Brown Sugar and Spiced Banana Ice Cream

I like experimenting with bold and interesting flavor combinations in all kinds of food, and doing so with ice cream sounded great to me. I received a review copy of Spice Dreams which is the second book from Sara Engram and Katie Luber about making good use of your spice rack. This book is devoted to ice creams, sorbets, and frozen yogurts made with sometimes adventurous flavor combinations. There are options like honey-mint ice cream with thyme and basil, chile-lemongrass ice cream, white chocolate-allspice ice cream, and chocolate ice cream with cumin and fennel. In the sorbet chapter, pink grapefruit-tarragon sorbet and chile-orange-chocolate sorbet both grabbed my attention. There are also suggestions for frozen sandwiches and sundaes like cardamom snickerdoodle ice cream sandwiches and peach waffle sundaes with cinnamon syrup. Last, there’s a chapter for sauces, syrups, and toppings to further gild the lily. Whipped cream with dried lemon zest is one I'll have to try. I flipped through the ice cream pages calling out options, and Kurt’s pick was brown sugar and spiced banana. I thought it was a great choice, and I readied the ice cream maker.

All of the ice cream and sorbet recipes in this book are written to make one to one and a half quarts. This one made one and a half. For that amount, only one banana was needed, and I thought there would have been at least two for some reason. The one banana was pureed with some milk, and then that mixture was added to more milk, brown sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, and salt in a saucepan. That was scalded and then used to temper four egg yolks. Eggs and the milk mixture went back into the saucepan and were heated until the custard was thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. I always strain custards just in case there’s any unappetizing cooked egg in there, and then it was chilled in an ice water bath. Once cool, it was refrigerated for a few hours before being churned into rich and nicely flavored ice cream.

My first instinct was to caramelize some sugar on top of banana slices and serve the ice cream on top. Or, I thought a drizzle of caramel sauce might be nice over a big scoop. Wrong and wrong. This ice cream brings plenty to the palate just as it is. The one banana in the custard gave it lovely fruity flavor, and the warm flavors of the spices would have been muddied by caramel. I did slice a fresh banana and sat pieces in the cups as garnish, but anything more heavy-handed than that would have been out of place here. This is one to enjoy just as is or maybe in a cone, and now I wish I had some cones and more of this ice cream.

Sara Kate Gillingham-Ryan, What Are You Reading?

Sara Kate Gillingham-Ryan is the founding editor of Apartment Therapy’s TheKitchn.com and writes the weekly email dispatch. She’s also the author of one of my favorite baking books The Greyston Bakery Cookbook. In addition to writing the monthly cookbook review column for House Beautiful, she also does freelance recipe development and other writing projects. Her new book about cooking for a crowd will be published in spring of 2011. I knew Sara Kate would have an interesting answer when I asked what are you reading?

Sara Kate:
New Yorker - I recently signed up again. I don't pressure myself to read the whole thing. Just a taste here and there. It's a great way to read pretty reliably good writers and as a writer, I need to keep that kind of inspiration in my reading life.

Spoon Fed by Kim Severson - I'm not done yet. It's a very entertaining and also heart-wrenching account of the life, so far, of a writer I really admire. I'm going to finish it at the beach this weekend.

Serve it Forth by MFK Fisher - I'll admit this if my first time reading this classic, Fisher's first book. It takes you to another place, one filled with perfumed Parisian morsels and Roman pies. It's next to the bed and I find I can pick it up and just have little nibbles.

On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee - I keep this around and browse through it now and then, to try to give myself the sense that I can re-live my failed high school career of science in a realm for which I care more deeply, that of the kitchen.

Four Season Harvest by Eliot Coleman - I'm a gardener and trying to figure out how to get more food out of my garden. As a cook, my passion for feeding people isn't confined to what goes on in the kitchen or at the dining table. I like growing the stuff too.






Thank you for participating, Sara Kate! Check back to see who answers the question next time and what other books are recommended.

Previous WAYR posts:
Jaden Hair
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Monica Bhide
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Sara Roahen
Andrea Nguyen
David Lebovitz
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Deborah Madison
Soup Peddler

Tamarind Chicken

I somehow managed to take what was supposed to have been a quick and simple stir fry and turn it into a two-day preparation. This meal is from the book Modern Spice, and the focus of this book is on updated, doable dishes that bring forth the great flavors of Indian cuisine without extreme effort. And, I completely ruined that concept when I went and made my own chutney. After calling around town in an attempt to locate prepared tamarind-date chutney, I learned it was available at one market. When I arrived at that market, there were several other chutneys from various brands and some wonderful, natural, preservative-free options. However, there was only one brand of tamarind-date chutney, and it was not so free of preservatives. A quick online search led me to a simple recipe for making my own, and so instead of purchasing a jar, I bought jaggery, tamarind paste, and dates. I exaggerated a bit when I said I stretched this into a two-day process because making the chutney takes about 15 minutes total, and the stir fry comes together in not much longer. I just made the chutney in advance so the meal itself would be an especially quick one. I’m happy to have my homemade chutney and plenty of it because it’s also used in recipes for peanut tikkis, tamarind-glazed honey shrimp, catfish curry, and the tamarita which is a tamarind-flavored margarita.

You can use brown sugar instead of jaggery, but since I was going to the trouble of making a homemade chutney, I wanted it to have the flavor of jaggery. That flavor is like molasses with a hint of smokiness. I bought enough that I can use some for cookies, and I can’t wait to taste them. Chunks of jaggery are very firm, and the best way to make them usable is to whack them with a hammer. I put a big chunk in a plastic bag, covered that with a towel so the plastic wouldn’t rip, and gave it a few wollops. It crumbled into a powdery pile after just a couple of hits. The jaggery was combined with pitted dates and water in a saucepan, and that was simmered for about eight minutes. Tamarind paste was added, it was blended until smooth, and then it went back into the saucepan with hot chile powder, ground ginger, garam masala, and salt. It simmered again until thick, and then I refrigerated it until the next day. Making the stir fry was as simple as can be. Chicken was cut into cubes, serrano chiles were halved, garlic was sliced, and shallots were chopped. The shallots, chiles, and garlic cooked for a bit in vegetable oil, and then the chicken was added. Once the chicken was cooked through, turmeric, red chile flakes, and salt were added, followed by the tamarind-date chutney. All the while, basmati rice was cooking.

I sliced a piece of serrano to use as garnish, but I should mention that those slices were not needed for any added spice. The halved serranos that cooked in the oil along with the red chile flakes gave the dish a very good level of heat which I enjoyed. The chutney was a nice, sweet, sour counterpoint to that heat giving the dish exciting, varied flavor. This is a meal that will be repeated often, and next time I’ll think to mix up some tamaritas while the rice starts cooking.