Purple Passion

Dear Foodies,

Purple Passion

After a lot of brainstorming that yielded nothing but weird combos, I thought I would have to pass the Monthly Mingle this month :O And then when we went grocery shopping I picked up a pack of blueberries and blackberries just cause there were on sale and I absolutely love them :) My roomie and I then went through the ice cream aisle hunting for inspiration :) And just as casually as ever she suggested a blueberry ice cream, hmmm.... Now, all of you would have guessed it the moment I told you I bought the berries but for some reason the two did not link themselves for me :))


But one thing on our mind was that we did not find a blueberry ice-cream in the frozen foods aisle, there was strawberry and raspberry but no blueberry ! Was that a dreadful flavor for an ice cream ?? I came home and did some blog search and found this post ! The pic was a winner and the recipe really simple too. I added some chocolate powder for some added flavor.

I used the recipe that you will find here as a guide. I definitely made a few additions and subtractions to it. I used Half n Half instead of the whipping cream just cos I had some with me. My roomie is not a huge fan of berries and I was not sure if she would like an ice cream with that flavor and so I added some chocolate flavor. The fact that I love chocolate has nothing to do with this addition :P

Ingredients:

• 3/4 pint blueberries
• 1/2 pint blackberries
• 1+ cup powdered sugar, adjust to taste
• 1/2 cup Water
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 Tbsp Cocoa powder ( I used Hershey's)
• 2 1/2 cups - Half n Half or Heavy whipping cream
• 1 Tbsp - Corn starch
  

Method: Using a hand blender and not an ice cream maker

1. For the blueberry syrup: Bring the water to a rolling boil and add half a cup of sugar and the berries. Simmer this for a few minutes until the berries start to pop and the whole mixture thickens. Turn off the heat and let it cool down. Blend it to a puree and filter to extract the thick syrup.
2. For the cream base:In another pot boil the cream and reduce it a little. Then add some corn starch mixed with a spoon of cold water and add to the cream and allow it to boil one last time till the cream thickens. Add the rest of the sugar, turn off the heat and allow to cool.
3. For the Ice cream: Now all that is left is getting all these together. In a plastic container that you wish to freeze the ice cream pour the cream. Add the vanilla extract and chocolate powder and blend well. Add the blueberry syrup, little at a time and continue to blend. Taste and add more sugar & syrup as needed.
4. Freeze theice cream mixture and blend every 30 mins for the first 2 hrs before allowing to set.
5. Serve with some fresh berries or honey.

I was scared that the blueberry flavor would be strong to everyone's liking and added a little too much chocolate powder (4 Tbsp) and that overpowered the flavor of the berries. I loved the color of the ice cream, its a nice gorgeous purple. This ice cream was similar in texture to the Mango Ice cream I made. I am guessing it is because of the water added in the form of the syrup. But it was a really nice flavor and I am going to skip the cocoa powder when I make this one again, not that I did not like the chocolate flavor (!!) but to see how the blueberry flavor alone turns out.
Go ahead and try this combo or any other that captures your mood, it is sure to be a hit :)

Here goes my ice cream to Meeta for her lovely MM- Scream for Ice cream, See you all there :)

Dulce de Leche ...

Happy Birthday Meeta !

Dear foodies,

Dulce deLecious !

This is the recipe for the most sinfully good ice cream. From the moment I got the first taste of Haagen Daaz Dulce de Leche, I was hooked. All my frnds here were hooked, we have bought sooo many boxes of it and none lat for more than a day or two. If you have not yet tasted this flavor yet, I urge each one of you to go find it ASAP !! It has a smooth caramely taste to it and as you can see in the picture on their site, it has twirls of caramel in it too. As if it were a treasure hunt, we would dig out all those pieces of caramel the moment the box was opened. Once I got the hand blender and knew I could make ice cream with its help, I just had to try making dulce de leche at home. And I must confide with you guys that I think I have come up with a perfect recipe for it. Yayyyyyy

The nuts are only for the contrast in the pic, the ice cream needs no such embellishments :P

Now such a delectable dessert is a perfect present for an even more gorgeous person. A very Happy Birthday to you Meeta ! It is wonderful to have known you through your blog. Your warmth, your passion for food, photography and life with all its varied colors comes through to us by your posts. You have surely raised every day food to the level of an art form ! The love and thoughtfulness with which you treat each dish inspires me to treat it the very same way in my kitchen too (and I must add it is a tough thing to do ;)). I have learnt a lot from your recipes or more so from your method of cooking, to keep it simple, accenting a few main flavors to bring out the beauty in a dish and also to be extremely daring at the same time ;). The next step now is to get hold of a good cam so I can seek your tutelage in that area too :)

When I had dulce de leche for the first time I was reminded of the taste of theratipaal or kalakhand, the flavor of milk reduced to more than 1/4th its volume. I was curious to see how it was made and did a google search. And the most common method seemed to be the most weird and craziest way ever. The can of condensed milk was to be punched with a hole and then immersed in water and set to boil for about 1-2hrs. I am not sure if I understood what they said. How can u pierce it and immerse it in water and still make sure it does not ooze out ! There was also a warning about chances of the cans exploding, now how much more crazier could it get. All that needed to be done according to me was cooking the condensed milk with indirect heat. I am not patient enough to set it on a double boiler and baby sit it for hours, so I choose the easier way out and used the oven instead. The result was an amazing caramel and I had to hold my self from eating it by the spoonfuls so I could save some for the ice cream :P. All of you just have to try this ice cream. And have you tried eating the plain sweetened condensed milk ?? I guess I have to change the recipe to 1 1/2 cans only ...:))

Ingredients:
Equipment needed:

• Ice cream maker or Hand Blender & plastic container big enough to store the ice cream
• Pyrex dish & a larger Baking pan to hold the pyrex dish (I used a 8" x8" x2" pyrex & 11" x 7" x 2" rectangular pan)
• Sauce pan to boil the cream in and a wooden spatula.

For the dulce de leche you need:

• 2 cans - Sweetened Condensed milk (14 oz each) at room temp
  

For the ice cream:

• 1 pack - Half & half, ( I used the traditional one) (32 oz, I think)
• 1 1/2 Tbsp - Corn starch (corn flour)
  
• Sugar as per taste (I used about 5-6 tsp)

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 375deg C.
   
2. Empty the two cans of condensed milk into the pyrex dish. Fill 3/4th of the larger baking pan with water and place the pyrex dish in it. Place these very carefully into the oven. I placed them on the upper most rack.
3. Bake for about 40-50 mins stirring with a wooden spatula every 10-15 mins. The cream colored condensed milk will turn into a nice brown caramel color.
   
4. Meanwhile empty the half & half into a saucepan and bring it to a boil.Stir some cold water/cream/milk into the corn starch and add it to the cream in the saucepan. Simmer for a little while till it starts to thicken. Turn off the heat and allow it to cool.
5. Once the condensed milk is cooked turn off the heat in the oven. The water in the baking pan if going to be boiling hot so be extremely careful while moving the pans. I left the oven door ajar for abt 20mins and waited till the temperature of the pans was comfortable enough to handle. Very carefully remove the baking pans out of the oven. Do use oven mits at every stage.
6. After both these mixtures cool down a little (luke warm), bring them together in a plastic container and blend for a few minutes. Taste the mixture and add sugar if required.(Transfer to the Ice-cream maker and follow the manufacturers instructions at this stage)
   
7. Place the ice cream in the freezer and blend it in intervals of 30-45 mins for about 3 hrs before allowing it to set.

The ice cream was absolutely delicious, it tasted exactly like the store bought one, or infact better than the store bought one....I urge each one of you to try it, no matter how small a batch !! Like I said, the original has twirls of caramel in it, which is the best part of the ice cream, but this one has that flavor all through....in every little bite or lick or slurp :) This ensured that none of us had to fight to get all the caramel bites in our spoonfuls, but could peacefully enjoy our bowlfuls :D Another thing with this ice cream is that it came out perfectly creamy unlike the mango ice cream that was more of a sorbet. From the tips I got in the comments section of the Mango ice cream post, I decided to boil the cream and milk and also thicken it a little to help build the creaminess. I hope I have convinced you all to try this one, even if I you are not convinced do make it and then you will be charmed for life !! ( I hope this one did it ;))

Meeta, this bowl is for you, I would have wanted to do some thing filled with chocolate but this one is definitely comparable :D I can't wait to see this months MM-Big Birthday Bang round-up..I can already see so many yummy dishes on their way there in the blogosphere :)

JFI...here I come with my jack fruit

Dear Foodies,

The Jack sitting on a dollop of ...hmm..what was the flavor ??

Mini tarts filled with the Jack

Bee and Jai came up with this wonderful plan of getting all us foodies to get back and savor the fruit that has so easily and silently slipped away from our memories. And did they succeed. Every day I have been seeing a minimum of one post of the fruit. A few have been really serious about it and managed to hunt for the real fresh fruit and the rest of us have made our peace with the canned ones.

When I opened my can of jack fruit I could think of no better way of eating but just as is !! But well that would not get me an entry into the event, nope ! I had seen a show on Food Network where Paula Deen topped key lime cookies with a cream cheese mix and baked them. It was a new thing to know that cream cheese could be baked. I had some ricotta cheese in my fridge that I knew would spoil if I did not use it up soon. And I had to use my hand blender you see. So I blended some ricotta cheese and cream cheese with a few flavorings to come up with this recipe. I added some oven roasted peaches and jack fruit ( I had to do something with it ! :D) and the result was yummy just like a mini cheese cake. I think the addition of eggs would have made this a perfect cheese cake.

Ingredients:

For the filling

• 4 Tbsp - Cream cheese

• 6 Tbsp - Ricotta cheese

• 1 tsp - Vanilla essence

• 2 tsps - Lemon zest

• Sugar as per taste

for the base and filler fruits

• 4 Tbsp - Cream cheese

• 6 Graham crackers

• 1 Tbsp - Butter

• 3 nos - Jack fruit & Peaches (washed)
  

• A couple of Strawberries

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to about 375deg C. Line a baking pan with aluminum foil. Place the cream cheese and ricotta cheese out of the refrigerator to bring them to room temperature.
   
2. Half the peaches and remove the pits. Line the jack fruit and peach halves on the pan and place them in the oven for about 20 mins or till you can see the juices in the peach bubbling.
3. Also wrap the graham crackers in the aluminum foil and place them in the oven for a few minutes. This makes the butter in them to melt and makes them soft and easy to crumble. This way I could skip pulling the blender out of the cabinet ! Well you could also just wrap them in tissues and pound them to your hearts content with a rolling pin :D Which ever suits you fine, just have them coarsely powdered.
4. Line a muffin pan with muffin cups and spray with some cooking oil spray. If you are patient enough use melted butter.
5. Fill the muffin cups with the crumbled crackers and press down with the bottom of a cup. Place them in the freezer for a few minutes to set.

6. Take a deep dish and place the cream cheese in it and blend using a hand blender until smooth. Next add the ricotta cheese and blend for a few more minutes until smooth and creamy.
   
7. Add the lemon zest, vanilla essence, sugar and mix well. This will be a thick mixture which looks like whipped cream brought to soft peak consistency, but a lot more dense.

8. Once the fruits are roasted and cooled, dice them up, even the fresh strawberries.
   
9. Slice a tiny piece of butter on each of the muffin cups and then spoon the cream cheese mix. Add a spoon of the diced fruits next and then top it off with more of the cream cheese mix.
   

10. You can go ahead and fill up all the cups to the brim as they will raise a little initially but will eventually fall in at the center forming a crater.

11. Place this in an oven pre-heated to 350deg C and bake for about 20 mins or until you notice the craters and a slight browning. I placed the them on broil for the last min to get an even brown on the top.


12. You can either serve them warm or chilled for an hour. I filled the crater with some mango ice-cream before serving :), you could also use some whipped cream or honey or maple syrup or....Ssshhhh

These were really good and paired with the mango ice cream, it was fantastic. My friends and I just loved them. They really matched a cheese cake in flavor and the fruits inside were a neat little surprise. I filled each cup with a different combo of the three fruits. The roasted jack fruit was really yummy. It gave a nice bite to the otherwise smooth tart. The lemon zest was the main flavoring in the cheese mix and it brought a lot of freshness to the tarts. I loved the robust flavor they gave the filling and will surely be using them more. The graham cracker base was a perfect complement to the vary textures in the filling. Do try it out with your own choice of flavorings and fruit fillings. But make sure you have enough fun :)

What do you do with extra fruit, have it with mango ice-cream ofcourse :D

I am going to send one of these out to Bee n Jai for hosting JFI this month. I can't thank them enough for getting me to buy Jack fruit here. Thank you :P and hey a final Thank you to Indira for coming up with this event in the first place :)

I Screammmm for Mangoes

Dear Foodies,

Do you want to scream too ??

Summer is here finally, atleast I hope so !! The weather here has been marching all over the place bringing rain and chilly weather just about any time of the day :-( The last few days have been good though with the Sun visiting us and my kitchen has a new entrant too...a neat little gadget I have been waiting to own. I got finally got a hand blender, and it was gifted to me by my buddy who plainly got tired of me asking for it every single time we went out shopping !! :-) I have been searching my brain for recipes that I could use it in :D. I made my best cake ever, a pineapple-upside down vanilla cake over the weekend. Yesterday I set out making my first Ice Cream :-) Yayyy !! Being a true Indian, whose heart starts to ache for Mangoes just as soon as the Sun peeps out in the summer, the flavor of the ice cream was decided ! I cannot find any fresh ripe mangoes at the stores here and so resorted to the Mango pulp I get from the Indian stores. The Ice-cream was so utterly simple to put together.

I had googled for recipes before starting out and found that there are version with and without eggs. The one's with eggs needed the milk, cream and egg mixture to be cooked a little by simmering them together. All this is then cooled and put into a ice-cream maker. For the egg-less version you just need to bring all your ingredients together in a bowl and then continue to make your ice-cream.Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups - Whole milk
• 2 1/2 cups - Heavy cream
• 1 tin - Mango pulp (~ 30 oz)
• 2 tsp - Vanilla essence
• 10 spoons of sugar or adjust as per your preference
• 1 tsp - Salt
  
• 2 tsp - Lemon juice

Blend all of this together in a bowl. If you have a Ice-cream maker, then I guess you can just follow the manufacturer's instructions. I used a huge plastic container and blended all the ingredients for a few minutes and placed the box in the freezer. I got it out every hour or so and blended it again for a few minutes before sending it back into the freezer. I did this about 3 times before I left it to set one last time. How much more difficult could the instructions get !! :-)

I tore the mint used for garnish and had it with the Ice-cream and loved the mix of flavors

The Ice-cream was delicious, and perfect for every single 'back from the Sun' trip to the freezer. The ice-cream did not have the creamy texture, but tasted more like a sorbet, with a light crunch from the ice that had formed. If any you guys have tips to get the creamy texture of ice-cream it would really help me in my future attempts. Is there something else I can do or is it the eggs that lend the creaminess to the ice-creams ??

This is the last picture, I promise :D

This bowl is off to Deepa of Recipes n More for the AFAM-Mango event , I hope she excuses me for delaying it by a day, and another scoop is off to Padmaja for the WBB-Summer fruits event. Aaah ! feels so good to be sending entries to events after a loooong time :D