We’ve talked a lot over the past few years about where our inspirations come from, and sometimes a flavor is developed from a number of different directions. This one began from a plan to create a flavor with the Pluot fruit – a hybrid fruit made from apricot and plum. Stone fruits are in season right now in a big way, and we try to take advantage of them before their season ends and the local berry season begins. The original plan was to make a Pluot jam with our Sour Cream Vanilla base.
Beautiful Flavorosa Pluot’s from our favorite local market, the Seward Co-op.
By total chance, the recent issue of Food and Wine magazine showed up the week before I planned on making this flavor, and I happened across a recipe for making crunchy quinoa to be used in a salad. Salad, schmalad – this was going in Pluot ice cream.
Good old fashioned uncooked Quinoa.
First the pluot jam. Making the jam was rather straightforward process, involving removal of the pits from the fruit, and then combining the pulp and skin with sugar and water, mashing and cooking down into a nice, thick jam.
Then came crisping up the quinoa. First the quinoa was lightly cooked until just tender and dried on a sheet pan. Once completely dry, the quinoa is fried in vegetable oil until it is brown and crunchy, and cooled on paper towels. The original recipe called for salt immediately upon removing from the oil, but I used both salt and sugar to give them a little sweetness as well.
The quinoa fry up with a surprising crunch and a dense nut-like flavor. Very tasty.
Finally the sour cream vanilla base is made with our favorite sour cream and vanilla beans. We use light sour cream because it keeps the fat content of the ice cream at the perfect level.
Our landing, is an incredibly silky vanilla ice cream, rippled with layers of Flavorosa Pluot jam and speckled with crunchy bits of quinoa throughout.
Want to try it? 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 6/28/13 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!
