Results tagged ice cream from David Lebovitz

My recent banana windfall gave me the chance to play around a bit with various banana ice cream combinations. Although I loved the taste of this one, frankly, I wasn’t sure I should post the recipe.

Since bananas are such a natural partner for coconut, I reasoned, “Why use milk or cream when there’s coconut milk? So I reached for a can of it. Continuing with that train I thought, I had a bag of jaggery, raw cane sugar that’s used in Indian cuisine.

I’d bought the husky, ultra-dark sugar up near the gare du Nord, in the Indian and Sri Lankan neighborhood, for no other reason than I was attracted to its rich color and the aggressive scent that wafted through the bag when I pressed it against my nose. When I moved to Paris, I remember people telling me to avoid that neighborhood, that it wasn’t safe. But it’s become one of my favorite quartiers, mostly because of the lively ethnic communities that have settled there. (As well as being the home to the Paris chapter of the Hell’s Angels.)

Continue Reading Banana-Brown Sugar Ice Cream…

For the first five years in Paris, I wouldn’t go to Scoop. I’d walk by, scan the selections of hamburgers and “les wraps”, and keep going. Even though I was intrigued with the list of house-made ice creams, I’d always reason to myself, “I didn’t move to Paris to eat a hamburger.”

I was reading recently about a site called My American Market that carries American foods, mostly targeted at expats living in France. There’s some hard-to-find baking products, like unsweetened chocolate and molasses, but there’s also plenty of goofy stuff, like muffin mixes, trail bars, and something called Molly McButter.

Continue Reading Scoop…

There’s nothing that can kill a great trip more than a bad airline experience. But since Twitter has now become the airline’s biggest public relations headache, I won’t complain about anything. Okay, except for the guy sitting in front of me for the 12-plus hour flight, who kept insisting that if he just leaned forward, then slammed his body backwards, his seat back would go back even further than the seat physically, would actually allow.

So even though it took a few minutes after we landed to remove my knees from my chest, (although I think I need to get some medical attention tomorrow for my bijoux de famille), I still have managed to keep a smile on my face after winging my way back from Ixtapa, Mexico for our first-ever Food Blogger Camp.

Aside from hooking up with my blogging pals; Elise, Matt, Jaden, Adam, Diane, and Dianne, I also met Diane’s other half, Todd, and Michael Ruhlman, who proved a formidable foe for the entire week. I don’t think we agreed about anything, except that we always agreed that we disagreed with each other.

Continue Reading Food Blogger Camp, part 2…

The other night I was standing on the métro and found myself face à face with a little affiche advising me, minding my own business as I rocketed below Paris, that it’s not alright to eat Mr. Ed. Then on Tuesday, I was taking a stroll through the thirteenth, on my way to have lunch with a friend in Chinatown, and came across a sign pleading a stop to the practice of le gavage, the forced stuffing of ducks and geese to make foie gras.

A lot of Americans think that all the French are unequivocally daring eaters, or aren’t picky, which is partially true: when you have a dinner party, you don’t have to worry about someone showing up who’s allergic to peanuts or dairy. Aside from a certain American who won’t eat squid, everyone around here eats almost anything, and just about everything might show up on a menu if you get invited to dinner. Except offal, which, in spite of the fact everyone thinks the French like to chow down on stomach lining, testicles, and kidneys, there’s plenty of them that turn up their noses at the idea of digging into a steaming dish of any of the above. btw: In case you invite me over for dinner, I’m with that camp.

Continue Reading Stop the Stuffing!…

Technically this gelato isn’t ‘polenta’ ice cream, but it’s made with corn flour. But when I was in Torino, Italy last year, a local gelateria was making what they were billing as a ‘polenta’ gelato, using farina bóna.

So if you want to argue with an Italian chef, you’re welcome to. After tangling with puzzling bureaucratic paperwork for a disproportionately-large chunk of my days lately, I’m happy to just accept what people say, and no longer question the how’s and why’s. (Like when I got a customs bill for an unsolicited delivery last week that had a tax on the tax. To preserve my sanity, I’ve stopped trying to make sense of those kinds of things anymore.)

Plus “Flour Ice Cream”, somehow doesn’t have the same appeal.

I was happy, at long last, to get around the making gelato from this unusual ingredient that I picked up during the Slow Food event I’d attended. Unlike the derision* that similar events like this draw elsewhere (which was why I always avoided going), Monsieur Skeptic went with an unusually-open mind and was thrilled to discover so many unusual and nearly-extinct food products that the Slow Food Foundation is working to keep alive.

Farina bóna is deeply-roasted corn, ground into flour, which was produced in villages, such as Vergeletto, in Switzerland, which had just 90 inhabitants.

Continue Reading Polenta Ice Cream (Gelato di polenta)…

Every year I get a slew of requests from people looking for a recipe for Pumpkin Ice Cream. While in The Perfect Scoop I have a recipe for Sweet Potato Ice Cream studded with maple-glazed pecans, there’s something about the fall that makes people think of all-things pumpkin. I’m a big fan of sweet potatoes, personally, but old traditions die hard I suppose. And Pumpkin Ice Cream got put on my to-churn list.

As luck would have it, I was leafing through a copy of The Craft of Baking by Karen DeMasco, former pastry chef at Craft in New York City, and landed on a picture of Pumpkin Ice Cream. Quelle chance! So I thought I’d give her recipe a spin in my ice cream machine.

Karen uses canned pumpkin, which a lot of people like to use because it’s easy and consistent. But it’s not so easy to find in Paris. And even though I’m an outcast for using sweet potatoes, I’m still a bit old-fashioned and like to make my own puree. So there.

Continue Reading Pumpkin Ice Cream Recipe…

If you’re looking for a simple scoop of chocolate ice cream…or vanilla…or strawberry…you’re not going to find it at Humphry Slocombe in San Francisco.

Okay, you might see one of them nestled somewhere amongst the wacky flavors on the ever-changing list. But you’ll have a better chance of finding Fumé (smoked) ice cream, Chocolate passion fruit, and cinnamon brittle. There’s a decidedly non-kosher Boccalone proscuitto ice cream, as well as Ancho coffee, Jesus juice sorbet (you don’t want to know…), Balsamic caramel, and Secret breakfast, a mixture of milk and sweetened breakfast cereal.

Continue Reading Humphry Slocombe Ice Cream…

When I gave the terrific recipe for the Caramelized White Chocolate, which I learned to make at Valrhona’s chocolate school, I’d hoped that many of you would use it to create your own concoctions. While no one came up with my favorite (stirred into oatmeal!), there was a lot of creativity put forth as people made everything from Caramelized White Chocolate Bars to a spread for a buttery, flaky croissant.

I’ve listed the ones I found at the end of the post, but I wanted to give the ice cream recipe I’ve been making this summer.

Continue Reading Caramelized White Chocolate Ice Cream Recipe…