Fresh Peach Ice Cream

I brainstormed a lot of ways to dress up this ice cream. Perhaps by adding some fresh ginger, or cookie crumbs to make it peach cobbler ice cream, I could make my ice cream more interesting and to keep it from being buried by the hundreds of thousands of hits that come up when you Google "peach ice cream."

But in the end, I decided to keep it simple, and just let the very basic ingredients of this ice cream to shine through.

So here it is, fresh peach ice cream without any of the bells and whistles I usually add. This ice cream really lets the peaches shine through, so be sure to only use sweet, juicy peaches you would want to eat on their own

It's the quintessential summer dessert; there's really no substitute for making your own creamy custard and stirring in fresh, juicy peaches.

We can get most fruits year round now, we hardly think about their seasons (For the longest time, I thought that grapes grew during the winter, before I figured out that we imported them from Chile.) But that trick we pull with so many fruits doesn't really work for peaches. Out-of-season ones are mushy, grainy, and tasteless. Peaches remain a summer fruit; there's something fleeting about them, their brief appearance at farmer's markets and in our desserts as we scramble to use as many of them as we can before they go out of season.

This ice cream capitalizes on their short-lived nature, packing as much of their flavor as possible in a single scoop, a single spoonful. It's a flash of summer, sweet and fragrant, to be savored slowly before it melts and slips away.

-Caroline

Fresh Peach Ice Cream

Yields about 1 quart | Click here for the printer-friendly recipe.

Ingredients

1 cup heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
¾ cup sugar, divided
4 egg yolks
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
6 ripe yellow peaches
pinch of cinnamon
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Directions

1. Pour the heavy cream and milk into a saucepan and heat until it just begins to simmer.
2. Whisk together the egg yolks and ½ cup sugar. Slowly pour the hot cream into the eggs, whisking constantly.
3. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly. Cook until until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon.
4. Take the saucepan off the heat and stir in the vanilla extract. Let it cool completely, then refrigerate for several hours or overnight.
5. Peel the peaches and cut them into small cubes.
6. Place the peaches in a pot over low heat. Add 2 tablespoons of sugar, the cinnamon, and the lemon juice.
7. Cook for 5 - 10 minutes, or until the peaches have released their juices. Taste, and add more sugar if needed. Let cool completely, then refrigerate for several hours.
8. Stir in the peach mixture to the custard. Freeze the mixture in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions.
9. Freeze the ice cream for several hours, until it is firmer.

Cherry Brownies with Goat Cheese Frosting

In a blogosphere featuring things like bacon ice cream and chocolate-covered pickles, the flavor combination of these brownies doesn’t seem that out there. Sure, it’s a little strange to make an icing out of goat cheese, or to pair it with brownies, but it’s definitely not innovative or completely unusual. Some of you might just wonder why I can’t leave well enough alone and just make normal brownies; it might seem a little like a gimmick.

So I want to explain why I like to to experiment with new flavors and baking ideas, why I think I and other food bloggers and chefs can’t seem to resist playing around with well-loved classics.

Let me take you on a little detour. For the first day of my history and literature tutorial last semester, I had to read an excerpt from Terry Eagleton’s book on literary philosophy called “What is Literature?”. One of the schools of thought that came up in the article was the Russian Formalists, who believed that the purpose of literature was to defamiliarize the familiar. Literature deformed traditional structures of language, making them strange and forcing us to struggle to understand their meaning, and thus causing us to comprehend their meaning and content with new appreciation. Eagleton compares it to how poisoning the air gives us a new awareness and awe of our facility of breathing.

Perhaps this isn’t a flattering comparison for either literature or food, but I believe bakers aim for a similar reaction when we push the bounds of traditional recipes. We aren’t trying to ruin the comfort food you take for granted, but rather to give you a new appreciation for them. A while back I read a review of Grant Achatz’s restaurant Alinea; it singled out one of his dishes, which looked more like a piece of modern art than food, yet its smell and taste were incredibly nostalgic, evoking memories of autumn and woodsmoke.

I’m not presuming to understand why Grant Achatz cooks what he does, but on the consumption end of things, I think such dishes involve this process of defamiliarizing the familiar. Finding old flavors and memories in such a strange setting make them particularly poignant. In a class called Science and Cooking at Harvard, I met similar chefs who worked in gastronomy; they showed us the weird and cool things they could make, explained the scientific reactions behind them. But what was missing from the lectures was the question of why, why someone would want to eat these dishes.

It isn’t just that the food tastes good or sells well or teaches chemistry to a bunch of humanities students terrified of lab work, but that it tastes both familiar and strange; and in tasting strange, it makes us appreciate the the familiar anew.

And so, to the brownies. I think the tang and savory flavor of the goat cheese complements the richness of the brownies, bringing out the chocolate and keeping it from being too sweet or overwhelming. The cherries’ juiciness and tenderness becomes particularly noticeable as it cuts through the creaminess of frosting and the dense fudginess of the brownies (this recipe is definitely on the fudgy end of the brownie spectrum).

I first discovered the brownie-goat cheese combination through my roommates. Lynette is a huge goat cheese fan, and I’ve come to expect the little Ziploc container of goat cheese in our fridge, which she dips into every night. When we went to Toscanini for ice cream, she went immediately for the brownie and goat cheese flavor. It was fairly mild, with the goat cheese barely noticeable, but I’ve intensified the flavors in this recipe. Familiar, yet new.

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Cherry Brownies with Goat Cheese Frosting

Click here for the printer-friendly recipe.
Yields: 16 servings | Brownie batter adapted from Alice Medrich’s Cocoa Brownies

Ingredients
For the Brownie Batter 
10 tablespoons butter, cubed
¾ cup plus 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 cup granulated sugar
½ teaspoon instant coffee
2 eggs, cold
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup all-purpose flour
1 cup pitted and quartered cherries

For the Goat Cheese Frosting
4 ounces goat cheese, at room temperature
4 tablespoon butter, at room temperature
2 tablespoons honey, or to taste

Directions 

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
2. Place the butter, cocoa powder, sugar, and instant coffee in a large microwavable bowl.
3. Microwave until the butter is completely melted, stopping every 30 seconds to give it a stir. The mixture will be very thick.
4. Stir for about a minute to cool the batter slightly, then beat in the eggs one at a time. Beat the mixture until it is smooth and shiny.
5. Mix in the flour and salt, and then fold in the cherries. 
6. Spoon the batter into a greased 8x8 inch pan or a 9-inch circular pan. Bake for about 25 minutes, until the center is barely set. (When you insert a toothpick into the center, it won’t come out clean; you want it to be thickly coated with moist crumbs).
7. Let the brownies cool completely.
8. Whisk together all the ingredients for the frosting until light and fluffy. Spread over the brownies.
9. Cut into small squares or very thin slices. 

Banana Bread Muffins

When in possession of overripe bananas, what does one do? Make banana bread muffins, of course! These are probably my favorite kinds of muffins. If any of you are familiar with the jumbo sized banana chocolate chip muffins that can be found at Costco, you would know how delicious they are. In fact, I'm obsessed with them. I love bringing one of those with me to munch on during my walk to class in the mornings, and I was so sad when my stash inevitably ran out. That meant that I could either make a run to Costco to restock, which would take at least 2 hours round trip...Or I could make some Banana Bread Muffins myself.

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The great thing about this recipe is that it can be made without dirtying a single dish. Seriously. Check out Yammie's Noshery for the instructions that tell you how to do just that. I made these muffins using the good old bowl and spatula, because I don't particularly mind cleaning up after a recipe as simple as this one which hardly involves any dishes at all in the first place.

In terms of flavor, these muffins definitely have that going for them. Super moist and flavorful, with just the right amount of sweetness. Add a sprinkling of chocolate chips -- or not. Either way, it tastes great.

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It's a light treat, something yummy to munch on as a snack or if you're like me, a great way to start off the day. Enjoy!

Cheers,
Monica

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Banana Bread Muffins

Adapted slightly from Yammie's Noshery   |   Yield: 10 - 12 muffins   |   Time: 45 minutes

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Ingredients

2-3 very ripe bananas
2 eggs
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

For the Glaze: (Optional)
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 tablespoon milk or lemon juice

OR

For the Chocolate Glaze: (Optional)
1/4 cup chocolate chips, melted
2 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions
Preheat oven to 375ºF. Combine bananas, eggs, and sugar. Then add flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, and cinnamon. Finally, add the oil and vanilla. Pour the mixture into the lined muffin wells and bake for 18 - 20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

To make the glaze, just combine the glaze ingredients and spread over cooled muffins. Serve & enjoy!

Cheesecake with Dulce de Leche Cortada

This summer I've been working at the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and it's been quite educational: I've learned a lot about small business in America, immigration reform, energy policy, and how to use Microsoft Outlook (I still haven't figured out why so many people still use this rather outdated system). I have a better understanding of why I believe in the social justice causes I'm involved with at school (i.e. why I don't agree with said energy policy), went to the July 4th naturalization ceremony at the White House, and watched more soccer in the past three weeks than the rest of my life combined.

I also learned about dulce de leche cortada. One of my fellow interns, Cynthia Florentino, used to live in the Dominican Republic; she said she used to make this when the milk would go bad because the power would go out. I was a little skeptical at first (she described it as being "kind of like couscous") but further Google-ing revealed that it was a thicker, custard-y version of normal dulce de leche. The milk is separated into curds and whey while it is being cooked with sugar (either by letting it go bad or adding an acid to it), yielding a more textured dulce de leche with an extra tang.

There's a lot of confusion about dulce de leche without adding this new strain, and in particular, its relation to caramel. So after some more Google-ing, I've put together the following illustration:

There actually is a difference between caramel and dulce de leche, at least on a chemical level.

Caramelizationrefers exclusively to the browning of the sugar. When making caramel, the sugar is browned and then the dairy is added. When making dulce de leche, the sugar and milk are cooked together. This means that the sugar caramelizes, but there's also an additional browning reaction with the milk. The proteins and sugar in the milk go through Maillard reactions, which is the same reaction that turns your steak brown and gives it that flavor. This gives dulce de leche a depth of flavor from cooking the milk, hence the common complaint from dulce de leche fans that caramel is just burnt sugar. (Speaking of dulce de leche fans...)

I paired the dulce de leche cortada with cheesecake; its slight tang pairs well with the tartness of the cheesecake, and its texture complements the smooth creaminess. The goat cheese gives the cheesecake an extra bit of flavor.

While the recipe involves standing over the stove for an hour to make the dulce de leche, this cheesecake is definitely worth it. Crank up the air conditioning and give it a try!

-Caroline

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Cheesecake with Dulce de Leche Cortada

Click here for the printable recipe | Yields: 1 9-inch cheesecake

Ingredients
For the Dulce de Leche Cortada
6 cups whole milk 
1 ½ cups granulated sugar
⅓ cup lime juice
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt

For the Cheesecake Crust
1 ½ cups graham cracker crumbs
¼ cup butter, melted
½ teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the Cheesecake
24 ounces ounces (3 packs) cream cheese, softened
4 ounces goat cheese, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
3 eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions 
For the Dulce de Leche Cortada
In a large pot, mix together the milk, sugar, lime juice, and cinnamon.

Cook the mixture over low heat, stirring every few minutes. The milk will quickly curdle; this is normal. After an hour of cooking, stir in the salt.

Cook the milk for about 60 to 90 minutes, or until most of the water has evaporated and the milk curds have turned a light brown color. It should be thick but pourable.

For the Cheesecake
Preheat the oven to 325 F. Make the crust. Mix together the graham cracker crumbs, butter, cinnamon, salt and vanilla extract. Press the mixture into a greased 9-inch round springform pan.

Whisk together the cream cheese and goat cheese until smooth. Whisk in the sugar.

Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Whisk in the vanilla extract.

Pour about ⅓ of the cheesecake batter on top the crust. Dot the top of the batter with spoonfuls of the dulce de leche cortada (using about ¼ cup). Use a toothpick to swirl the dulce de leche. Repeat two more times with remaining batter and dulce de leche.

Bake the cheesecake for 50 - 60 minutes, or until the center of the cheesecake is barely set, but still slightly jiggly. Turn off the oven, crack open the door, and let the cheesecake sit in the oven for another 15 minutes. Let cool completely, then refrigerate overnight.

Notes
If the dulce de leche cortada is too hard or thick to swirl into the cheesecake, let it cool completely, then add ½ cup milk and reheat, stirring until it is smooth.