Dark and Stormy

Our Facebook fan flavor contest from a few weeks back provided a ton of great flavor ideas and we’ll probably add a few more before summer is over.  This week we’re going to go back to the summer cocktail theme using a fan suggestion and visit another great summer drink featuring ginger ale, lime and rum – the Dark and Stormy.  For the ice cream version, we made a ginger brown sugar ice cream with candied lime and dark rum syrup.

 

Dark and Stormy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The most labor intensive part of making this flavor is making the candied lime – so we’ll start there.  The lime rind is carefully separated and sliced – then boiled 3 times to remove the bitterness.  Once that is done, the lime “zest” is simmered in a simple sugar syrup until tender, tossed with sugar and laid out on a sheetpan to dry.

 

 

Candied Lime

Candied Lime

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then comes the dark rum syrup.  It starts with brown sugar and water, which is boiled into a syrup.  The dark rum is added at the end once cool to prevent all of the alcohol from burning off.  Rum is a sweet liqour that disappears in more sugar, so we want a little of the alcohol to stay in the syrup and round out the flavor.

 

 

IMG_1669Cinnamon Syrup

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last but not least, the ice cream base.  To serve as the ginger ale portion of the cocktail, we use brown sugar and fresh grated ginger.  It makes for a nice slightly dark and gingery base to hold up the candied lime and rum syrup.

 

 

brown sugarginger

 

 

 

 

 

 

The candied limes are added in at the end of the churn and the rum syrup is swirled in as the ice cream is packed into it’s container.

 

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The scoop is a light and airy brown sugar ginger ice cream studded with candied limes all embraced by a dark rum syrup swirl.

 

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Dark and Stormy Ice Cream Recipe

(makes approx 1-1/2 quarts)

Ingredients:

For Ice Cream:
2C Heavy Cream
1C Milk (use any fat percentage you prefer – higher lends to a creamier base)
2 Eggs
3/4C Brown Sugar
1 Tablespoon of finely grated ginger
1/2 tsp salt

For Syrup:
1C Brown Sugar
1/2C Water
2 Tablespoons of Dark Rum

For Candied Lime:
3 Limes
1C Sugar + Extra for dusting
1C Water

Instructions:

1. Prepare the candied Lime (make 1 day ahead of time): Remove the peels from the limes.  Using a sharp knife, carefully remove any thick white pith from lime peel. Cut peel into thin 2-inch-long strips. Place peel in pot and cover with water. Bring to boil and strain, repeat boiling and straining 3 times to remove bitterness from peel. Once boiling has been completed, bring 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar to boil. When sugar is dissolved, add strained lime peel and reduce to simmer; cook for approximately 30-45 minutes or until lime peel is tender. Once tender, strain lime peel and toss with sugar to coat, then spread out on sheet pan and let dry completely (will go faster in refrigerator – usually takes about 3-4 hours). Once lime peel is dry chop into small 1/4″ sized pieces and chill in refrigerator until you are ready to churn ice cream.

2. Prepare the syrup (make ahead of time and chill): Combine the brown sugar and water in a heavy bottom pot and place on burner over medium/high heat.  Bring to boil and cook until temperature reaches 220 degrees farenheit (you’ll need a candy or high heat digital read thermometer). Watch closely because it can boil over lightning fast. Remove from heat. Let cool to room temperature and then add the rum and stir until incorporated. Chill further in refrigerator until you’re ready to make ice cream. It helps to test some of the syrup in the freezer to make sure it doesn’t get too hard or thick.  If it does – simply add a bit of water or rum and heat until you can incorporate it all (or do it while it is still warm).

3.  Prepare the ice cream: Crack eggs into a mixing bowl and whisk fully. Add grated ginger, brown sugar and salt and whisk again until all are fully incorporated.  Place ice cream mix in heavy pot and cook over medium heat, stirring continuously. Heat ice cream mixture until temperature reaches 165 degrees. Remove from heat.  Cool the ice cream base to room temperature (an ice bath will do this in about 15-20 minutes).   Once cool, place ice cream mix in a container, cover, and chill in refrigerator overnight.

Churn ice cream base in ice cream machine according to manufacturer’s instructions. Add in 1/2C candied lime in the last 5 minutes of the churning process. The rum syrup is swirled in to the ice cream as you pack it into the container. Freeze in a tightly covered container for at least 4 hours, preferably overnight if you can wait.  Then, enjoy!

*Yields approximately 2.5 pints of ice cream.

 

 

If you’d rather not make it, you can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Two winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 7/10/15 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally in Minneapolis. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

 

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Ginger Brown Butter Vanilla Bean

We haven’t done a vanilla centric flavor in awhile, so I took the opportunity this week to remedy that.  While it’s true my sons are completely spoiled in their access to ice cream, the wide assortment of flavors we make are often complex and a little challenging for them.  I wanted to tailor something more for them, especially with birthdays coming up – we HAD to have some kind of ice cream to eat with the cake.  Hence, we arrived at this week’s flavor – very much a vanilla but tinted with just a twist as we do.

 

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The process for this flavor is relatively simple – it’s all in the base.

 

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First, the ginger is finely grated and added fresh to the cream base, along with fresh vanilla bean.  Vanilla extract works fine in a pinch, but nothing compares to actual vanilla bean flavor.  All of these flavors steep and infuse into the ice cream base during the cooking process – so it is important that they go in beforehand or their flavor will not be as intense.

 

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A little bit of butter is browned in a pan, and whisked in once the ice cream base has reached a temp around 120 degrees Fahrenheit.  If added in while the ice cream base is cold, it coagulates immediately and you get chunks of brown butter which you most likely don’t want.  When added in while warm, it gets whisked into the base and emulsifies to become one.  Harmonious brown butter flavor in an umami concert with ginger and vanilla bean and cream.

 

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The scoop – a beautifully rich, ginger and brown butter tinted vanilla bean ice cream.

 

 

Ginger Brown Butter Vanilla Bean Ice Cream

(makes approx 1-1/2 quarts)

Ingredients:

2C Heavy Cream
1C Milk (use any fat percentage you prefer – higher lends to a creamier base)
2 Eggs
3/4C Sugar
1 Whole Vanilla bean
1Tablespoon of finely grated ginger
2Tablespoons of melted butter (browned)
1/2 tsp salt

Instructions:

Crack eggs into a mixing bowl and whisk fully. Add grated ginger, vanilla bean (scraped from pod) and sugar to eggs and whisk until all are combined well. Add cream,milk,  salt and whisk again until all are fully incorporated.  Note: You can add in the vanilla bean pod to steep during the cooking process for more vanilla flavor, but make sure to pull it out and discard before freezing the ice cream.  Place ice cream mix in heavy pot and cook over medium heat, stirring continuously.  Once mix reaches 115 degrees Fahrenheit, whisk in the melted browned butter until emulsified into the ice cream base.  Continue to heat ice cream mixture until temperature reaches 165 degrees. Remove from heat.  Cool the ice cream base to room temperature (an ice bath will do this in about 15-20 minutes).   Once cool, place ice cream mix in a container, cover, and chill in refrigerator overnight.

3.  Churn ice cream base in ice cream machine according to manufacturer’s instructions. Freeze in a tightly covered container for at least 4 hours, preferably overnight if you can wait.  Then, enjoy!

*Yields approximately 2.5 pints of ice cream.

If you’d rather not make it, you can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Two winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 5/15/15 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally in Minneapolis. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

 

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Gingerbread with Lemon Cream

The holiday season is in full swing which means folks are busy baking up all their favorite cookies, cakes, pies and pastries to share with family and friends. And hey, we’re no different. So when my loving wife suggested that we make gingerbread cookies with our four-year-old son to swing into the holiday spirit, I concurred, and then immediately got caught up with the idea of gingerbread and ice cream. It’s not new concept to us. In fact, gingerbread was the second flavor we ever put out on this here blog. This time I wanted to add in the component of lemon, you know, the classic lemon icing that tops gingerbread cookies. So I toiled with the idea of making a gingerbread flavored ice cream and adding lemon bars, but in the end, I was a sucker for a lemon ice cream with gingerbread croutons. Honestly, I thought you all would be too. So let’s get started with this week’s holiday flavor: Gingerbread with Lemon Cream…

 

 

Gingerbread spicesGingerbread batterGingerbreadGingerbread Croutons

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In case you were wondering why we’re not making gingerbread cookies…we are looking for something dense that will hold up in our ice cream. We adapted this recipe from Smitten Kitchen for our ice cream, but the original produces a fantastic dense sticky gingerbread that is fantastic on it’s own. We start with Cardamom, Cloves, Cinnamon, Ginger and Nutmeg to give this cake intensity. The batter is poured into a Bundt pan and after baking is knocked out to cool. For the ice cream, we cube the gingerbread and bake again to form a crunchy layer on the outside that will hold up to the ice cream. The croutons are tossed in at the end of the churn.

 

 

Lemon Zest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next, we mix in a handfull of freshly grated lemon zest to our organic sugarcane base before cooking. The base is cooked, the zest is steeped, and then strained before cooling and into the ice cream maker.

 

 

Gingerbread with Lemon Cream

 

 

 

Gingerbread with Lemon Cream! It’s craft ice cream for the holidays and we want to share it with you…

You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 12/20/13 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

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