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.

I made marshmallows... and it was messy.

After making a couple batches of ice cream in the past week, I had about 8 egg whites lounging in the fridge, waiting to be put to good use.  I did some Googling to try to find a recipe I could make with all those egg whites that didn't involve an oven, which we are not yet in possession of....  My ice cream guru, David Lebovitz, had some suggestions which included homemade marshmallows.  Marshmallows don't require an oven, so I decided to give them a try. 

Tray of sticky marshmallow dough.

 Messy, very messy.  First sticky, then powdery.  Then, in my case, sticky again.

Cutting and powdering the marshmallows.

I used sheet gelatin since they didn't seem to have plain powdered gelatin at our grocery store here (despite the Indonesia's love of weird jiggly gelatin desserts).  Luckily, David's instructions included options for sheet gelatin.  I also ended up using cane syrup in place of corn syrup, which I didn't find here. 

Marshmallows.  Fin.

Overall, my version seemed to work out pretty well... bouncy, fluffy, light, sugary, just like marshmallows should be.  However, they were a little damp, which I think is because I got impatient when the mixture was cooling.  I should have let it go longer.  Also, apparently I am not very good at cutting a sheet into equally-sized squares.  My talents lie elsewhere.

Now we just need to see if they melt properly, because, as you well know, marshmallows are best when they're crispy on the outside and melty on the inside.  S'mores are on the menu this weekend, provided I can find graham crackers.

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.

Clafouti!

"Clafouti" is fun to say: CLAFOOOOOOOTIIIII! Chuck said it like 900 times as this thing was cooking. Clafouti is kinda like a giant poofy pancake or a soufle or something... kinda reminds us of the swedish pancake thingy Martha makes in the cast iron skillet.

I think clafouti is traditionally made with cherries, but due to our glut of peaches and blackberries, we went with that. Typically I turn to David Lebovitz for his amazing ice cream recipes, but I read this Washington Post article about him, and thought his clafouti recipe sounded delicious. I would make it again- super easy! You could make it with basically whatever fruit you like...

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.

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)

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.

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.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I couldn't resist buying David Lebovitz's new cookbook, Room For Dessert, since I love both his blog and his ice cream cookbook, The Perfect Scoop. The first recipe I chose to try out was his chocolate chip cookie recipe... the internets tell me that it's as good as, if not better than the NY Times recipe from a couple years ago which is supposed to be "perfect." Both recipes recommend refrigerating the cookie dough for some time before baking the cookies.I made the cookies for a par-tay we had at the house, and didn't get a chance to taste the finished product before they were all gone (snagged by beer drinkers with the munchies), but I can say that after trying some of the dough as I mixed it up, if the finished cookies are half that good, they rock. The dough was super chunky and the toasted nuts (I used half walnuts, half pecans) gave it a rich flavor.

Can't wait to try some of the other recipes from Room for Dessert!

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.

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. 

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."

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.

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.

Pink Grapefruit and Champagne Sorbet

After going to the farmers market this morning, I decided I needed to use up some of the 8 grapefruits that Chuck and I bought on a whim last week, but were too lazy to fix for eating. So I juiced the 3 remaining grapefruits and busted out the ice cream maker for some David Lebovitz pink grapefruit champagne sorbet... it was great and really easy. Only 3 ingredients necessary: grapefruit juice, champagne, sugar.