(y)our food choices™

Albeit small but delicious scoops; Orange-Tangerine Gelato and Cardamom Ice Cream, with chopped pistachios and blackberry honey.

With our upcoming trip to Paris, and summer right around the corner, thoughts of ice cream have been popping up for us. Since there was a ½ pint of heavy cream left over from Steve’s ice cream creation and only a few days left until it expired, I needed to come up with another flavor to compliment the delicious cardamom ice cream he made a few days earlier. Scouring our cookbooks and seeing what fresh fruit we had in abundance, I found a delicious gelato recipe from Martha’s Classic cookbook. Although she calls for blood oranges I made ours with a combination of naval and tangerine oranges. The result is reminiscent of eating the Creamsicles of our childhood. The orange goes perfectly with the cardamom. With a few chopped pistachios and a little drizzle of honey, the double scoop makes a simple childhood favorite into a sophisticated palate pleaser.

Orange-Tangerine Gelato

Adapted from The Martha Stewart Living Cookbook; The Original Classics

2 cups milk

zest of 1 orange (use a vegetable peeler and remove only the orange zest, no pith)

1 cup fresh orange/tangerine juice

5 large egg yolks

¾ cup sugar

1 cup heavy cream

In a medium sauce pan, heat milk and orange zest over a gentle simmer. Remove from heat and let the milk seep for 30 minutes. In a small sauce pan gently heat the orange juice and reduce until only about ¼ cup remains, about 30-40 minutes. Allow the orange juice to cool completely.

Prepare an ice bath. Reheat the milk and orange zest. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until thick and pale yellow. Slowly add the milk to the egg yolks while whisking, then return the egg and milk mixture to the sauce pan. Continue to heat and stir with a wooden spoon until slightly thick. The custard should coat the back of the spoon.

Remove from heat and stir in the heavy cream. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve and place the custard on the ice bath. Stir in the orange syrup and allow to completely cool before pouring the custard into an ice cream maker. Process the gelato according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Freeze in a container.

Cardamom Vanilla Bean Ice Cream w/ Pistachios

There are flavors that defy description because they are so unique to a single source and so unlike anything else that it’s virtually impossible to draw a comparison to anything. Cardamom is one of those flavors for me. Any attempt to describe it as tasting like anything else seems futile. I’ve read descriptors like “camphor” and “eucalyptus” and “lemon” and I suppose I can taste the eucalyptus in cardamom. It’s a sweet spice like cinnamon with the cool of mint but it tastes like neither. Cardamom is warm and intensely satisfying in its uses in both sweet and savory dishes. From chai tea to curry, basmati rice to ice cream, cardamom rocks whatever it touches.

Green Cardamom Pods

We had some heavy cream that needed to be used before it went bad and Jason suggested we make ice cream. I love vanilla ice cream but I wanted a little something more. Cardamom came to mind almost immediately. I found a recipe at thespicehouse.com that included both green cardamom pods and a vanilla bean – perfect! With a sprinkle of chopped pistachios, this beautifully flavored ice cream satisfies a craving for the exotic.

Cheers, Steve

Cardamom Ice Cream Recipe

2 cups whole milk or light cream

1 vanilla bean

8 whole green cardamom pods, cracked

¾ cup sugar

4 egg yolks

¾ cup heavy cream

Heat milk or light cream in a saucepan with the cardamom pods and vanilla bean. Bring to a gentle boil. Remove pan from heat and cover, allowing cardamom and vanilla to steep for approximately 20 minutes. Remove cardamom pods, split vanilla bean and scrape seeds into heated milk.

Beat eggs and sugar until pale yellow. Reheat the milk. While continuing to slowly beat the sugar/egg mixture, gradually add about ½ cup of the milk, enough to thin and temper the egg mixture, then scrape the egg mixture back into the milk and heat slowly until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon. Don’t let the custard come to a boil. If it gets too hot too quickly the egg in the mixture will cook into lumps and the custard will “break.” Once the custard has thickened, take the pan off the heat and set the pan into an ice bath and continue stirring until the custard cools.

Beat the remaining heavy cream until just beginning to thicken and fold into the cooled custard. Pour mixture into ice cream maker and freeze following the manufacturer’s instructions. When the ice cream is finished it will look like soft-serve ice cream. Scoop it into a freezer-safe container and freeze for another 2+ hours to allow it to harden before serving. Scoop and enjoy!