Never Tell a Chemist He [or She] Can't Cook {Recipe: Chocolate Ice Cream}

It's summertime! Of course ice cream is good anytime of year, but when temperatures are rising nothing beats cool, creamy ice cream! Both my husband and I grew up having homemade ice cream. My family usually just made vanilla and served it with various toppings. My husband's family made vanilla, coffee, strawberry and chocolate. The only one I ever tried that my father-in-law made was the chocolate. 

My father-in-law liked to tell a story of when one ladies in his friend group said that baba au rum difficult to make and there is no way my father-in-law could make it. His response was, "I have a PhD in Chemistry, I can certainly make baba au rhum." So the next time they got together, my father-in-law made baba au rhum and, according to him, it was perfect. He would end the story with, "Never tell a chemist he can't cook." 

That was the only time he ever made baba au rum, but there were other dishes he prided himself with. One of them is ice cream, in particular, chocolate ice cream (the others are sourdough waffles and pancakes, which I hope to make one day). I have to admit, its pretty good. I don't usually like a custard based ice cream because I have had some that tasted "eggy." This one does not. 

Original Chocolate Ice Cream Recipe

Chocolate Ice Cream

The original recipe for this ice cream is supposed to make one gallon. We don't go through that much, so I reduced to 1/3 and got about a quart of ice cream. 

2 cups whole milk

4 tablespoons grated chocolate

1 cup sugar

1 egg

2 teaspoons flour

pinch of salt

1 1/3 cups heavy cream

scant 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Scald milk, sugar and chocolate. Allow chocolate to melt and mix with other ingredients. Strain through cheesecloth, if necessary. Beat together the egg, sugar, and flour. Very slowly stir milk mixture into beaten egg mixture, be careful not to do this fast or the egg will cook. Return to fire and heat, but do not boil until mixture thickens. Cool. When cold, add whipped cream*, cinnamon and vanilla extract. Stir thoroughly and freeze [according to your ice cream maker's instructions]. 

*Note: All the other ice cream recipes that are from my father-in-law specify that heavy cream be "whipped stiff," so I assume the same goes for this recipe. The texture turned out perfect with whipping the heavy cream. 

This recipe comes from a hand written and illustrated cook book from my mother-in-law. At the beginning of the ice cream section she wrote out some tips for making ice cream. Here are the tips:

Enjoy and Happy Summer!

Dessert in the Desert {Recipe: Strawberry Honey Balsamic Ice Cream with Black Pepper}

We live in the desert, in both a literal and culinary desert. Our small desert community is isolated and doesn't support much in the way of fine dining. We have a few good restaurants, but mostly we have fast food and pizza. In part, this is why we sometimes go to extraordinary lengths make out of the ordinary foods at home. If we can't go out to get what we want, we will find a way to prepare it at home. This Strawberry Honey Balsamic Ice Cream with Black Pepper is a perfect example of the lengths we will go prepare something out of the ordinary. 

Many of the foods that we try to create at home are inspired by foods we have tried while traveling. This ice cream is a nod to the Strawberry Honey Balsamic with Black Pepper ice cream we had last summer at Salt & Straw in Portland, OR. The Salt & Straw ice cream is one of the best we ever had. So this summer we set out to find similar ingredients to those Salt & Straw uses. This is probably the most "foodie" thing we have ever done. 

Salt & Straw uses Honey Ridge Farms Balsamic Honey Vinegar and Pohnpei black pepper in their Strawberry Honey Balsamic with Black Pepper ice cream. Honey Ridge Farms ships their products. As of this writing, the vinegar is $12.99 without shipping and handling for a 8.45 ounce bottle. It is a little trickier getting the Pohnpei black pepper. It is expensive and not readily available. We found it on Amazon for about $35 with shipping and handling. Although I just checked while writing this, and they seem to be sold out. The Pohnpei black pepper is a milder, sweeter pepper than ordinary black pepper.

Adding the honey balsamic vinegar to the strawberry seems to intensify the strawberry flavor. It does not add a vinegar flavor at all. It is what makes this ice cream so good! The Pohnpei black pepper adds a slight spice to the ice cream. It is not necessary to use it; the ice cream is quite nice without it. 

It may be awhile before we head back to Portland, OR. So in the meantime, we will be making our own version of Strawberry Honey Balsamic Ice Cream with Black Pepper. It's a little challenging and expensive to get the ingredients, but it is way cheaper and easier than traveling to Portland get it!

Strawberry Honey Balsamic Ice Cream with Black Pepper

The Pohnpei black pepper is expensive and can be hard to get. It is not necessary to use it, the ice cream is very good without it.

Recipe for Small Batch Strawberry Honey Balsamic Jam was posted on May 15, 2017.

1 cup whole milk

2/3 cup granulated sugar

pinch of salt

1/4 teaspoon Pohnpei black pepper

2 cups heavy cream

1/2 cup Strawberry Honey Balsamic Jam, divided

1/4 teaspoon Pohnpei black pepper, optional

Whisk together whole milk, sugar and salt, until the sugar and salt is dissolved. Add in heavy cream, pepper, and 1/4 cup Strawberry Honey Balsamic Jam; stir until completely combined. Pour into a 1 quart ice cream maker of your choice and process accordingly. We use a Cuisinart electric ice cream maker that takes about 20-25 minutes to process, then place in a container and freeze for another 2 hours to "ripen".  Swirl in another 1/4 cup Strawberry Honey Balsamic Jam before placing the ice cream into the freezer to "ripen", while the ice cream is still a little soft. 

Enjoy!