I Scream For, Well, You Know....

My favorite foods are the ones that are the worst for me: bread and ice cream. Good bread only please--you can keep your supermarket white. But I kinda like all ice cream, even the stuff with carageenan and polysorbate-80. (Mmmm...Baskin-Robbins Jamoca Almond Fudge!) Sadly, not only is ice cream a bunch of empty calories with a ton of sugar, it's also made with milk and cream. And no, I'm not a vegan...I am severely lactose intolerant. 

It came upon me suddenly last year. One day I could consume dairy products with no problem. The next, well, let's just say shit happened. And now the really great (I think) recipes for dairy ice cream here on Minxeats will need to be recreated in a non-dairy format. In the meantime, please enjoy them as is. Some early recipes include eggs, but after discovering Jeni's secret I now choose to dirty a couple more small bowls in order to avoid the potential disaster of scrambled eggs in my custard. (Egg drop ice cream isn't a thing.) 

Does anyone have suggestions for dairy substitutes in ice cream? Of course coconut milk is always an option, but the taste of coconut might not work for more delicate flavors like chamomile tea. I've tried some non-dairy ice creams, and while some are good, others don't quite hit the mark. Van Leeuwen's can be a bit dense, particularly when eaten side by side with a dairy flavor. (I know--I shouldn't do that.)

On with the show.

Apple Pie Ice Cream even has crust pieces in it!

Apricot Cardamom Pistachio Ice Cream So many great flavors together!

Cardamom Carrot Ice Cream is my favorite Indian dessert, gajar ka halwa, in ice cream form.

Chamomile Honey Tea Gelato Will it surprise you when I say this is my all-time favorite ice cream? (Technically, it's a gelato.) It's infused with a very specific brand of now-discontinued tea bag, and I might have enough of them left to make another batch. One can use regular chamomile tea, as long as it's of high quality. It won't have the honey flavor, but a drizzle over the top, sundae-style, will get you close. Celestial Seasonings, Twinings, and Bigelow make chamomile honey tea with vanilla that might also work, as long as the vanilla isn't too obvious. If you find another honey chamomile tea out there, please LMK about it.

Cracker Toffee Ice Cream This ice cream is also infused with tea and includes the crunchy delight of cracker toffee bits. If you don't want to make the toffee, just throw in handfuls of Heath bar bits, which will be different but still delicious.

Key Lime Pie Ice Cream Everyone's favorite dessert, in ice cream form. Or just make the pie. lol

Meyer Lemon Poppyseed Ice Cream Please make sure your poppy seeds are fresh! The little buggers get rancid quickly, and rancid poppy seeds will ruin your day. And your ice cream.

Oomame Chile Crisp Ice Cream Some people put chile crisp on vanilla ice cream. I put it in ice cream. I thought it was super delicious, but Mr Minx was not convinced. No problem. More for me! (I ate the entire quart, apart from a couple tablespoons.)

Pudgy Partner Ice Cream  This is my version of Ben & Jerry's Chubby Hubby. Tasted at least as good, maybe better. 

Sour Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream Sweet cherries are fine, but I prefer sour cherries. Pitting them is a pain in the butt though.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Chamomile Honey Tea Gelato

Over the past few years, we've been hearing about the puzzling mass die-off of honey bees. Studies show that 85% of all plants are due to pollinators--like honey bees--so this is an issue that should concern everyone. The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation has instituted special programs to address this issue and have recently entered into a charitable partnership with The Republic of Tea. Their new Biodynamic Chamomile Honey Tea, available exclusively at Whole Foods throughout the Mid-Atlantic, was created to bring attention to this issue. The company was kind enough to send us a can to sample.

The chamomile in this tea, as with other The Republic of Tea chamomile varieties, comes from a small biodynamic farm at the base of the Italian alps, and is highly fragrant. In this particular tea, the flower is infused with a delicate but noticeable honey flavor, and it makes a terrific hot or iced beverage. While sipping it (iced), I thought it would make a lovely ice cream. Indeed, at the Fancy Food Show last summer I had tasted a chamomile tea ice cream that knocked my socks off.

So, after a fruitless search for my own ice cream maker (likely tossed in a fit of pique, as my kitchen is too small to hold such unitasking appliances), I borrowed one from a gracious friend and set to work. Because chamomile is a rather delicate flavor, I thought gelato, made with whole milk rather than tons of heavy cream, would be a better way to show off the flavor of this tea. And it was. The flavor of the chamomile is subtle, but the honey is quite pronounced. There is no vanilla in it at all, but Mr Minx thought there was. It's really very delicious, on its own or scooped over a piece of pound cake. It'd also be dynamite served with a fruit crisp or crumble.

Chamomile Honey Tea Gelato

2 cups whole milk
¾ cup sugar
6 The Republic of Tea Chamomile Honey Tea bags
5 egg yolks
1 cup heavy cream

Put the milk and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring until the sugar melts. Add the teabags and continue to heat the milk just until tiny bubbles appear around the edges. Remove the pot from the heat and allow the tea to steep for at least one hour. Remove the tea bags from the milk, gently squeezing them dry.

Whisk the egg yolks in a large bowl. Reheat the milk until steaming. Using a ladle, dribble some of the hot milk into the eggs in a thin stream, whisking constantly. After about half the milk has been whisked in, pour the egg and milk mixture back into the pot with the remaining milk. Cook over medium-low heat until thick enough to coat a spoon, whisking all the while.

Strain the custard and stir in the heavy cream. Refrigerate until cold.

Freeze the cold custard in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Gelato has less air than ice cream, so keep it in the machine only until it starts to hold its shape. Once the consistency is like somewhat melted ice cream, scoop it into a covered container and freeze until firm.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Fancy Food Show Summer 2015 - Tea

The Summer Fancy Food Show has come and gone and I'm just getting around to writing about it. :) But the summer has been busy with other stuff, and it's always a good idea to cogitate on things before putting them on paper. Or in this case, online.

Judging by the many tea products I sampled, tea is trending. Here are a few products that I really enjoyed.

Kombucha is a tea-based product that some find hard to drink. Granted, fermented tea does have a lot in common with vinegar, and for the most part, the non-hipsters among us don't go around drinking vinegar. I think kombucha is quite palatable, but it all depends on the flavor. Ginger works really well to mask the fermented taste, for example. What really works to hide the whole kombucha-ness of the stuff is to add fizzy water and sweetener and turn it into soda. Live Soda company does just that in flavors like rhubarb and rootbeer that are actually very tasty. And because the company is based in Texas, they also make a flavor called Pure Doctor that mimics Texas' own Dr Pepper quite nicely. There's just a bit of tangy afterburn with each sip, but it goes down like a refreshing soda. Unlike soda, Live Kombucha Soda has probiotics (Lactobacillus and Saccharomyces boulardii), electrolytes, b-vitamins, and antioxidants.

I also had a rose flavored chai tea latte by Bolani that was scrumptious. It was sweet and creamy, with chai spices and also a fairly heavy hit of rosewater. Not enough to be perfumy, but it was definitely there. It was like drinking liquefied Turkish delight, which, if you're like me, you'd be totally into. They also do black tea, plain green tea, and a mint green tea that can be consumed straight from the package, or warmed up.

Numi Teas has come out with a line of organic, fair trade teas made with turmeric, a spice with anti-inflammatory properties. They also have four new "Indulgent" teas flavored with chocolate. The turmeric teas are on the unusual side, but the chocolate flavored ones are quite a treat. I like to drink them warm, with milk and sugar.

My favorite tea product of the show also involves milk and sugar. Tea-rrific Ice Cream, out of Connecticut, is a line of tea-infused ice creams in six flavors: Ginger Matcha, London Mist (Early Grey with vanilla), Masala Chai, Chamomile, Chunky London Mist (with chocolate and pecans), and Lavender Blueberry. The ice creams are made with hormone-free cream, cage-free eggs, and evaporated cane juice infused with high quality teas, like chamomile from Egypt. I don't even like chamomile tea (nor did any of the people I spoke to at the Tea-rrific booth), but the chamomile ice cream, with its distinct honey notes, was my favorite of the bunch. Honestly, they were all excellent. In fact, Tea-rrific Ice Creams were my favorite product at the whole show. And considering how many things I tried, that's saying a lot.



Posted on Minxeats.com.