As you may have read from my post on Friday, I scored some beautiful black raspberries at the Lancaster Central Market with the intention of making them into my favorite ice cream flavor, black raspberry, naturally.

They sat in my fridge calling out each time I opened the door “ice cream!” and I finally got around to making the ice cream base on Sunday afternoon. I left the base sit overnight in the refrigerator to chill thoroughly and churned it today when I got home from work.

I found a few recipes on other blogs and websites and in the end choose to create the raspberry puree according to a few recipes’ recommendations and create a basic custard style base according to the vanilla bean recipe that I have successfully execute a few times, now.

For the raspberry puree, I began by washing all the berries and allowing them to drain. Next, I put all the berries into a blender and pureed all of them into a liquid. Strain the berries through a fine mesh strainer. You’ll need to use a spoon to push all the liquid through and it will take a few minutes. Once you’re finished, all the seeds should be left over and your puree will look like this:

While you’re making the puree, heat the milk, cream, half the sugar and a pinch on salt over medium-low heat just until boiling. In a separate bowl, using an electric mixer, mix the other half of the sugar and egg yolks until light yellow in color and thick.

Once the milk mixture is hot, stir 1/3 of it into the egg yolk mixture. Once combined add another 1/3 of the milk mixture and combine and then pour the whole thing back into the saucepan with the remaining 1/3 of milk mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon for a few minutes over low heat until the mixture thickens slightly, coating the back of the spoon.

Once thickened, remove the mixture from the heat. Strain into a medium sized bowl through a fine mesh strainer. Stir in all the rasberry puree an mix well. Chill on an ice bath until cold and place in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours or overnight. The next day it should look something like this:

Pour into your countertop ice cream machine and mix for 20 minutes until thick.

Mine did not get as thick as I wanted it to and began to leak down the sides because I mixed too much at once. Next time, I’ll mix it in two batches so I can achieve a thicker consistency. I placed the ice cream back into the freezer for a few hours and came back to this:

 It tasted fresh and delicious; better than anything from the freezer section at the grocery store. I think I could have used less berries though, the color was darker than I’m used to. I used 1 quart of berries, next time I’m going to try reducing how many berries I use to get a more “normal” berry color/flavor. I may pick up some more berries this week…You can never have too much ice cream, and it keeps so long in the freezer!

Here is the recipe a combination from me and from Cuisinart:

Custard Style Black Raspberry Ice Cream

Ingredients

1 quart black rasperries
2 cups whole milk
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup sugar, divided
pinch of salt
4  large egg yolks

Preparation

1. Puree the raspberries in a blender until smooth. Push through a fine mesh strainer or a food mill to take out off of the seeds. Set aside.

2. In a medium saucepan set over medium low heat, whisk together the milk, cream, half the sugar and salt. Bring the mixture just to boil.

3. While the milk/cream mixture is heating, combine the yolks and remaining sugar in a mediu bowl. Using a hand mixer on low speed or a whisk, beat until mixture is pale and thick.

4. Once the milk/cream mixture has come to a slight boil, whisk about 1/3 of the hot mixture into the yolk/sugar mixture. Add another 1/3 of the mixture, then return the combined mixture to the saucepan. Using a wooden spoon, stir the mixture constantly over low heat until it thickens slightly and coats the back of the spoon. This mixture must NOT boil or the yolks will overcook – the process should only take a few minutes.

5. Pour the mixture through a fine mesh strainer, stir in the black raspberry puree and bring to room temperature over an ice bath. Cover and refrigerate 4 hours or overnight.

6. Turn on the Cuisinart ice cream maker; pour the mixture into the frozen freezer bowl and let mix until thickened, about 20 minutes. The ice cream will have a soft, creamy texture. If a firmer consistency is desired, transfer the ice cream to an air tight container and place in freezer for about two hours. Remove from freezer about 15 minutes before serving.

As strawberry season comes to an end and cherry season begins, I bought one last batch of strawberries to use for dessert. Initially, I found a recipe by Barefoot Contessa on Foodnetwork.com for strawberry rhubarb crisp but couldn’t find any rhubarb at the store so I modified it to strawbery and blackberry crisp. The great thing about crisps is that you can pretty much use any kind of fruit that you want.

A crisp is a mixture of fruit that is topped with a crumb topping usually containting butter, brown sugar and oats. This recipe called for orange juice and orange rind which I thought would be a nice compliment to the strawberry and a flavor I had never thought to use in a crisp before.

Start by hulling and slicing the strawberries and wash the blackberries. Mix the fruit with the sugar and orange zest.

Whisk the cornstarch and orange juice together until the cornstarch is completely dissolved.

Pour it over the fruit and set aside while mixing up the topping.

Use chilled butter straight from the fridge buuret cut it up into cubes. Mix the topping in an elecrtic mixer with the paddle attachment. Combine the flour, sugar, brown sugar, oats and salt in the mixer bowl and then with the paddle on the slowest speed, slowly add the butter until the mixture is granular and looks crumbly. Keep an eye on it, it will mix quickly; I left mine on too long, mixed it too much and it turned into more of a dough. It still tastes great, but is harder to sprinkle evenly on the top of the fruit.

Once the topping is ready, place the fruit in a large baking dish or small individual size ramkins and top evenly with the topping mixture.

Place the baking dish(s) on a baking sheet to catch any juices that bubble over and protect the bottom of your oven.

Bake for one hour at 350 degrees until the fruit is bubbling and the top is golden brown. Serve warm with vanilla ice cream. Crisp is best served the day it is made, if it sits over night the crisp will get soggy. I forgot to take an after picture so here is the one from the recipe on Foodnetwork.com.

I loved the orange addition but might use less of the orange juice next time, it was very runny.

Here is the recipe from Foodnetwork.com: 

Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

Ingredients

I can remember the very first pie I ever made. I was in Home Economics class in the 11th grade and my teacher told us we could make any kind of fruit pie we chose. My dad has always been crazy about blueberries and so I chose the blueberry pie. Turns out, that was a great choice because blueberries are one of the easiest fruit pies to make; blueberries require no prep work, they don’t have to be cut or seeded, they’re pretty much wash and use. Anyway, I learned to roll out pie crust from scratch and how to flute edges so they looked pretty. I made the decision during that class that I wanted to be a great pie maker.

Growing up my mother was a cake and cookie baker (perhaps that’s where I get my love of all things cake) but she always told me that when it came to pie, her crust never came out right and she ended up tearing it, so having pie at my house was rare and always a special treat. After making my first pie and learning that I could conquer the crust I began making pies all the time. Lucky for me, pie is Eric’s favorite dessert, too so by the time we met, I could win his heart with my cherry pie but I’ll save that story for when I make a cherry pie in a few weeks.

As I mentioned yesterday, it’s strawberry season and there is no better combination that fresh local strawberries, rhubarb and pie crust, along with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and some whipped cream, of course. Yesterday, I walked to Central Market and picked up strawberries and rhubarb.

Strawberries are best when used the day you buy them, as you can see, these are the perfect ripeness.

I pulled a new recipe for this pie from Epicurious.com and it included a pie crust recipe. Typically I use the same crust recipe and know how to execute it well but decided, on a whim, to try this new one. Bad decision. I started all the crust how I start all crust, with the food processor. If you try and make pie crust without one, you’re just asking for trouble. I started using one when I got married (and finally got a food processor) and have been kicking myself ever since for not having one all along. It mixes the crust more evenly and thoroughly and saves lots of time.

The recipe called for chilled butter and shortening, the butter was already in the fridge but I threw the shortening in for about an hour to get it cold. Then I cube it all up and stick it back in the fridge until its ready to use. The key to good pie crust is really cold ingredients.

Fill the food processor with the flour, sugar and salt and turn on for a few seconds to mix it well.

Fill a small cup with ice cubes and cold tap water and set aside to get cold. Then add your cold butter and shortening. Pulse a few times to and mix until it looks crumbly, the size of peas and carrots. Add ice water one tablespoon at a time to wet the mixture (2-3 tbsp should be all you need). You’ll know the dough is ready when it balls up and pulls away from the sides of the processor.

Take the dough out and flour around the sides so it’s not sticky anymore. Form into a large ball and cut in half, wrap each half in plastic wrap and place in the fridge for about half and hour to chill. You can make pie dough a few days in advance and store it in the fridge. If I’m making more than one for an event or dinner party, I usually make the crust up at least a day ahead to save myself some time when its time to make the crust. I’ve also frozen it so I have some “ready to use.” Both methods work well.

While the crust dough was chilling, I washed and chopped up my strawberries, washed and chopped up the rhubarb and added the rest of the ingredients for the filling. I mixed it all up and let it sit until it was ready to go into the pie shell.

The reason I chose to use this new recipe, was because the filling called for brown sugar and cinnamon. I have never tried strawberry rhubarb with brown sugar before and it sounds fantastic. I’m a firm believer that cinnamon is an essential ingredient in most fruit pies and often end up adding it when a recipe doesn’t call for it. Seeing it on this ingredient list was a definite plus.

After the pie crust felt firmer and chilled, I began to roll it out and disaster insued. When I roll out crust I make a base of flour, white sugar and cinnamon. The sugar and cinnamon are something my grandma taught me, the sugar really makes the dough sparkle. Make your base first then place your round of dough on it and top with more flour, sugar and cinnamon.

Start to roll out, don’t press too hard and rotate your dough constantly, adding more flour, sugar and cinnamon continuously. You want to prevent the dough from sticking to your rolling pin and to the counter. At this point, I realized that this pie crust was extremely delicate and softer than I had anticipated. I began to worry that it was not going to turn out well but eventually got it rolled out to here:

As soon as I began to attempt to pick the crust up to place it in the pie dish, the whole thing tore and split apart. I then cursed, punched the dough and tried to salvage it. It was to the point of no return. Then I had to make a decision. Attempt to do this all again with the second half of the dough in the fridge (for the top crust) and throw together a crumb topping? Or make my tried and true crust recipe, just as I had finished washing and cleaning up the entire food processor? I chose the way I knew and mixed up a new bottom crust. I left the second top crust in the fridge, hoping it would get firmer. I knew that I was planning a lattice top for the pie so if it ripped, it wouldn’t be a big deal, I was going to cut it into strips anyway.

I rolled out my new/old crust lickity split, filled my pie dish and fluted the edges. It’s not so pretty, but trust me it was night and day from the previous attempt.

I filled the crust with the strawberry and rhubarb filling and then began attempt #2 at rolling out this new pie crust.

The second attempt was much like the first, disaster. I cut the strips for lattice and they broke and tore about every 2-3 inches. So I ended up throwing all the small pieces on top of the pie in as much of a lattice design as I could manage. I’m not taking this to any parties and it will still taste just as good. Here is my end result:

I brushed the top with a mixture of egg and water and put in the oven at 400 degrees for 20 minutes and then reduced the temperature to 350 degrees and cooked for another hour and 25 minutes. Be sure and place a sheet pan underneath this pie, lots of juice will bubble out and burn on the bottom of your oven, otherwise.

Here is my finished pie:

This is the super close money shot:

You can even see the tiny grains of cinnamon in the crust.

All in all I was pleased with this pie, considering the crust disaster. Why didn’t the crust work? This could have been attributed to many factors. I’m used to using an all butter crust, so the shortening butter combo could have thrown me off and I just wasn’t used to it. It was warm out and perhaps the dough was just too warm and fell apart.  I could have put in too much water, though I used 3 tablespoons of water and the recipe called for 10. Maybe I didn’t use enough flour when rolling it out. Who knows. I read the reviews for the recipe and a lot of people said they used a different crust recipe but those who made this crust had nothing negative to say about it. Pie crust is tricky, sometimes and baking is more of a science than cooking, one wrong move can throw the whole thing off.

The most important thing to me, though is taste and this pie tasted amazing! It’s perfect for a snack, for dessert and even for breakfast with a cup of tea or coffee (it’s got fruit, so it makes for a very healthy breakfast).

Here’s the recipe from Epicurious.com:

For crust

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup chilled solid vegetable shortening, cut into pieces
• 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 10 tablespoons (about) ice water

Make crust:
Combine flour, sugar and salt in processor. Using on/off turns, cut in shortening and butter until coarse meal forms. Blend in enough ice water 2 tablespoons at a time to form moist clumps. Gather dough into ball; cut in half. Flatten each half into disk. Wrap separately in plastic; refrigerate until firm, about 1 hour. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Keep chilled. Let dough soften slightly at room temperature before rolling.)

For filling

• 3 1/2 cups 1/2-inch-thick slices trimmed rhubarb (1 1/2 pounds untrimmed)
• 1 16-ounce container strawberries, hulled, halved (about 3 1/2 cups)
• 1/2 cup (packed) golden brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1 large egg yolk beaten to blend with 1 teaspoon water (for glaze)

Make filling:
Preheat oven to 400°F. Combine first 7 ingredients in large bowl. Toss gently to blend.

Roll out 1 dough disk on floured work surface to 13-inch round. Transfer to 9-inch-diameter flass pie dish. Trim excess dough, leaving 3/4-inch overhang.

Roll out second dough disk on lightly floured surface to 13-inch round. Cut into fourteen 1/2-inch-wide strips. Spoon filling into crust. Arrange 7 dough strips atop filling, spacing evenly. Form lattice by placing remaining dough strips in opposite direction atop filling. Trim ends of dough strips even with overhang of bottom crust. Fold strip ends and overhang under, pressing to seal. Crimp edges decoratively.

Brush glaze over crust. transfer pie to baking sheet. Bake 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350°F. Bake pie until golden and filling thickens, about 1 hour 25 minutes. Transfer pie to rack and cool completely.

It’s strawberry season and given the fact that the novelty of my new ice cream maker has no worn off yet, I wanted to make ice cream with fresh strawberries. I found this recipe for strawberry gelato in Mario Batali’s cook book, Molto Italiano, and immediately wanted to give it a try.

What’s the difference between gelato and ice cream? Here’s a little Wikipedia explanation:

Gelato is different from some ice cream because it has a lower butterfat content. Gelato typically contains 4-8% butterfat, versus 14% for ice cream in the United States. Gelato has a higher sugar content than ice cream. Dairy based gelato contains 16-24% sugar and water and fruit based sorbet contains 24-30% sugar. Most ice cream in the United States contains 12-16% sugar. The sugar content in gelato is precisely balanced with the water content to act as an anti-freeze to prevent the gelato from freezing solid.

I’m was getting together a menu for an all Italian dinner and given the present hot weather, though that strawberry gelato would be the perfect ending to such a meal.

This recipe is very similar to the one I made for vanilla bean ice cream, here. It will take you about 2 days to complete, but the steps are fairly simple. You will use sweetened condensed milk (the one in the can) and dry milk powder. I had never used milk powder before but found it right next to the condensed milk. Unfortunately, they only sold it in a large box.

I guess i’ll be making lots of gelato to use this thing up!

First you whisk together the dry milk powder and some sugar in a small bowl. Put the milk and cream in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, stir in the milk powder/sugar mixture until it dissolves. Slowly bring to a light simmer, be careful not to boil, it will scald the milk.

While the milk/cream is heating up, whisk together the egg yolks and sugar in a separate bowl. Once hot, spoon a cup of the hot milk into the egg yolks and whisk together, then pour it back into the saucepan and stir with a wooden spoon over medium heat until it thickens slightly or reaches 185 degrees F.

Strain the mixture through a mesh strainer into a medium size bowl and put on a ice bath to cool it down.

Once cold, cover and put in the refrigerator over night.

The following day you will begin by prepping the strawberries, haul and cut them all. Sprinkle with 1/4 cup of sugar and 1/4 teaspoon of salt, mix, cover and place in the fridge for 45 minutes. This sweetens the strawberries and the salt pulls out excess water.

After 45 minutes, take out the milk mixture and the  chopped strawberries. Drain the strawberries and place them into the milk mixture. Use an immersion blender or a regular blender to blend the whole thing together well.

Place the mixture in your cold ice cream maker and turn it on for about 20 minutes. The gelato will thicken, but will not be as thick as ice cream.

Place in a container in the freezer for 3 hours or until ready to eat.

The gelato is fresh and not too sweet. There is such a difference without artificial sweeteners or chemicals to preserve it. And the pink color is gorgeous! I served my gelato with chocolate macarons I made the night before. It was an perfect combination!

Here’s the recipe from Mario Batali’s Molto Italiano:

Ingredients

2 tablespoon(s) dry milk, nonfat
1/2 cup(s) sugar
1 1/2 cup(s) milk, whole
1/2 cup(s) heavy cream
4 large egg yolks
14 ounce(s) condensed milk, sweetened
1 pound(s) strawberries, fresh
1/4 teaspoon(s) salt

Preparation

In a small bowl, whisk together dry milk and 2 Tablespoons sugar. Combine milk and heavy cream in a large heavy bottomed saucepan and stir in dry milk mixture. Bring just to a simmer over medium heat, stirring to dissolve sugar.
Meanwhile, in a medium heatproof bowl, whisk together egg yolks and 2 Tablespoons sugar. Slowly whisk in about 1 cup of hot milk mixture, then return mixture to saucepan and stir in condensed milk. Cook over medium heat, stirring
constantly with a heatproof spatula or wooden spoon, until custard registers 185 degrees on an instant read thermometer. Do not let mixture boil
Immediately strain custard through a fine mesh strainer into a heatproof bowl and chill over an ice bath, stirring occasionally, until cool. Cover and refrrigerate at least 6 hours or preferably overnight. Chill ice cream maker parts if necessary.
Combine strawberries, remaining 1/4 cup sugar and salt in a medium bowl. Cover and refrigerate for 45 minutes.
Drain strawberries and combine with custard mixture in a blender (in batches if necessary) and blend well.
Freeze in ice cream maker according to manufacturers directions. Pack gelato into a freezer container and freeze at least 3 hours before serving. Best served the day it is made.