Roasted Winter Vegetable

We’re embracing winter this week, but we’re going to sweeten things up a little bit. Inspired by a late Christmas celebration in early January, this week’s flavor is based on our dinner’s side dish that night, a winter vegetable gratin. It was perfect, and so is this week’s flavor – Roasted Winter Vegetable.

 

 

Winter VegetablesSweet Potato LayerParsnip LayerButternut Squash LayerTurnip LayerRoasted Vegetable Gratin

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The vegetable gratin was pretty simple really. Thinly sliced sweet potato, parsnips, butternut squash, and turnips, alternately layered in a casserole, seasoned in between and roasted low in the oven with a bit of chicken stock. The gratin is finished with a little cream, and topped with panko, grated parmesan and olive oil. The vegetables become so sweet from roasting low and steaming in their own juices, that this gratin could have easily been dessert. But that’s what we’re doing…

For the ice cream, we made the gratin almost exactly the same. We alternated layers of these winter vegetables, seasoning with salt and pepper in between, and slow roasted with a small amount of salted water.

 

 

Roasted Vegetableroasted vegetable pureeVegetable water reductionWinter vegetables getting strained out

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When the vegetables are out of the oven, they go into a food processor and are pureed. This seasoned winter vegetable puree is added to our ice cream base before pasteurization. But first we need to make use of the left over liquid in the bottom of the baking dish. This liquid is packed with flavor. We reduce the liquid until almost dry, and add to the ice cream base. After pasteurization, the ice cream base is strained through a fine mesh strainer, salted and cooled. Use the solids for another purpose. Pie maybe? Whatever, just use them. The chilled base is ready to churn.

 

 

Roasted Winter Vegetable

 

 

Salty sweet! With each bite you can almost distinguish the flavor of each vegetable. A great accompaniment to pecan pie perhaps? However it’s eaten, embrace it, and this week, embrace winter with a little added sweetness.

 

 

 

 

Roasted Winter Vegetable Ice Cream

1 sweet potato, peeled
1 butternut squash, peeled
1 large parsnip, peeled
1 purple top turnip, peeled
1/2 cup water, salted
salt and pepper, for gratin

2 cups heavy cream
1 cup milk
2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable puree
Liquid reduction
1 teaspoon salt, for ice cream base

 

Instructions:

1. Prepare the gratin: Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. With a mandolin, slice the vegetables 1/16-1/8 inch thick. In a ceramic or glass casserole, alternate layers of vegetables, seasoning with salt and pepper in between each layer. Add the salted water, cover with foil and bake for 80 minutes. Remove from oven.

2. Prepare puree and reduction: With a slotted spoon, transfer vegetables to a food processor. Process until smooth. Set aside for ice cream base. Transfer liquid in bottom of baking dish to a small sauce pan and reduce until nearly dry. Reserve reduction for ice cream base.

2. Make ice cream base: Crack eggs into a mixing bowl and whisk fully.  Add sugar and whisk.  Add cream, remaining milk, vegetable puree, liquid reduction, and salt. Whisk until ingredients are combined.

4. Cook/pasteurize ice cream base: Place ice cream base in a small pot and heat over medium heat, whisking or stirring continuously until temperature reaches 165-170 degrees. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature (an ice bath will do this in about 15-20 minutes). Strain base through a fine mesh strainer and put base in a clean container, cover, and chill in refrigerator overnight.

5. Churn ice cream base in ice cream machine according to manufacturer’s instructions.

*Yields approximately 2.5 pints

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 1/30/15 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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Maple Bourbon Sweet Potato

Happy Thanksgiving!  In keeping with our tradition of creating holiday themed flavors this time of year, we’ve chosen the sweet potato route for this week’s flavor.  Sweet potatoes are one of my favorite things – and are an unsung star both as a side dish and a dessert for Thanksgiving dinners across the country.  The sweet potatoes’ natural sweetness pairs very well with many flavors.  Thus we chose to throw some bourbon in (it’s pretty cold out) and sweeten the deal with maple.  Good solid fall flavors, and colors.

 

 

Maple Bourbon Sweet Potato Maple Bourbon Sweet PotatoMaple Sugar

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the sweet potato base, we roasted the potatoes in butter to get out some of the moisture and concentrate the sugars.  Plus they get all nice and caramelized which gives them a nice depth for the base.

 

 

Maple Bourbon Sweet Potato

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once the sweet potatoes are finished roasting, they are pureed while still warm with cream.  The puree is added in with the rest of the cream, bourbon and sweetened with maple sugar.

 

Maple Bourbon Sweet Potato

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We use maple sugar in this recipe because it has all of the flavor of syrup but is a bit easier to work with as a base sweetener – and maple syrup will lower the freezing temperature of ice cream because of it’s high sugar concentration.  All of the flavors mingle while the base is pasteurized over heat and a little bourbon is added again before the base is frozen.

 

Maple Bourbon Sweet Potato

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here you have it.  A rich sweet potato ice cream tinted with maple and rounded out with bourbon.  A perfect way to celebrate all we have to be thankful for this year.

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 11/28/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

 

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