Flavor #61 - Cinnamon Toast Ice Cream

I was pretty excited when I found this recipe as I had never seen it in a store before. Cinnamon Toast is such comfort food that it seems like it would be a great ice cream flavor.

2 Cups Milk
2 (3-inch) Cinnamon Sticks
5 Slices Firm White Sandwich Bread
1/2 Stick (1/4 cup) Butter, Melted
2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
1/2 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
6 Large Egg Yolks
1/2 Cup Granulated Sugar
1/4 Teaspoon Molasses
1 Cup Heavy Cream

This took about 2 hours to put together, so plan on putting time aside to get this ready.  

• Start by heating the milk with the cinnamon sticks over medium heat until it comes to a boil. Take the pan off the heat once the boil begins. 
• Heat the oven to 300° and put the racks towards the bottom and the top. 
• Take 3 slices of bread and cut them down to 1/4 inch cubes. Take the remaining two slices and pulverize them in a blender to get bread crumbs. Place both the crumbs and the cubes in separate bowls.  
• Whisk together butter, brown sugar, and ground cinnamon in another bowl. Drizzle 3 tablespoons of the butter mixture over bread cubes and stir to lightly coat. Spread in 1 layer in a shallow baking pan. Add bread crumbs to remaining butter mixture and stir to evenly coat. 
• Spread the cubes out on a baking sheet while you spread crumbs evenly in another shallow baking sheet. Toss the sheets in the oven for 25 minutes, stirring each occasionally and switching the racks at the half way point. 
• While the toasting is going on whisk the yolks, sugar and molasses. 
• Once the toast is done, put the crumbs in a bowl and pour in the warm milk and let the mix sit for 10 minutes before straining all the solids out and reheating the milk. 
• As the milk reheats, slowly add the egg mixture making sure not to cook the eggs. Bring the mix to a near boil until the custard begins to stick to the spoon.
• Take the mix off the heat and transfer to another bowl and chill before tossing it in the machine. Add the toast cubes to the mix as you transfer the ice cream to the freezing container.

I am told it tastes a lot like Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal. Try to eat this one quick as I am also told the toast does not stay crisp for more than a few days. From the looks of things, I won't have to worry much about that!

Enjoy!

Flavor #60 - Grape Sorbet

I had been trying how to figure out how to make a grape sorbet that tasted like Kool Aid since I first got the machine. 

There were always barriers to me getting it how I wanted it since I do not use artificial flavors. the key is to use Concord Grapes, which don't grow everywhere and need to be in season. Since I began this challenge, I have been waiting for autumn, when the grapes are in season. However, I had not been able to find them until this week. I wasn't even looking for them and there there were!

1 Quart of Concord Grapes

1/4 Cup of Water

2/3 Cup of Simple Syrup

1/2 Lemon, juiced

The grape flavor is the same grape flavor you find in Kool Aid, Grape Jelly and just about every other artificial grape food stuff you've ever had - except this is the real deal!  Great color too!. A little labor intensive as you need to de-stem the entire quart, boil it down with a little water, strain the heated mixture, chill, add the syrup and lemon juice and toss in the machine.  Totally worth the wait!

Enjoy!

Flavor #59 - Cookie Overload

Over the weekend I was down on the Connecticut shore and had a chance to stop by The Old Lyme Ice Cream Shoppe. I would normally avoid any place called a Shoppe, but this place had a great reputation and made all their flavors on site. I same the name and had to ask about the flavor "Class of 2014". Turns out it is a combo of two of the most popular flavors in the country; Oreo and Cookie Dough. I have dubbed it Cookie Overload.

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

3/4 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

12 chopped Oreos

One batch of Cookie Dough (See #37)

I like sweet ice cream but I do have my limits. This is about as sweet as I like it.  The crunch of the Oreos go better than I would have expected with the cookie dough, which also makes me wonder why I didn't think of this earlier!

Enjoy

Flavor #58 - Pumpkin Spice Latte

This time of year pumpkin flavor shows up in just about everything. When I was initially plotting out recipes for the challenge, I considered pumpkin as a fall flavor never realizing how many ways I could do it. This will be the first of several variations on the flavor of the Jack-O-Lantern.

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

3/4 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

1 Cup of Coffee Reduced to 1/4 Cup

1 1/2 Teaspoons of Cappuccino Powder

1 1/2 Teaspoons of Pumpkin Spice

Much like going to one of the big corporate coffee shops, there is no actual pumpkin in my Pumpkin Spice Latte.

Enjoy!

Flavor #57 - Boston Cream Pie

The Boston Cream Pie, with origins going back to the 1850's at the Parker House Hotel, is not a pie, but a cake. Two layers of yellow sponge cake with a layer of custard in the middle and the top covered with thick chocolate. It's really not that popular here in the Boston area, but you do see it around. I have been a fan of this desert since I was young, so why not turn it into an ice cream.

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

3/4 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

1 8" Pan of Yellow Cake

3/4 Cup of Custard

1/2 Cup of Milk

2 Tablespoons of Sugar

1/2 Teaspoon of Vanilla

2 Egg Yolks

1 Tablespoon of Flour

1 Tablespoon of Butter

1 Pinch of Salt

Chocolate Sauce to Taste

This is a labor intensive recipe as you need to make the chocolate sauce, custard, cake and ice cream base. I suggest starting with the chocolate sauce if you are not buying a store bought brand. The sauce needs to cool for a while, so this needs to go first. Cake and custard can be made at almost the same time with the ice cream mix prep coming while the cake is in the oven. Everything will need to cool suitably before you begin to make the ice cream or the other ingredients will melt the ice cream as you put it all in the container.

This is one of the few recipes I have with a prescribed way of adding things to the freezing container, making things almost look like a trifle. Start with a small layer of ice cream at the bottom, followed by a thin layer of cake. I cut the cake into 1" cubes and layered them across the container. Custard goes next, followed by chocolate sauce. You should have enough material to run a similar series of layers with it all topped off by a final layer of ice cream. Do not stir everything together or it will become a mess. Same with putting down the second and third ice cream layers as you will need to be very careful when adding the ice cream and smoothing out the layer prior to adding the cake. In the future, I am considering doubling the custard for a thicker layer while also making the cake even thinner to mix things up a little.

This recipe certainly catches the flavor of Boston Cream Pie. The custard layer is icy and gives the recipe an interesting mix of consistencies with the creamy ice cream, spongy cake and icy vanilla custard.

Boston's Parker House Hotel has a very cool history that includes contribution to the culinary world, global politics, US race relations and English and American literature. The lobby is well kept and loyal to its original 1920's style and Parker's Bar is a great place for a pint or two while taking in a song from the pianist in their classic American dining room.

Enjoy

 

Flavor #56 - Chocolate Angel's Wings

I have had many requests for this particular flavor. Guinness is known the world over for its unique drinking experience. Why not make it into an ice cream?  There are somethings to consider while preparing. First, the carbonation can make mixing with the other ingredients a challenge, as it was when I made the Root Beer ice cream. Second, too much Guinness in the mix will keep the mix from freezing well. Third, adding some additional flavor is key as the Guinness flavor will be light, yet bitter. It will be important to try not to overtake the flavor of the Guinness or what's the point of doing this to begin with?

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

1/3 Cup of Guinness

3/4 Cups of Sugar

1 1/2 Teaspoons of Ground Cappuccino

1 Pinch of Salt

1/4 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1/2 Cup of Chocolate Chips

Mix it all together, except the chocolate, and put it in the machine. You should find that the mix will be lighter and fluffier as it comes out of the machine because of the carbonation of the Guinness. The flavor will be light, as expected, and will compliment the coffee and the chocolate that is mixed in during the transfer to the container. Feel free to add more Guinness when serving, as I have in the picture above, much like a traditional float. Additional chocolate syrup can be added too.

Sláinte!

Flavor #55 - Apple Cider Donut

When I first started on this quest I asked my Facebook friends for their favorite flavors. As it was June, Apple Cider Donut was one I was looking forward to, but only in the Fall. I had the recipe planned when Zach walked through the door the other day with a big sack of apple cider donuts a friend gave him from one of the local farms in North Andover. The race was on at that moment to get this together before the donuts went stale.

 1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

1/2 Cup of Sugar

1 Pinch of Salt

1/2 Teaspoon of Mace or All Spice (Optional)

4 Cups of Apple Cider

2-3 Apple Cider Donuts

This all starts with the reduction of the 4 cups of apple cider down to 1/2 a cup. This will take a good 90 minutes of carefully heating and stirring, keeping the cider from burning, scalding and eventually from sticking to the sauce pan.  The reduction will need to cool but be sure to take it our of the pan before it sticks. I used a Pyrex measuring cup to hold it while it cooled and became a sticky ball of goo, which made it easy to reheat in a hot water bath over the stove. Put the ice cream mix together and warm that in a sauce pan adding the cider sludge over the heat. Heat is the only way to get the sludge back into liquid form and mix well with the milk and cream. Once the mix is smooth, cool the mixture again and toss in the machine.  I chopped 2 1/2 donuts to get the amount I was looking for. As donuts can be different sizes use as many as you like. I like mine a little stale and crisp around the edges and these made for a great addition to this flavor.

Thanks Travis!

Enjoy!

Flavor #54 - Apple Pile

Fall is apple season here in New England and if you live far enough outside of the city, chances are there is a decent orchard close by. For me, it's Mann Orchards in Methuen, MA. Although their orchard is not as big as it was a few years ago before they sold off some land to Target, Mann Orchards has a nice selection of apples, apple products, produce, baked goods and does a bang-up lunch business with a deli on the premises. 

Mann Orchards has a great selection of pies, including several different styles of apple pie. Apple pie ice cream was one of the first flavors I made without using a recipe almost 10 years ago. There has been a fair amount of tweaking my technique since then, but the basic formula has remained pretty true throughout.

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

3/4 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

1/2 of an 8" Crumb Top Apple Pie, Chopped

As always, mix the pie in with the ice cream when you transfer the ice cream from the machine to the container. Apple Pie a la Mode. It is an awesome fall flavor whose name come from a failed attempt to make a homemade pie. The crust was too thin and not crisp enough, so when you tried to get it out of the pie plate you did not get a slice of pie, you ended up getting a pile of what was supposed to be apple pie.

Enjoy!

Flavor #53 - Peaches & Cream

Moving to the country. Gonna eat me a lot of peaches.

Rounding out my summer flavors, peach is something I have been toying with for a while and although I like the way this came out I still think there is room for improvement. This version of Peaches & Cream is a true blend of the two flavors where some might say the peach is almost too mild. The recipe is a DJ BC style mash-up of a number of other recipes.

1 1/2 Cups of Heavy Cream

1 1/2 Cups of Milk

3/4 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

4 Georgia Peaches, Juiced and reduced to 1/2 Cup

The juicing of the peaches will take some time and, much like reducing coffee down to a stronger flavor, there is a lot of room for error. You have to keep an eye on this. The change for me is that you would typically cut up the peaches, add about a 1/4 cup of sugar and a dash of water and simmer it all in a sauce pan to yield more than a cup of juice after straining out the fruit.  The juice really should be reduced down to a stronger half a cup.

Sweet Peaches & Cream.  Good thing it will be hot this weekend!

Enjoy!

Flavor #52 - 8 Mile

I had this one planned for a while, figuring I would be using leftover Halloween candy. Alice got some M&M's from someone at work so Halloween came early this year.

1 Cup of Heavy Cream

1 Cup of Milk

1/2 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

1 1/2 bags/18oz of M&M's

M&M's might not melt in your hands but they sure run their color when they hit the ice cream. As a homemade flavor, you can see first hand how most similar commercial flavors are using chemically enhanced chocolate as the M&M brand will freeze hard and the color shmear is also something you will not see with the chemically engineered version.

Still tastes pretty damn good and the colors can be kind of cool against the white of the vanilla ice cream.

Enjoy!

Flavor #51 - Angry Fruit Sorbet

As I made this, all I could think of was Monty Python.

This is another flavor for me that came together out of a deep, clear cut need to clear out the fridge. This amounts to pint of raspberries and a few strawberries that had spend the maximum amount of time is the cold darkness. If they weren't out of there soon, they would go bad. This worked out well and now that I have spent this much time making and remaking flavors the past three months, to do a quick flavor like this takes less than 90 minutes.

1 Pint of Raspberries

1/2 Cup of Strawberries

1 Cup of Simple Syrup

Over a low heat, toss the fruit into a sauce pan with a little sugar and a little water, stirring occasionally until the fruit is very soft. Do not bring to a boil! This should take around 30 minutes. Let the fruit cool. You can even put it in an ice bath if you are in a hurry. Strain the fruit to eliminate the seeds. You should yield about a cup of juice. Mix with an equal amount of simple syrup and get it in the machine. You will have a nice small batch of frozen goodness!

Angry Fruit? Angry that I did not get to it sooner.

Enjoy!

Flavor #50 - S'mores Ice Cream

I had been thinking about this flavor for a while but really started concentrating on it while we were on the annual family Christmas in July over the Independence Day weekend. Honestly, I am not much of a S'mores guy. For those who are not familiar with this American campfire staple, it is a combination of a chocolate bar and hot toasted marshmallows sandwiched by two slabs of graham crackers. Very sweet and tasty. I'm just not much of a marshmallow fan, but when the mood strikes and you're outdoors on a beautiful summer evening around a fire, S'mores can be a really great treat when done right.

But how do you recreate this for ice cream? The graham crackers are simple enough. But toasting marshmallows seems somewhat silly for this recipe. But then again, the heat from the toasted marshmallow melts the chocolate and without it the graham crackers have no ability to stay together. My idea was to do this the opposite of a traditional S'more. Starting with the graham cracker, spread a thick layer of marshmallow Fluff on one slab. From there, melt about a quarter cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips in a Pyrex cup and slather the melted chocolate on top of the Fluff. Get the other slab of the graham cracker sandwiched on top, gently squeezing until you see the chocolate and the fluff at the edge of the graham cracker. Two large sized S'mores was all I needed for this small batch. Get them in the freezer to harden up as you make the regular vanilla mix and process the batch. Chop up the S'mores while the batch is in its final minutes in the machine and add to the ice cream once it transfers to the container.

1 Cup of Heavy Cream

1 Cup of Milk

1/2 Cup of Sugar

1 Teaspoon of Vanilla

1 Pinch of Salt

4 Graham Crackers

1/2 Cup of Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

1 Small Container of Marsh Mellow Fluff - Use to taste

Marshmallow Fluff is the polar opposite of what I want my ice cream to be. There is little in that jar that makes for a healthy frozen treat. Marshmallows in general are the worst of what passes for food in the USA. But they are a critical ingredient for this recipe, so I wave the white flag on this one.  The best part is the vanilla ice cream goes well with the overall S'mores flavor and has already received the thumbs up for the boys.

Enjoy