basil ice cream spiked with lemon zest, so I followed his recipe, substituting lemon basil for the traditional Genovese basil.  Awesome stuff- creamy, lemony (somewhat lemongrassy), herby, sweet.  A good accompaniment to spicy Asian dishes, I'd say.  Get thee to thy green grocer or farmer's market and find some lemon basil!

Thai Iced Tea Ice Cream

Thai iced tea is probably one of my favorite drinks... there's just something about the creaminess and aroma of it that complements spicy Thai food so well.  The internets tell me that the special taste comes from strong brewed black tea combined with a varying combination of cardamom, orange blossom water, star anise and tamarind. Plus it's got that crazy orange color.

Tim found some loose Thai tea at our grocery store here in Jakarta, so we bought a big old bag of it.  For some reason, the idea of an ice cream based on Thai iced tea popped into my head.  I figured someone out there had already made this delicacy, and lo, they had... I followed this recipe from Use Real Butter, which in turned followed ice cream king David Lebovitz's basic ice cream base recipe.

In a nutshell, you steep the tea in the milk until it turns that distinctive orange color, strain out the tea and then proceed to make a pretty basic custard that you freeze in your ice cream machine.... in the end you have this tasty, bright, fragrant dessert, perfect for a hot day.

Grilled Corn Salad and Fresh Mint Ice Cream

Tim and I were invited to a BBQ here in Jakarta this past weekend... the hosts made an awesome spread of great Aussie sausages, a whole baked red snapper with rosemary and some tasty steaks.  Our contributions to the meal were of the side-dish and dessert variety:  a grilled corn salad with feta, tomato, cilantro and a cumin-chili-lime dressing and fresh mint ice cream with chocolate chunks, both of which seemed to go over quite well with the crowd.

The salad was really tasty and easy.  Grill corn right on the cob until it's slightly charred, cut it off the cob and mix it with cherry tomato, chopped red onion and cilantro, and a lime vinaigrette flavored with chili powder and powdered cumin.  The only changes I made to the recipe was to toast the spices for the dressing in a dry pan until fragrant before adding them...  brings out the flavor.  Also, I skipped adding the whole cumin seeds, as ours were a little "off."

The mint ice cream was a big hit... while it wasn't florescent green like the stuff you get at the store, but it was better since it was full of natural mint flavor from steeping a bundle of fresh mint leaves in the cream before making the custard.  Awesome. 

Cheesecake Ice Cream

When preparing for our non-Super Bowl Super Bowl party, as a result of some faulty spur-of-the-moment grams-to-cups-to-ounces calculations, I over-purchased both sour cream and cream cheese... not wanting it to go bad, I decided to put it to good use in this very easy and very rich cheesecake ice cream, from my favorite ice cream cookbook, David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop."

I had leftover "fudge ripple" from my tin roof ice cream, so I layered that with the cheesecake ice cream, and, while I was at it, dumped in the closest thing I could find to graham crackers here: some crumbled "digestive" biscuit cookie things... I was hoping the cookies would simulate the graham cracker crust of a cheesecake. 

Came together pretty nicely!  The ice cream is great- super creamy and rich, just like cheesecake.  I bet you could throw all sorts of other things in there if you weren't feeling the chocolate... strawberry, blueberry.

P.S.: As a funny aside, I noticed that many products at the grocery stores here in Indonesia, whether made here or elsewhere (such as Australia or Thailand), are sold in bags... sour cream (see below), cooking oil, mayonnaise, among other things.  

P.P.S.: Turns out I didn't actually use cream cheese in this recipe, but rather the oft sought-after "cream chess."

Tin Roof Ice Cream

Ben and Erin invited us over to their place for a barbeque yesterday after Tim and Ben returned from mountain biking in Sentul City, just outside of Jakarta.  Ben made some awesome barbeque shrimp, beer boiled brats and barbeque chicken.  My contribution was an arugula salad with goat cheese, walnuts and cranberries, but more importantly, dessert.

Since we still don't have an oven in our apartment, I decided to bust out my ice cream machine (plugged in via transformer, of course).  Since peanuts are so prevalent here in Indonesia (kacang in everything from satay to dessert!), I decided to make something that involved them.  Tin roof ice cream it was! 

Rich vanilla ice cream (vanilla beans are so cheap here!!) with streak of fudge running throughout, scattered with chocolate-covered dry roasted peanuts.  Mmmmmm...  as usual, David Lebovitz's's ice cream recipes are perfection.

Coffee Oreo Cognac Ice Cream

I'm still working my way through the 16 egg yolks leftover from my egg-white heavy (is that an oxymoron?) American flag cake. Egg yolks just beg to be made into ice cream.

I asked Chuck if she had an ice cream flavor preference. "Something with Oreos," she said. In contrast, I was thinking, "Something with booze." Enter this recipe from Simply Recipes, which combines both AND adds coffee, which makes it even better.I made a couple small changes to the recipe, namely using instant espresso powder rather than instant coffee, and cognac rather than rum. Also, I used 8 egg yolks.

Delicious... I think the only additional change I would make is to add more Oreos at the end for chunkiness.

Chocolate Buttermilk Ice Cream

This deliciously non-traditional ice cream flavor, buttermilk chocolate, was the perfect way to use up buttermilk (leftover from cupcakes) and egg yolks (leftover from my massive flag cake). Tangy, rich, creamy and chocolatey.

I basically followed the basic buttermilk ice cream recipe from Smitten Kitchen and the chocolately modification from the Cupcake Project, although I used only 8 egg yolks. Plenty rich enough.

Banana Peanut Butter "Ice Cream" with Chocolate Chips

Whenever I buy a bunch of bananas, there are always a couple that turn brown before I get a chance to eat them. I peel them, pop them in a bag and throw them in the freezer with the intention to make banana bread with them, which I never do.

When I saw this ingenious idea for turning those ripe, frozen bananas into a no-sugar, no-cream "ice cream," I was intrigued. Plus, this recipes also has peanut butter and chocolate. How can it be wrong? Give it a try... something about the consistency of the frozen bananas when they're whizzed up in the food processor mimics the creaminess of ice cream, so there's no need to add anything else! The recipe called for cocoa powder, but I threw in some chocolate chips for crunch. I'm sure either would be lovely, though.

Birthday Goodies!

For Chuck's 27th birthday, she got two desserts... one hand-held, relatively mess-free dessert for the keg party, and one melty, delicious ice cream cake for the after-party.

1. One-Bowl Mini Chocolate Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting:
This recipe from the Other Martha is super easy- one bowl, one measuring cup, one measuring spoon. Plus, the cupcakes stay really moist. I had just a little bit less than the required amount of cocoa, so I topped it off with some espresso powder, which I think really complimented the chocolate.
The buttercream frosting is decadent... don't look at the ingredient list, though.

2. Ice Cream Cake with Chocolate Crunchies and Heath Bar:
The ice cream cake I made is loosely based on this recipe, but with chocolate and coffee ice creams, topped with Heath bar crumbles. The chocolate crunchies in the cake are great- I was worried they would get soggy between ice cream layers, but they stayed crunchy!
If you do try making this cake, though, I warn you: beware the leaky springform pan!

Sesame and Halvah Sundaes with Caramel Sauce

Martha loves sesame... not quite as much as she loves ginger, but definitely a lot. She was coming to DC, so I thought I'd use the opportunity to try out this recipe from Food and Wine for sesame ice cream sundaes with caramel sauce, sesame candies and halvah (a spongey, but pretty tasty sesame candy concoction.)
This recipe bordered on sesame overload, but could be slightly modified and greatly improved.

The ice cream by itself = delicious.
The ice cream with a caramel sauce = great (although the caramel in the recipe is less of a sauce and more of a candy- I added cream to the cooked sugar to give it a saucy consistency).
The ice cream and caramel with the sesame candy and halvah toppings = unique and tasty.
The tahini cream = weird and slightly off-putting.

If I made it again, I would skip the tahini cream in favor of more caramel. Also, I would use a different recipe for the caramel sauce- the one in the magazine was a little wonky, as I said.

"Man-Catcher" Brownie Sundaes

I've been making these "man-catcher" brownies for several years since seeing them in the Washington Post. Despite the ridiculously goofy name, they are awesome. Super fudgy and rich. None of that cakey crap. If you want a chocolate cake, make a chocolate cake; don't make brownies.

Also, they are easy. Almost as easy as making brownies from a box, and 10 times better, so don't be intimidated.

The recipe is easily halved, which is good since it makes a massive amount. I successfully made a half recipe in a 9"x9" pan and cooked it for 30 minutes.

Made the sundaes for the Superbowl by topping a small brownie square (zapped briefly in the microwave to warm) with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and some blackberry coulis. Awesome.

Salted Butter Caramel Ice Cream

The first time I heard of David Lebovitz's salted butter caramel ice cream, I had to wipe the drool off my chin. I've been waiting a while to make this ice cream, though, since I was a little bit intimidated by the caramel aspect of the recipe. I had visions of burnt sugar permanently stuck to all of my pots and pans...

Turns out making caramel is not that hard! You have to keep an eye on it, for sure, and you have to be careful not to give in to temptation and stick a spoonful of the liquid caramel in your mouth since it's searing hot, but otherwise, not as difficult as I'd imagined!

This ice cream is to die for. Super rich, buttery, and awesome. I had a little trouble getting it to freeze correctly in the ice cream maker for some reason, but even a little runny, it still tasted amazing. Nothing much too look at, but, as I said, a taste to die for.

Pear-Caramel Ice Cream

I got a bunch of fresh pears from the CSA last week and was trying to think of a fun way to cook them. I had been complaining to Chuck and Tony earlier this week about the lack of ice cream in our freezer, so I took this opportunity to bust out this pear-caramel ice cream from the fabulous David Lebovitz's book, The Perfect Scoop.

I was nervous about the caramel part of it (I had visions of the caramelizing sugar escaping from the pan and burning/hardening all over the counter, my hands, everything), but it was very easy, as long as you keep your eyes on it.

This ice cream is really unique- it has the buttery sweetness of the caramel, but a fruity flowery flavor from the pears.

Peach Ice Cream

Peach recipe #1, for those peaches that barely made it out of the orchard and home from Bluemont without dissolving into supperipe mush: David Lebovitz's peach ice cream from "The Perfect Scoop."

This is my favorite kind of ice cream recipe, in that it doesn't involve tempering any egg yolks, which I think is a pain in the ass. Cook the peaches slightly, whiz with sour cream and heavy cream, freeze in ice cream maker... devour.

(Served here with blackberry galette)

Brownie Ice Cream Sandwiches: FAIL (mostly)

Recipe for the super thin brownies: the other Martha.

I ran out of time and couldn't make my own ice cream to sandwich inside the brownies, so I used store-bought coffee and vanilla. I was planning on rolling the vanilla ones in sprinkles for some color, and Jennifer suggested nuts for the coffee ones. However, the logistics of handling the super thin sheets of brownies and the melty ice cream totally screwed me! Hence the FAIL.

BUT: they were received more than warmly by the dinner party guests, and they did taste good despite their messiness and general unattractiveness. Hence the (mostly).

I shall try again and attempt to devise a way to make them without having the ice cream squirt out everywhere.