Week 16: The Grapefruit Sorbet Diet

We went to the cape this weekend so i needed something easy to make. This definitely fit the bill. I found bottled fresh grapefruit juice in the produce section. It was much less expensive than buying the amount of fruit I would have needed to get 8 cups of juice. This recipe is nice because it has brown sugar. I cut down on the sugar because I thought the granita was way too sweet. It is sort of healthy, the fruit is good for you as it is low in calories, brown sugar is better than processed white sugar, and the small amount of vodka, we can call that an antiseptic. I think the vodka makes the mixture not freeze too much so that it is still soft. This is a very pretty sorbet. It's light and refreshing. The whole point of the grapefruit diet is that when you eat or drink grapefruit with a meal the enzymes in the grapefruit act with the protein your eating to make you feel more full. It seems like a pretty weird diet, but aren't they all. If I was going to join the cult of grapefruit dieters, I would have sorbet instead :)

Week 15: Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Heaven

I love peanut butter in pretty much anything. So it goes without saying that I was going to love this from the start. I liked that it had bits of mini chocolate chips in it. The chocolate gives it some depth of flavor but the chip size isn't an overpowering texture. I strayed away from the original recipe a bit. Instead of making a vanilla based ice cream with gobs of peanut butter, I opted for a peanut butter base. I had made peanut butter ice cream once before with a different recipe. That one didn't have eggs nor did it require heating or refrigeration prior to mixing. It was very easy but still tasted amazing. Although this tastes amazing and much like peanut butter mousse, I think the taste isn't that different from the other (easier and faster) peanut butter ice cream. That recipe was in the book that came with the maker. I tried other recipes from that book and they weren't as good as that one. Finding good recipes is half the battle. If I didn't have this book I would be scouring the Internet for recipes that may not have been tested. I will say this: most of the duds I have made were due to my lack of following the directions correctly. She is very exact and I am not. I use the cooking method to ice cream making (a little of this a little of that) while she the baking method (measuring everything!) Some recipes have worked out in my favor. Others not. This one was on my side. I made it how I wanted to and it worked. Deliciously!

There is a really cute blog out there called the chocolate peanut butter gallery. So if you love this combo check it out!


This ice cream was Anne's choice. She loves peanut butter as much as I do, perhaps even more! Let's hope she loves it!

Week 14: Orange Granita

Its ironic that this recipe is in an ice cream book because it A) isn't ice cream, B) its not really even sorbet, and what puzzles me more as to why its there is that C) it didn't even require use of the ice cream maker. Although it may not fit the reasons that one might include it in an ice cream book, it is icy and sweet. For your history lesson...what is granita?

The orange juice is slightly tart while the added sugar makes it sweet. The fact that it is frozen and then scraped over and over gives it a fluffy airy quality that sorbet just doesn't have. This is a great summer dessert. Its a very adaptable recipe too. You could pretty much use any juice and cut down the amount of sugar depending on the sweetness of the juice you use or how healthy you want to make it. I took a trip to Stew Leonard's and got their fresh squeezed orange juice. Sorry guys I didn't slave all day squeezing oranges! But I think this juice was just as good. It tasted real to me, anyway. For those of you who try it, I'd like your thoughts. 

On a side note I was at the Brimfield Antique show and tried orlimonade - we laughed at our pronunciation it but it had orange, lemon and lime juices blended together with sugar and water. It was awesome! On a hot day like Friday it was perfect! I need to learn how to make it. It might actually make a great granita...ooohhh.

Make this one, its easy, doesn't require fancy equipment, and tastes refreshingly good.

4 cups orange juice (or any juice), 1 cup sugar, pour into a shallow dish, put in freezer, and every fifteen minutes or so scrape with a fork until fully frozen and fluffy. Eat and enjoy! 

Week 13: Graham Central Station

Lucky Number 13! I first tried ice cream with graham crackers at our local J. Foster called Graham Central Station. I've been in love with it ever since and I get it most times I go there. I think this version is just as good. This is a very special day because I got to make this weeks choice with my friend Brie. She bought me the book that started this blog going so it was nice to finally get her in the kitchen to make something.When she gave me the book she picked this as a flavor she most wanted to try, so its perfect that she was willing to be my assistant today.

So Graham Cracker Malted Vanilla.came together like most other vanilla based ice creams however this one has real vanilla bean instead of vanilla extract. We made 2 double batches because I knew that this one will be a hit. I bought cinnamon graham crackers and honey graham crackers. In her batch we mixed the two, in mine I used just cinnamon. It didn't make a huge amount of difference in the flavor, so use what you like. The crunchy texture of the crackers is nice when they were freshly added in, but when I tried it again a few hours later the crackers had softened and they melted in your mouth. They became more a part of the ice cream itself than just seeming like a add in. The malt adds a nice earthy flavor. Its definitely a much stronger flavor in a malted milk ball than it is here but its still there. Malted milk is actually malted barley, wheat flour, and whole milk evaporated into powder form. It doesn't smell very good in the container but when mixed with enough sugar it doesn't taste how it smells, thankfully. 

There is just the right amount of sweetness to this. The flavors work perfectly together. I don't think I would change a thing about this one.

Thanks again to Brie for helping make this one. It took a long time but it was worth it! Hopefully I can get her back to make something else (that's less time consuming).