ICE CREAM!!

I admit it, I love ice cream. My all time favorite is from back in Cincy, an amazing place called Graeter's. Their double chocolate chip flavor could inspire me to commit mayhem, chips bigger than a silver dollar. It is available at Krogers, and now Earth Fare, but at 5 bucks a pint its pricey (but WORTH IT!!) I decided to make my own ice cream, and even better sorbet. About 4 years ago my mom and I bought a Cuisinart Fro-Yo, Ice Cream and Sorbet maker. Pop the cylinder in the freezer over night, blend up our brew and freeze away. It takes about 30 minutes in the machine, then another hour in the freezer for solid consistancy. Mangia!!

Fruit Sorbets

The easiest things you can make in this gizmo.

1 quart berries of any kind
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup corn syrup
4 tbsp lemon or lime juice

Bring sugar and water to a low boil to dissolve sugar. Add corn syrup. Allow to cool.
Blend strawberries and juice until pureed. Pour through a fine mesh strainer or cheesecloth.
Combine strawberry puree and simple syrup. Chill for 1 hour. Pour into ice cream machine according to directions. Freeze for 30 minutes until soft serve in texture. Freeze for 1-2 hours until firm. 

That's the basic. I went on  to do many more types of sorbet, keeping to the basic proportions. Some winners were Lemon Basil*, Blackberry Mint, Watermelon Mint, Lemon Thyme* and Mango.
For the Lemon (or other juice based sorbets) the recipe is a little different.
2 cups water
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups lemon juice
1 tbsp lemon zest

Make the simple syrup, cool. Combine with citrus juice and herbs, add to ice cream maker.
Note for the herbs: You can choose to finely chop the herbs and leave them in the sorbet, or leave them whole and steep the flavors in the fridge for an hour then remove before freezing.

Now for the fun stuff!!

Orange Sherbet (this was a request)
Combine 3 cups whole milk with 1 can frozen OJ concentrate, thawed. Add 2 tbsp sugar. Blend until smooth. Freeze as usual.
Can be made with all flavors of frozen drink concentrates. Adjust sugar to taste.

Decadent Chocolate Ice Cream (and I do mean decadent)

1 1/2 cups whole milk
1 1/3 cups heavy cream
1 vanilla bean, split and scraped
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup cocoa
2 large eggs
1 egg yolk
1 tsp vanilla
8 oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped fine (I used Hershey's Special Dark bars)

In a saucepan combine milk and cream along with the vanilla bean. Simmer over low heat for 30 minutes. Remove vanilla bean.

Combine the sugar, cocoa, eggs and egg yolk in a bowl. Measure out 1 cup of hot milk and stir into bowl at a rapid pace. You may use a hand mixture for this process (known as tempering). Stir the chopped chocolate into the remaining milk and stir until totally melted. Stir in egg mixture and cook slowly, stirring constantly, until mixture resembles a pudding consistancy. Pour into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Make sure plastic is touching the surface of the mixture. Refrigerate until cold, then add to ice cream machine.

Vanilla can be made using this same recipe, just omit the cocoa and chopped chocolate. Another variation is to add chopped peppermint candies to the mix while it is in the ice cream maker. Add 1/2 tsp peppermint extract to the milk mixture.