Here’s another ice cream recipe from David Lebovitz’s book, The Perfect Scoop, and it’s a great one for now, Quebec’s glorious strawberry season. It’s not a very sweet ice cream, but really shows off the flavour of the strawberries, so make sure you use only the best berries for this ice cream. The sour cream gives it a nice tang, and the heavy cream that smooth, ice creaminess you would want. It’s a simple ice cream, meant as a showcase for the berries.

I had made a strawberry-rhubarb compote a bit later in the week and topped this ice cream with it. It got about 10x better, so definitely try something like that!

Strawberry Sour Cream Ice Cream
from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop

1 pound fresh strawberries, rinsed and hulled
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon vodka or kirsch
1 cup sour cream
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

1. Slice the strawberries. Put them in a bowl with sugar and vodka or kirsch.

2. Stir until the sugar begins to dissolve and all of the strawberries are coated. Let stand at room temperature for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

2. Pulse the strawberries and their liquid with the sour cream, heavy cream, and lemon juice in a blender or food processor until almost smooth, but still slightly chunky.

3. Refrigerate mixture for at least one hour. Freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Believe it or not, I had never tasted a persimmon up until a few days ago. I’ve been seeing lots of desserts using persimmons around, so when I saw some at the market, I picked them up right away and started scouring the internet for the perfect dessert to make with them.

The first thing I discovered that there are two types of the persimmon fruit: astringent and non-astringent. Astringent persimmons have to be eaten when they are super soft, jellylike in texture. These will be sweeter and juicier and the hachiya persimmon is the most delicious and common of these ones. The non-astringent can be eaten while they’re still firm and they take a long while to get soft and will be milder in their flavour and sweetness. The fuyu persimmon is the popular type of non-astringent.

While this may be sound overly exciting, it’s a good thing I discovered this, because obviously, the type of persimmon you have will affect how it should be cooked! I had bought fuyu persimmons, and finally decided that I wanted to prepare a bread pudding with them, something warm, sweet and gooey to make me happy in these January evenings.

I adapted this persimmon bread pudding from Martha Stewart and ended up with a perfect bread pudding. Instead of using white chocolate, I threw in some milk chocolate chips, and instead of melting the chocolate into the milk sauce, tossed them in separately. This gave the pudding little chocolate chunks and bits of the chocolate sweetness, instead of having it smoothly integrated into the sauce. I also added more cinnamon and nutmeg, as well as raisins. The recipe I’ve included is how I prepared it.

I loved this bread pudding – in fact, I thought it was pretty perfect. I didn’t completely puree the persimmon, and instead cooked them, got them all soft, mashed up a lot of them, but left chunks of the fruit intact. I was left with a light, sweet flavour throughout the pudding and nice pieces of almost peachy-cantaloupe firm fruit scattered in. I loved the amount of cinnamon, and the milk chocolate was great in there as it added a definite sweetness. This isn’t an overly saucy bread pudding, and I loved the non-soggy texture. This is a great base to any bread pudding, and if you wanted to try other fruits in there, it would work wonderfully. I’m thinking peaches next time!

Persimmon-Chocolate Bread Pudding with Raisins
adapted from Martha Stewart

3 Fuyu persimmons, peeled, seeded and cut into small pieces or slices
Zest of 1 lemon
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1 cup sugar, plus more, for baking dish
Unsalted butter, for baking dish
10 slices (about 1 1/2 pounds) 1 1/2-inch-thick day-old or toasted brioche, cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
3/4 cup milk chocolate chips
3/4 cup raisins
2 cups milk
3 large eggs

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a small saucepan, combine persimmon, lemon zest, lemon juice, and 1/2 cup sugar; simmer over low heat until sugar is dissolved.

2. Mash heated persimmons until there a lot of the fruit is pureed, making sure to leave some fruit pieces intact.

3. Butter a 2-quart shallow baking dish, and sprinkle lightly with sugar. Place bread in baking dish; sprinkle with cinnamon and nutmeg. Scatter chocolate chips and raisins over the bread as well.

4. In a medium saucepan, combine remaining 1/2 cup sugar and milk; stir frequently over low heat. Remove from heat once the sugar is dissolved.

5. Whisk eggs in a medium bowl. Slowly whisk warm milk mixture into eggs, being careful not to cook the eggs; stir in persimmon mixture. Pour mixture into baking dish, covering bread completely.

6. Bake until filling sets, about 35 minutes.

My first attempt at making jam seems to have been successful, especially if I go by the reactions of some of the people had when I gave some to them (hellooooo Patra!).

Ever since the pickles, I’ve been wanting to try jarring more foods. Still wanting to keep it fairly simple, I figured a jam would be a good way to go. Fruits aren’t really in season anymore, but I did have a big bag of frozen strawberries and some frozen raspberries leftover from the summer. A strawberry/raspberry jam just isn’t that exciting, so I decided to follow this recipe and add some heat to it by including a nice amount of jalapeno peppers.

The end result was wonderful! I enjoyed the addition of the raspberries, as I found that the jam was very sweet, and the tartness of the raspberries probably cut the sweetness a bit (in doing some research on jam-making, it seems you shouldn’t try to reduce the amount of sugar in recipes, as that will affect the consistency of it, usually making the jam runny – any input on this?). I like things HOT, so I added more jalapeno peppers, seeds and all, than was suggested by the recipe. The jam was definitely hot, but not overbearingly so. The sweetness helps, and the heat seemed to dissipate a little over time. The end result was a sweet, fruity and spicy-hot jam.

This jam is great with cheeses, and I couldn’t stop piling it on to any cheese I could get my hands onto…Apparently, it’s a great addition to baked brie…since I have away the jars I made and only had a bit left for myself, I can only say that I definitely believe it and am looking forward to making this, and other jams, again and again!

*I ended up buying a liquid pectin, and since the recipe called for powdered pectin, I had to look up if you could use them interchangeably. It turns out that you can, but you have to change the amount. Apparently, you also have to add liquid pectin in at a different point than you do with powdered pectin; you add liquid pectin after you’ve cooked the fruits and with powdered pectin, you add it before or while cooking. Either way, the consistency of my jam was good – not too thick and not too runny, so it worked out for me! The recipe below is my version, using liquid pectin (I also halved the original recipe). Check out the original if you’re using the powdered pectin!

Strawberry Raspberry Jalapeno Jam
adapted from All Recipes

1 ½ cups crushed strawberries
1 cup crushed raspberries
3/4 cup minced jalapeno peppers
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons liquid pectin
3 ½ cups white sugar
4 half pint canning jars with lids and rings

1. Place the crushed strawberries, minced jalapeno pepper, and lemon juice into a large saucepan, and bring to a boil over high heat. Once simmering, stir in the sugar until dissolved, return to a boil, and cook for 1 minute. Remove from heat and add the liquid pectin.

2. Sterilize the jars and lids in boiling water for at least 5 minutes. Pack the jam into the hot, sterilized jars, filling the jars to within 1/4 inch of the top. Run a knife or a thin spatula around the insides of the jars after they have been filled to remove any air bubbles. Wipe the rims of the jars with a moist paper towel to remove any food residue. Top with lids, and screw on rings.

3. Place a rack in the bottom of a large stockpot and fill halfway with water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then carefully lower the jars into the pot using a holder. Leave a 2 inch space between the jars. Pour in more boiling water if necessary until the water level is at least 1 inch above the tops of the jars. Bring the water to a full boil, cover the pot, and process for 10 minutes.

4. Remove the jars from the stockpot and place onto a cloth-covered or wood surface, several inches apart. Allow to cool overnight Once cool, press the top of each lid with a finger, ensuring that the seal is tight (lid does not move up or down at all). Store in a cool, dark area.

As delicious as peaches are, I can never get through a whole basket of them before they cross the just-ripe threshold into the waaay-too-overripe badlands. Of course, when it’s peach season here, it makes sense to buy them by the bucket, but I needed something fun to do with all the ones I couldn’t eat in time.

It’s been forever since we’ve used our ice cream maker at home, so I decided to give the roasted peach ice cream recipe on Sticky Gooey Creamy Chewy a spin. It sounded like the perfect summer ice cream, and I loved the fact that I wouldn’t have to use any egg yolks or worrying about any of that tempering business.

The end result wasn’t quite what I was hoping for. The ice cream is nice, but if I’m going to eat ice cream, I want it to be worth every single calorie. This one is rather plain and nondescript. I didn’t add the preach preserves when I made it, and perhaps that was part of the reason the ice cream wasn’t bursting with fresh, peach flavor. I did, however, add peach schnapps to the mixture, and pretty much doubled the amount of roasted peaches that gets mixed in. I thought adding cinnamon to the brown sugar coating I roasted the peaches in would add a nice dimension to the ice cream, but I could barely taste it. Next time, I would easily double the amount of cinnamon and make sure to add the peach preserves.

I did have a little problem when it came time to mix the cream mixture in the ice cream maker…the recipe calls for whipping cream, and after just a few minutes in the machine, the mixture really started expanding, to the point where it was all overflowing out of the machine, so I had to stop the process much earlier than I should have. I don’t think this had a serious effect on the outcome of the ice cream, but it was still a bit strange…

All in all, it has an okay texture, and does have a refreshing peachy flavour, but it isn’t nearly as tasty or as summery as I was hoping it would be.

Roasted Peach & Cinnamon Ice Cream
adapted from Sticky Gooey Creamy Chewy
Printable Recipe

2 cups half-and-half
1 cup whipping cream
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup peach preserves (I didn’t use this)
1 vanilla bean, split and scraped (I used 1 teaspoon vanilla extract instead)
Pinch kosher salt
4-6 medium cinnamon-roasted peaches* (Because I didn’t use peach preserves, I increased this to about 10 medium roasted peaches)

1. Combine all ingredients, except the peaches, in a saucepan and place over medium heat. Attach a candy thermometer to inside of pan. Stirring occasionally, bring the mixture to 170 degrees F. Remove from heat and strain into a lidded container. If you do not have a thermometer, bring the mixture just barely to a simmer. As soon as you see a bubble on the surface, remove it from the heat.

2. Cool the mixture, then refrigerate it overnight.

3. Freeze mixture in an ice cream machine according to unit’s instructions. Once the volume has increased by 1/2 and reached a soft serve consistency, add the peaches and continue turning to incorporate. Spoon the mixture back into a lidded container and harden in the freezer at least 1 hour before serving.

Makes 1 quart

*Cinnamon Roasted Peaches

8-10 ripe peaches
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon

1. Combine brown sugar with cinnamon.

2. Cut peaches in halves and pit them. Coat the cut side of the peaches in the brown sugar-cinnamon mixture and place, cut side down, on a baking sheet.

3. Bake at 400 degrees F for 20-30 minutes (or longer – bake until you see the skins of the peaches peeling off)

4. Remove peaches from pan and let cool. Be sure to save any peachy, sugary liquid from the pan!

5. Remove skins from peaches and dice. Include all juices when adding to the ice cream!

If you like this, you might also like:

Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream
Burnt Sugar Ice Cream
Orange Sorbet