Chocolate Buttercream Ice Cream

Elise,
It's the summer of ice cream, which doesn't really differentiate from any other summer.
My favorite ice cream ever was Chocolate Butterccream ice cream from Mad Martha's in Martha's Vineyard. I had it years ago; I've always wondered about recreating it. And I think I just did.
David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop has a recipe for Milk Chocolate Ice Cream. I substituted Vanilla for the Cognac and increased the salt to a generous 1/4 tsp. 

I used this chocolate.

Chocolate Buttercream Ice Cream Barely adapted from David Lebovitz.

8 oz. milk chocolate with at least 30% cocoa solids, finely chopped
1 1/2 C heavy cream
1 1/2 C whole milk
3/4 C sugar
generous 1/4 tsp salt
4 egg yolks
2 tsp vanilla

       Put the chocolate and the cream together in the top of a double boiler over, not immersed in, simmering water and stir it just until the chocolate melts, then take it off the simmering water.
      Warm the milk, sugar and salt in a heavy pot and stir it until the sugar mostly dissolves. Whisk the egg yolks. Very carefully and slowly, I use a ladle, add about half of the milk to the egg yolks, whisking like crazy. Then pour the egg and milk mixture back into the rest of the milk, still whisking like crazy.
      Stir this with a heat proof spatula over low heat, or medium low if you are impatient, but then really watch it. It will thicken and coat the back of the spatula. If you over cook it, the custard will curdle, and then you probably have to start over. Unless it just curdles a little bit, like mine did, and then go on and make it anyway. The little bit of curdling didn't seem to adversely effect the finished product. Once it is thick enough, take it off the heat.
      Pour the custard through a strainer into the cream and chocolate mixture, add the vanilla and chill it, either in an ice bath or in the fridge. When it is well chilled freeze it in your ice cream maker.

Fresh out of Beef Broth

Elise,
There I was with the bone-in chuck roast defrosted and a freezer full of chicken broth.
Mom is always raving about John's pot roast and Harry's short-ribs and how each one claims the magic ingredient is Lipton Onion Soup Mix.
I started there and searched for pot roast recipes that didn't require beef broth. The most promising was a brisket recipe that wanted Ketchup, Heinz Chili Sauce, Lipton Onion Soup Mix and red wine.

You are probably wondering what the less promising ones wanted. I added some carrots and onions and left it all in the slow-cooker overnight.




































It was delicious. The beef broth wasn't even missed.

Love, Margaret

Freezer is Bare Pot Roast

1 Bone-in Chuck Roast
1 C Red Wine
1 C Heinz Chili Sauce
1 C Heinz Ketchup
1 envelope Lipton Onion Soup Mix
2 medium onions, chopped
4 medium carrots, chopped

Brown the roast well on all sides. Remove it from the pan and saute the onions and carrots together, until the onion is softened and golden.
Stir together the chili sauce, ketchup, wine and 1 C water.
Put the roast in the slow cooker, put the onions and carrots around it, sprinkle the soup mix over everything and then pour the sauce on. Shift the roast a little this way and that to allow the sauce to seep underneath it. Cook it on low for 10 hours.

Oh dear...

Maybe I shouldn't have believed the recipe when it said to use a spray instead of buttering the pans. Or maybe I should have taken them out of the pan while they were warm instead of going to bed right after they came out of the oven.

Fortunately, it doesn't taste very good either so there's no great loss.

 

 

Posted with Blogsy

Go Seahawks!!!

 

 

Posted with Blogsy

Tres Leches Cake in A Cup

I know you're in Paleo-land but I also know you love Tres Leches.I think this recipe could use some tinkering, or at least replacing the sauce with caramel, but dessert in a mug that only takes 10 minutes from beginning to end? That's my kind of dessert.

Tres Leches Cake in a Cup

 

Love, Elise

Hot, good and easy. I'm talking about soup.

Elise,

                It’s winter in paleo land.  Soup meets three of the four criteria for winter dinner- good, hot, easy. The fourth criterion is all-done-even-the-dishes-by-6:30. This is so I can be a member in good standing of the HBN (horizontal by nine) club. I’m thinking of fomenting a schism in the ranks of HBN and creating a fundamentalist off shoot called HBE. At any rate, if the dish meets the first three, then the last one comes down to pilot performance.

                Slow cookers are wonderful for soup. Homemade stock is sine qua non.  A hand held blender can make your life so much easier and more pleasant. It removes that pour-the-scalding-liquid-into-a-narrow-mouthed-blender step and the dirty-two-pots-because-you-have-to-blend-in-two-batches step. Just remember our 11/3/11 cautionary tale and unplug the blender every time you turn it off or you might be adding in the trip-to-the-emergency-room step not to mention the come-home-to-a blood-spattered-kitchen-and-have-to clean-it up-before-bed step.

                One of my go-to soups this time of year, really any time of year except full summer, is Curried Sweet Potato Soup. It’s a three season soup. 

 

                Good—curried sweet potatoes, say no more.

                Hot—duh.

                Easy—peel and slice the potatoes, cook them in broth and coconut milk, as some curry paste or powder and some grated ginger, blend when soft. Finish with salt and pepper.

                While this might sound pretty tame, it’s not. If you are still feeling underwhelmed, you can dress this soup up with a myriad of sides, garnishes, accompaniments and additions. Toasted sliced almonds, raisins, sautéed bananas, chopped crystallized ginger, chutney all go well on the side.   

 

You can add spinach or kale and double your superfoods. You can add some cooked ground turkey for a third superfood or shrimp sautéed in ginger and garlic if you have a little more time on your hands.

                His Lordship thinks it tastes like candy. 

Curried Sweet Potato Soup

4 large sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced

2 cans coconut milk

6 cups chicken broth

2 TB grated fresh ginger or more to taste

1-4 TB curry powder or paste. This is vague because curry powders and pastes vary spectacularly and you have to know yours and add accordingly

                Put the first four ingredients in a pot and simmer until the sweet potatoes are soft. Stir in the curry. Blend until soft.

                Tart it up with toasted sliced almonds, raisins, sautéed bananas, chopped crystallized ginger, chutney. Health it up with some cooking greens and/or cooked ground meat.

Oh Jerusalem

Somehow it sounds more stirring if you say Oh before the title of the cookbook, Jerusalem. It sounds like the title of a poem, which it isn't. I know this because I consulted the-source-of-all-knowledge and googled it. William Blake, however, wrote "Jerusalem".

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countence Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark Satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! Oh clouds unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!

I will not cease from mental fight
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.


Not much related to cooking there, unless you count the arrows of desire. And I suppose for some recipes, mental fight. Interesting though, Blake's fascination with rhetorical questions - what immortal hand or eye, etc. That tangent aside...

Amos gave me Plenty (by Ottolenghi, not Blake, for Christmas). It's got a lot of eggplant recipes which I suppose is not surprising for a vegetarian cookbook but you know how I feel about them.

I did find a recipe that appealed to me, called somewhat incongruously, Chard and Saffron Omelettes. They aren't really omelettes, more like little pancakes with herbs in the batter  and filled with the oddest combination of chard, saffron and yukon gold potatoes. Oh yeah, and there's creme fraiche too. The flavor is unfamiliar and delicious. They are easy. And meatless. And Paleo.

If you don't have the book the recipe is here. You should try them.

Love, Elise