Snickers and Brownie Ice Cream

I hate waste.With that in mind, I decided to repurpose the remaining Snickers Cheesecake Brownie in some ice cream. This is what happens when you bake like crazy and family and friends start telling you they will only take small samples for taste testing.

Yes, it’s true. I’m now forbidden, or at least until bikini season ends to bring over full dessert trays. I’ve been told sugar and butter can have an expanding effect on peoples body when consumed in high amounts. I say don’t believe the hype.

As for the Snicker’s Ice Cream-big hit! It’s rich, it’s creamy and you will look good eating it.

A few notes:

• The base of this ice cream is vanilla. But since the brownies were fudgy they turned the ice cream base to chocolate (no complaints here on that one).
• This is a highly adaptable recipe, so I’ve provided a basic vanilla ice cream recipe. If you would like to use the Snickers Cheesecake Brownie as your add-in, the recipe is here. Otherwise add-in what suits your palate or what you have on hand. Suggestions: Oreos, chopped up Reeses Peanut Butter, left over mixed berry pie or any pie.
• You can cut the richness and calories by changing the cream and milk portion from 2-1 to 1-1, as in 1½ cup heavy cream and 1½ cup milk.
• If you don’t have an ice cream maker, place the finished custard in the freezer for two hours; remove it from the freezer and beat it with a hand mixer or with the paddle attachment of a stand mixer on low. Repeat this two more time. Transfer to a tightly sealed container and freeze until firm.
• As for the two different pictures – more practices in photography. I queried my Facebook readers to see what they thought about the first initial shot (pic here) and I had mixed responses. My favorite one, someone mentioned the ice cream sandwiches looked like they were stuffed with tuna. Ouch! Not good. There were also quite a few responses that the picture was too dark. They were right, I didn’t mind the dark lighting but the ice cream was blown out and looked unappetizing.

I re-did the shot without the ice cream sandwiches, but that had more to do with not having any on hand. The end result was not being able to decide between the white and blue background, so again, I queried everyone. The winner from those who were kind of enough to give me their input was for the white background.

I have to say my choice is for the blue I like the lighting and the composition better. But I also tend to like darker shots, which of course is a bigger challenge for me than bright or bright white shots. I’d love to hear what you think. Let me know in the comments section of this post which picture you like best.

Basic Vanilla Ice Cream

Ingredients:

• 2 cups cream, divided use
• 1 cup milk
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 5 large egg yolks
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup add-in

Instructions:

1. Create an ice bath by filling a large roasting pan or casserole dish with ice water halfway up. Pour 1 cup of cream into a medium size bowl and place the bowl into the ice bath and place a strainer on top of the bowl. Set aside.

2. Add remaining 1 cup of cream, milk, sugar and salt into a saucepan over medium heat. Stir mixture until sugar dissolves and tiny bubbles appear around the edge of the pan, about 3-4 minutes. Set aside to cool slightly.

3. Whisk the egg yolks in a bowl then pour heated (slightly cooled) cream mixture onto the egg yolks and whisk constantly to prevent curdling. Place the combined egg and cream mixture to a saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly until the custard thickens (it should be thick enough to coat the back of a spatula and hold a line drawn through it) and temperature on an instant read thermometer reads 175 degrees F. Remove pan from heat and strain custard into the cold cream in the ice bath. Stir custard mixture to below 70 degrees over ice bath.

4. Transfer custard to refrigerator to chill for at least 4 hours or overnight. Remove from refrigerator and transfer to your ice cream maker and churn according to manufacturer’s instructions.

What’s up with retailers selling scarves and sweaters right now?  I don’t want my season fast forwarded. You know what happens when time accelerates quickly?  Things get droopy, saggy and become wide in all the wrong places too fast, too soon.

See how unattractive all that is? Please. I beg you, don’t support the fast-forwarding season by buying your fashion 3 months in advance.

Let’s enjoy summer for just a few more weeks. To help keep you in summer mode I’m offering White Sangria Popsicles.

Hit the jump to Endless Simmer for the recipe.

Mudslide Ice Cream Cake

My summer so far has been consumed by boozy cocktail popsicles, but guess what is elbowing its way into the boozy frozen treat affair? Yep, ice cream, Baby!

I have to admit, while I love churning out ice cream—photographing it . . . yeah, not so much. It melts way too fast (much faster than popsicles) and I seem to have a complete block when it comes to styling it. This is probably why after 208 posts and a year and a half after I started this blog I only have four ice cream recipes. But guess what? I kind of hate to be beat by anything, and refuse to let my craptastic photography skills get the better of me, especially for something I love and love to make. So I churned and churned and now I have a freezer full of boozy ice cream waiting to get stylie for some shots.

. . . Stay tuned because the next one has whiskey in it! For now hit the jump over to Endless Simmer for the full post and recipe write up on this Mudslide Ice Cream Cake.

Tropical Fruit Punch Popsicles

Let’s face it— sweat sucks, especially if it’s oozing from you while at rest. I don’t mind if it comes on like a hot shower when my muscles are burning during a workout, but sweating while idle is like cruel and unusual punishment.

Hit the jump on over to Simple Bites for the  recipe.  I’m honored and happy to be posting these Tropical Fruit Punch Popsicles for my friend Aimee. If you haven’t been there before, leave yourself sometime and look around at the wonderful recipes and tips and tricks for meal planning, more cost efficient food spending, working with seasonal ingredients and much more.

Churro Ice Cream

How do you get the cinnamon and sugar taste of those beloved Churro sticks found at a state fair or amusement park without actually deep frying Churros and chopping them up for a final churn? You make a Churro crumb by combining yellow cake mix with a cinnamon and sugar streusel, then add it in  during the last churning stage. The little bit of dry cake mix gives it all the needed flavor, too much and you will have cake batter flavored ice cream.

A few notes:

• Have two sauce pans ready during the custard making part. This helps to cool down the Step 4 prior to moving on to the egg addition of the custard stage. This will help to prevent the eggs from curdling.
• Whatever you do, don’t get distracted or multi-task once the eggs are added. You will need to keep stirring the eggs, or they will begin to curdle faster than you can say, NOOOOO!
• Plan ahead. Some ice cream recipes like this one require a fully cooked custard due to the eggs. You will also need to cool the cooked custard for at least four hours before adding it to an ice cream maker to churn.

Churro Ice Cream

Makes 1 Quart

Ingredients:

Churro Mix:

• 1 cup flour
• ¾ cup sugar
• ¼ cup light brown sugar
• ¼ cup yellow cake mix, dry
• 11/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 11 tablespoons of butter. cold

Ice Cream:

• 2 cups cream, divided use
• 1 cup milk
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 1 ½ cup churro crumb
• Pinch of slat
• 3  cinnamon sticks
• 5 large egg yolks
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Instructions:

To make the Churro mix:

1. 1. In a stand mixer bowl fitted with a paddle attachment, combine and mix flour, sugar, light brown sugar, cake mix and cinnamon. Add cold butter and mix on low until mixture is crumbly.

To make the ice cream:

1. Add 1 cup of cream, milk, sugar and salt into a saucepan of medium heat. Stir mixture until sugar dissolves and tiny bubbles appear around the edge of the pan, about 3-4 minutes. Add in cinnamon sticks and vanilla extract and stir to combine. Cover the pan and let aromatics steep for 1 hour. Steep longer for a stronger flavor.
2. Create an ice bath by filling a large roasting pan or casserole dish with ice water half way up. Pour remaining cup of cream into a medium size bowl and place the bowl into the ice bath and place a strainer on top of the bowl. Whisk the egg yolks in a bowl; set aside.
3. Reheat the steeping cream mixture over medium high heat until bubbles form along the edge once more, about 1-2 minutes. Pour reheated mixture into a new suace pan and set aside for 3 minutes to cool. Pour reheated (cooled slightly) cream mixture into the egg yolks and whisk constantly to prevent curdling. Place the combined egg and reheated cream mixture to a saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly until the custard thickens (it should be thick enough to coat the back of a spatula and hold a line drawn through it) and temperature on an instant read thermometer reads 175 degrees F. Remove pan from heat and strain custard into the cold cream in the ice bath. Stir custard mixture to below 70 degrees over ice bath.
4. Transfer custard to refrigerator to chill for at least 4 hours or overnight. Remove from refrigerator and transfer to your ice cream maker and churn according to manufacturer’s instructions. Add churro crumb during the last 5 minutes of churning. Transfer churned ice cream to an airtight container and freeze for at least 4 hours or overnight.

Cantaloupe and Kiwi Daiquiri

Another week, another cocktail on a stick. This time around I’m getting topsy-turvy with some rum. Hit the jump to Endless Simmer for the full post  with recipe.

Chocolate Chip Vanilla Ice Cream Pies-

Time to put some baking convention on pause. See the crust on that ice cream pie, that’s not your standard graham cracker crust. In fact it’s a chocolate chip cookie crust, but that’s not the pause I’m talking about. That chocolate chip cookie crust is made with no butter!

Seriously, if things haven’t gone weird enough by turning a cookie into a pie crust, I also went and took out the most important part of cookie making: butter.

But if you are a regular reader, you know I’ve done this before with my Caramel Crème Cookies in which I replaced the butter with caramel sauce. It’s actually not all that unique. In fact all I did was change out the fat ratio. In this case I traded the butter for the ice cream.

The result. . . . Hello, tender chocolate chip cookie crust, get yourself ready for an ice cream pie!

Um, no I don’t often talk to my baked goods like that. But I’m so excited at the endless possibilities this recipe provides. Imagine the flavor combos? I can’t wait to try a Mint Chip Ice Cream Pie made with a chocolate brownie crust using Häagen-Dazs’s chocolate ice cream and filling it with their Mint Chip ice cream!

As you can tell I had so much fun with this assignment for Häagen-Dazs.  Now that you’ve seen mine, hit the jump here to see what these talented bloggers created with their scoop of Häagen-Dazs. For more recipe inspiration, head on over to the official Häagen-Dazs like no other Facebook and check out the creative uses of ice cream in savory dishes.

A few notes:

• To keep the cookies from rising in the muffin pan, foiled cupcake liners filled with rice were use to weigh down the crust to help keep its shape. Avoid using a paper liner as it is harder to peel away from the baked cookie crust.
• The cookie crust can be made 2 days in advance of final Ice Cream Pie assembly.
• Crust variation: Omit chocolate chips and nuts and replace vanilla ice cream with Häagen-Dazs’s Dulce de Leche or Caramel Cone ice cream for a deep caramel flavor.

Chocolate Chip Vanilla Ice Cream Pies

Chocolate Chip Cookie Crust | Yields 16 Cookie Crusts

Preparation: Heat oven to 350 degrees F and lightly butter each well of a muffin a pan.

Ingredients:

• 21/2 cups of flour
• 2 teaspoons of baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup of vanilla ice cream
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• ½ cup dark brown sugar
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 1 cup of chocolate chips
• 1 cup walnuts or pecans (optional)

Instructions:

1. Sift flour, baking soda and salt; set aside. Cream ice cream and both sugars over medium speed of a stand mixer with a paddle attachment. Add in eggs and vanilla mix to combine. Fold in flour mixture with a wooden spoon or a sturdy spatula until just combined. Fold in chocolate chips and nuts (optional) until combined.

2. For easy handling, place dough in refrigerator for an hour. Place approximately 2 tablespoons of dough in the each well and pat dough to an ¼ inch in thickness around the walls and bottom of well. Place lightly buttered foil cupcake liner on top and slightly press down into cookie dough. Fill cupcake liner with dry rice or beans. Bake for about 10-12 minutes. Remove pan and cool in pan for 5-7 minutes. Lift cookie crust out of wells and pour rice out. Gently remove foil liners and let cookie crusts cool completely.

To assemble Chocolate Chip Vanilla Ice Cream Pies:

1. Fill cooled cookie crusts with desired Häagen-Dazs ice cream flavor. Drizzle chocolate and caramel sauce on top.

Strawberry Icebox Cake

Rounding out this week’s 4th of July dessert group is this simple  and delicious dessert that you can throw together in less than  thirty minutes. Icebox cakes are about as easy as it gets; sculpt, chill, serve and enjoy the compliments.

A few notes:

• To simplify this icebox cake further I used Cool Whip instead of making my own whipped cream.
• For the flavor I used fresh strawberries and pureed them, but any type of berry or fruit will work.
• For ease of layering, I used a pastry bag to pipe the strawberry whipped cream layer.
• This can be assembled two days in advance (up to the point prior to frosting) and kept tightly wrapped in plastic.

Strawberry Icebox Cake

Makes an 8X8-inch cake | Preparation: Line an 8×8-inch cake pan with plastic wrap overlapping all the sides by at least one  inch all around.

Ingredients:

• 6 cups (16oz. container) of Cool Whip, divided use
• 2 cups pureed strawberries (about 4-5 cups of whole strawberries)
• 12 graham crackers

Instructions:

1. Place 4 cups of Cool Whip in a bowl and gently fold in the pureed strawberries.
2. Place graham crackers on bottom of cake pan. Pipe approximately one and a half cups of strawberry/Cool Whip mixture on top. Use a spatula to smooth out the whipped cream surface. Continue layering, by alternating graham crackers and whipped cream until the cake is completed. Move the cake to the freezer and chill for at least 30mins.
3. Remove the cake from freezer and cut in half. Stack the cut portions one on top of another for a tall, narrow cake. Alternately, keep the cake as originally assembled for a 8×8-inch square cake. Finish by frosting the cake with the remaining two cups of Cool Whip.

4th of July Cocktail Cooler Popsicle

Okay, so not my best work in terms of visual execution on the red, white and blue striping (ahem – purple, red, and pink?)  but failed coloring aside, the flavor is spot on for this Fourth of July popsicle enhanced with a bit of Happy Hour for an adult treat. To keep this kid friendly, just omit the alcohol and fun for all can be had on a stick!  And what isn’t more fun on a stick?

Hit the jump over to Endless Simmer for my recipe write-up on this week’s cocktail popsicle.

2011 Ice Cream Cupcake Contest Entries

After drooling over sixty entries and inspired by all the creativity, I’m burning to churn and bake my own dynamic duo to fold into a cupcake liner. I’m sure you will be too so hit the jump here to take a look at all the entries.

But since this is a contest, I had to select my top three picks. My criteria was based on flavor and creativity, keeping in mind that each entry had to contain both cake and ice cream. My picks will be used with the other judges picks to narrow down the selections to one grand prize winner that will be announced at the end of the month.

Here’s are my top picks (in no particular order) :

Smores Cupcake_52 Kitchen Adventures

S’mores Cupcake Ice Cream Sandwiches, by Stephanie of 52 Kitchen Adventures. This is such a unique and creative way to work in graham cracker beyond the cursory dusting I so often see on other S’mores  cupcakes.

Texas Cake Batter Cookie Dough Ice Cream Cupcakes by A Cooking Addiction.

Texas Cake Batter Cookie Dough Ice Cream Cupcakes by Teresa of A Cooking Addiction. Great concept from start to finish. The edible chocolate wrapper—love it; and instead of coming across as too busy, I like the way the all flavors are stacked one on top of another.

Honey Hazelnut Cupcake with Gianduja Gelato by Vivian Macaron

Honey Hazelnut Cupcake with Gianduja Gelato by Vivian of Vivian Macaron. I love the use of gelato vs. ice cream as the backdrop for the Gianduja flavor. The denser,  creamier texture  of gelato couples nicely with the cake and provides a good balance to the strong Gianduja taste.

Tequila Sunrise Cupcakes by Nonesuch Exists

BBQ Banana by What Fay Did Next

And because narrowing it down to just three was so difficult, I have to mention two runners-up. Tequila Sunrise by Kerry of Nonesuch Exists. This one is like a cocktail, ice  cream cupcake with its orange tequila cake and pomegranate ice cream and frosting. BBQ Banana by Fay of What Fay Did Next. Love the simple inspiration behind the creation of this banana cake and caramelized banana ice cream with white chocolate ganache.  And as if that wasn’t enough, the topper is a marshmallow frosting.