Chocolate Malted ice cream, a recipe in Scoop
Just because summer’s over doesn’t mean you have to give up summertime desserts like ice cream – and you can even learn how to make your own gourmet ice cream with the new book “Scoop” by Ellen Brown.
Many of us know that a lot of the mass-market ice cream sold at grocery stores tastes worlds apart from ice cream bought at a local ice cream shop. But have you ever thought about the reasons why? And the fact that you can learn how to make your own ice cream, not to mention sorbet, gelato, and more? Engaging author Ellen Brown explores all of this and more in her 2011 book “Scoop: 125 Specialty Ice Creams from the Nation’s Best Creameries” (Running Press, 240 pp., $19.95).
If you read this book you will, as Brown writes, “…learn the role each ingredient plays in making ice cream, and you’ll learn ways to change the formulation to suit your personal taste.” You’ll also learn a new way to have fun: making your own sweet treats!
In addition to ice cream recipes, Scoop features recipes for treats like profiteroles and hot fudge sauce. Speaking of sauce, if you’re not in the cooking mood and want to buy a great local product, try Brookdale-based Desperately Seeking Chocolate dessert sauces. They’re available online or at shops such as New Leaf and Whole Foods in Santa Cruz and other Bay Area cities.
Brown’s background includes serving as the founding food editor of USA Today. To perform research for this book, she visited more than 20 U.S. artisan ice cream producers, including shops and dairies. Each kindly shared their recipes with the author, who adapted these into new recipes for amateur chefs who don’t want to search for unusual ingredients or buy a lot of new equipment (the main new tool to own or buy, of course, is an ice cream maker of some kind). To develop recipes for the book, Brown used a Cuisinart 1.5 quart ice cream maker, which can be purchased via many online sources for about $50. Local stores that carry various ice cream makers include Chefworks in downtown Santa Cruz and Mountain Feed and Farm Supply in Ben Lomond.
Recipes include Grasshopper Pie Ice Cream adapted from Mitchell’s in San Francisco, Turkish Coffee Ice Cream (McConnell’s, Santa Barbara and Ventura) and Mango Mimosa Sorbet (Silver Moon, Los Gatos). Other flavors include Chocolate-Jalapeno Gelato, Pistachio Halvah Ice Cream, and Toasted Sesame Seed and Honey Gelato. One of the author’s favorite recipes is based on Kona Mocha Chip Ice Cream from Lappert’s in Marin County. Brown explains “…there’s a bit of buttermilk powder in the recipe that adds a tangy note to contrast with the rich coffee flavor and chocolate.”
She adds, “The prize for ease of preparation, however, goes to Dulce de Leche Gelato from Giovanna Gelato in Massachusetts. To create the caramel you just boil a can of sweetened condensed milk for a few hours! Then mix that with some milk and churn it. It takes about ten minutes of hands-on time, and the flavor is fantastic.” Another favorite recipe for Brown is Fig Gelato adapted from Florida’s GS Gelato (watch for this in the next few days on my site!).
Vanilla With Verve, the first recipe chapter, is emblematic of all nine recipe chapters (which include For the Kick of Coffee, Frozen From Fruits, and Starring Nuts and Seeds). Brown starts with a few interesting facts about vanilla, and advises how to shop for, and prepare, whole vanilla beans. Many vanilla-centered recipes follow; these include what creamery they’re adapted from and, for unusual ingredients (which rarely appear), definitions and where to find these. The first recipe, Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, includes buttermilk powder. Brown tells you where to find this and explains that it’s “an easy way to achieve buttermilk flavor…without ending up with half a quart of buttermilk going bad in the refrigerator.” I’m sure many of you out there, like me, can relate.
One of the best things about the book: Brown offers lots of alternatives and variations depending on whether you don’t like an ingredient or can’t find something.
Scoop has lots of tips for the home chef, and what’s refreshing is Brown explains the reason behind the tip. For example, in the introduction she describes how small ice cream producers include natural stabilizers such as guar gum or xanthan gum. Adding creaminess without using eggs, these stabilizers can be found in many health food stores. However, an easy substitute is cornstarch, an inexpensive item which is already in many home cooks’ pantries. Brown also discusses the basic science of ice cream, and readers learn the differences between ice cream (two types, one with eggs and one without), sherbert, sorbet, and frozen yogurt. If you’re not the type of person who cares about the “why” or the “science,” just skip this chapter and go straight to the recipes – all 140 of them! But you might want to skim the part about equipment; you’ll be delighted to discover that most of what you need you probably already own (mixing bowls, cutting boards, etc.). Brown does give a short list of additional items that can come in handy, plus she describes the different types of ice cream makers so that you can choose which kind you’ll purchase to make these recipes.
Are you a fan of ice cream served at Santa Cruz’s Saturn Café? The restaurant uses McConnell’s ice cream, and Brown has adapted a few from McConnell’s including flavors Cappuccino, Turkish Coffee, and Bordeaux Strawberry (which features Bordeaux wine).
Petaluma-based Laloo’s, whose ice cream can be found locally at shops including Aptos Natural Foods, New Leaf, and Whole Foods, makes ice cream from goat milk. The intriguing Scoop recipe for Cappuccino Goat Milk ice cream includes goat cheese and ground espresso coffee.
Brown gives readers the history of many of the ice cream shops and creameries, including personal stories of the founders and chefs, which can make a person even more eager to try a recipe or visit a shop. Denver-based Bonnie Brae Ice Cream head chef Richard Brown discusses watching parents feed a child ice cream for the first time: “Suddenly there’s this cold stuff, and then they taste it and it’s sweet, and then there’s a smile.” Imagine if you could make this happen with your own child with ice cream you’ve created yourself: how rewarding! Bon Appetit!
On Twitter? Follow me @santacruzfoodie.
