Backyard Mint Ice Cream with Dark Chocolate Freckles

My first time making an ice cream based on Jeni's eggless ice cream recipes was this Peppermint Ice Cream with Peppermint Candy and Dark Chocolate.  The idea was a good one, but I wasn't very impressed with the outcome.  It didn't stop me from trying out her other recipes, though, or adapting them, and I can definitely say that I'm a happy convert to her eggless homemade ice cream recipes.

So when Paula gave me that bag of fresh picked mint from her backyard, I knew I wanted to try making Jeni's Backyard Mint Ice Cream.  I've had the fresh mint ice cream from Toscanini's before, so I was pretty sure I knew what to expect:  a slightly more herbal, even grassy, pure mint ice cream.  And I decided I'd try to add some "dark chocolate freckles", which are basically made by streaming melted chocolate into the churning ice cream.  I've kind of shied away from trying this because even though my ice cream maker has it's own condenser (so I don't have to worry about the ice cream base melting while churning), the opening for add-ins is not that easy to access.  This is probably the only complaint I have about my Lello gelato maker.

Backyard Mint Ice Cream with Dark Chocolate Freckles (from Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams at Home)
makes about 1 quart

2 cups whole milk
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon cornstarch
1 ½ ounces (3 tablespoons) cream cheese, softened
1/8 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 ¼ cups heavy cream
2/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
A large handful of fresh mint from your backyard or a farmers' market, leaves roughly torn into small pieces
4 oz. dark chocolate, chopped

Mix about 2 tablespoons of the milk with the cornstarch in a small bowl to make a smooth slurry. Whisk the cream cheese and salt in a medium bowl until smooth. Fill a large bowl with ice and water.

Combine the remaining milk, the cream, sugar, and corn syrup in a 4-quart saucepan, bring to a rolling boil over medium-high heat, and boil for 4 minutes. Remove from the heat, and gradually whisk in the cornstarch slurry.

Bring the mixture back to a boil over medium-high heat and cook, stirring with a heatproof spatula, until slightly thickened, about 1 minute. Remove from heat.

Gradually whisk the hot milk mixture into the cream cheese until smooth. Add the mint. Pour the mixture into a 1-gallon Ziploc freezer bag and submerge the sealed bag in the ice bath. Let stand, adding more ice as necessary, until cold, about 30 minutes.

Refrigerate to steep for 4-12 hours.

Strain out the mint. Pour ice cream base into the frozen canister of your ice cream maker and begin to spin the ice cream.

Meanwhile, melt the chocolate in a double boiler.  Remove from the heat and let cool until tepid but still fluid.

When the ice cream is thick and creamy and almost finished, drizzle the melted chocolate slowly through the opening in the top of the ice cream machine and allow it to solidify and break up in the ice cream for about 2 minutes.

Pack the ice cream into a storage container, press a sheet of parchment directly against the surface, and seal with an airtight lid. Freeze in the coldest part of your freezer until firm, at least 4 hours.

As you can see in the picture above, the chocolate hardens into small, amorphous flecks, but what you can't see is how thin and crispy the chocolate is.  It's exactly like eating an After Eight mint and just as addicting.  It's so good I willfully ignore the pain each bite causes my sensitive teeth.  I may or may not have stood at my kitchen counter, scooping this ice cream straight from the tub into my mouth.  I think it's the first ice cream I've made in a long time that I will finish all by myself!  ^_^

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Happiness Cake

I've been wanting to make this cake ever since I first saw it in the Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook where it's just called a Chocolate Chip Layer Cake.  I think that simple name does not even begin to describe what it is:  mini chocolate chip butter cake layered with passion fruit curd, chocolate cake crumbs, and coffee buttercream frosting.  Hello.  So I decided to rename it Happiness Cake, because this is what happiness is.  =)

The main reason why it took me so long to make this cake is because according to the cookbook, you needed a cake ring and acetate lining to build up the layers.  I wasn't interested in acquiring any more random stuff for my kitchen so I just kept drooling over the recipe but not making it.  At one point I started thinking about making it into a cupcake form, but then I got the bright idea to just put all the layers in small Mason jars, which I already had!  I love that they can be kept in the freezer for a while and are totally portable, so they make really good gifts for friends!

 
There are a lot of different parts to this cake, and some parts take more time than others and need to chill before using or need to use immediately, so this is how I would suggest going about it:

1. Make the cake and put it in the oven to bake.
2. While the cake is baking, make the passion fruit curd and let it chill in the fridge.
3. After the cake is done, let it cool and lower the oven temperature to 300°F.  Make the chocolate crumbs, which will also need to cool after baking.
4. Just before you are ready to assemble everything, start making the coffee frosting.  This will take a while to come together, so you can go ahead and start with the assembly process while you are waiting.

Another note about the coffee frosting, even after mixing in my stand mixer for more than half an hour, I still wasn't getting it to come together, so eventually I just poured out the liquid coffee milk that was left and paddled until everything was homogenous.  Then I found that I needed a lot more of the coffee frosting than the original recipe called for, so in the recipe below, I increased the amount of frosting but decreased the coffee milk to butter ratio a little.

After assembling the 6 jars, you'll end up with a lot of leftover components.  Feel free to make a Happiness Scrap Heap out of them just for yourself or, if you have more jars, you can try making more Happiness Cakes, just without the perfect circles.

 
Happiness Cake (adapted from Momofuku Milk Bar)
makes 6 small (8 oz.) jars with lots of leftover scraps perfect for snacking on

1 recipe Chocolate Chip Cake (below)
1/3 cup passion fruit puree
1 recipe Passion Fruit Curd (below)
1 recipe Chocolate Crumbs (below)
1 recipe Coffee Frosting (below)

Chocolate Chip Cake
makes one 9"x13" cake

1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar, tightly packed
3 eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup canola oil
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups cake flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
Nonstick cooking spray
3/4 cup mini chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Combine the butter and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and cream together on medium-high for 2-3 minutes.  Add eggs and mix on medium-high again for 2-3 minutes.

On low speed, stream in the buttermilk, oil, and vanilla.  Increase the mixer speed to medium-high and paddle for 4-6 minutes, until the mixture is practically white, twice the size of your original fluffy butter-and-sugar mixture, and completely homogenous. 

On very low speed, add the cake flour, baking powder, and salt.  Mix for 45-60 seconds, just until your batter comes together and any remnants of dry ingredients have been incorporated.

 
Spray a 9"x13" pan with nonstick cooking spray and line with a piece of parchment paper.  Using a spatula, spread the cake batter in an even layer in the pan.  Give the bottom of the pan a tap on the counter top to even out the layer.  Sprinkle the chocolate chips evenly over the cake batter.

 
Bake the cake for 30-35 minutes.  At 30 minutes, gently poke the edge of the cake with your finger; the cake should bounce back slightly and the center should no longer be jiggly.  Leave the cake in the oven for an extra 3-5 minutes if it doesn't pass these tests.

 
Take the cake out of the oven and cool on a wire rack, or in a pinch, in the fridge, freezer, or snow (just make sure, you know, it's stopped snowing).  The cooled cake can be stored in the fridge, wrapped in plastic wrap, for up to 5 days.

Passion Fruit Curd
makes about 1 1/2 cups

1/2 cup passion fruit puree
1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon powdered gelatin
3/4 cup butter, very cold
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

Put the passion fruit puree and sugar in a blender and blend until the sugar granules have dissolved.  Add the eggs and blend on low until you have a bright-orange-yellow mixutre.  Transfer the contents of the blender to a medium saucepan.  Clean the blender canister.

Bloom the powdered gelatin in 2 tablespoons of cold water.

Heat the passion fruit mixture over low heat, whisking regularly.  Once it boils, remove it from the stove and transfer it to the blender.  Add the bloomed gelatin, butter, and salt and blend until the mixture is thick, shiny, and super-smooth.

 
Transfer the mixture to a heatproof container and put in the fridge until the curd has cooled completely, at least 30 minutes.  The curd can be refrigerated for up to 1 week; do not freeze.

Chocolate Crumbs
makes about 1 1/4 cup

1/3 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon cornstarch
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
3 tablespoons butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 300°F.

Combine the flour, cornstarch, sugar, cocoa powder, and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and paddle on low speed until mixed.

Add the butter and paddle on low speed until the mixture starts to come together in small clusters.

 
Spread the clusters on a parchment- or Silpat-lined baking sheet.  Bake for 20 minutes, breaking them up occasionally.   The crumbs should still be slightly moist to the touch at that point; they will dry and harden as they cool.

Let the crumbs cool completely before using.  Stored in an airtight container, they will keep fresh for 1 week at room temperature or 1 month in the fridge or freezer.

Coffee Frosting
makes about 2 cups

1 cup butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/3 cup milk
1 1/2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Combine the butter and confectioners' sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and cream together on medium-high for 2-3 minutes, until fluffy and pale yellow.

Meanwhile, make a quick coffee milk:  whisk together the milk, instant espresso powder, and salt in a small bowl.

 
On low speed, gradually stream in the coffee milk.  You are essentially forcing liquid into fat, so be patient.  The butter mixture will clump up and separate upon contact with the coffee milk. 

 
Do not stream more coffee milk into the butter mixture until the previous addition is fully incorporated; keep the mixer on and remain patient.  The result will be a wildly fluffy coffee frosting, pale brown, and super-shiny.  Use immediately.
 
Happiness Cake in a Jar Assembly

 
Using an empty jar as a cookie cutter, cut out 12 circles from the chocolate chip cake.  (Yes, there are 13 circles cut out above.  I had to eat one.  For science.)

 
Press one circle into the bottom of a jar.  Brush with a generous amount of passion fruit puree.

 
Spoon in a layer of the passion fruit curd.  Top with a layer of the chocolate crumbs.

 
Carefully spread a layer of the coffee frosting on top.

 
Repeat with another layer of cake, passion fruit puree, passion fruit curd, and chocolate crumbs.

 
Finish with a final layer of coffee frosting.

 
Repeat with the remaining 5 jars.  Cover and place in the freezer for at least 12 hours to set the cake and filling.  The cakes will keep in the freezer for up to 2 weeks.  Defrost in the fridge for at least 3 hours before serving.

 
Dig in with a spoon and experience happiness.

Four years ago:  Panna Cotta, Take 2; The Feng Family Secret Peking Duck Recipe; Korean Pancake Face Off

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Pains au Chocolat (Chocolate Croissants)

When I went to France last summer, I vowed to eat a pain au chocolat every morning.  Think buttery, rich croissant dough wrapped around smooth, dark chocolate.  It's sweet, but not too sweet, so it's possible to eat one a day with an espresso.  And if it's made right, it's flaky and shatters when you bite into it, unlike the sad, soft versions I usually find here in the States.  Sure, you'll probably make a mess eating it, but it's sooo worth it.

While I did not succeed in my goal, I can at least say that now I've made my own, and nothing beats a freshly baked pain au chocolat.  For this recipe you'll need croissant dough and chocolate baking sticks.  I sourced mine from King Arthur Flour, but if you wanted, I bet you could just carefully line up some semi-sweet chocolate chips instead.

 
Pains au Chocolat (adapted from Bouchon Bakery)
makes 10

1/2 recipe croissant dough, thawed but still cold
20 chocolate baking sticks
1 egg, beaten and strained (I like to thin this out a little with 1 teaspoon of water)

Spray a baking sheet with nonstick cooking spray and line with parchment paper.

Lightly flour the work surface.  Roll the dough out to a rectangle about 19 x 9 inches.  Trim to a 17 ½ x 8 inch rectangle.  Cut the dough in half lengthwise, then cut each half into five 4 x 3 ½ inch rectangles.

 

Set a chocolate baking stick ½ inch up from the bottom of each rectangle.  Turn the bottom edge up and over to cover the baking stick.  Set a second baking stick close to the folded dough.

 

Brush the top of the dough with the egg wash, roll the dough over the second stick, and continue to roll, finishing with the seam on the bottom.  Set on the baking sheet.  Repeat with the remaining 9 pieces of dough, spacing them evenly on the baking sheet.*

 
Brush the pains au chocolat with egg wash.  Cover the pans with plastic tubs or cardboard boxes and let proof for about 2 hours.

 
Preheat the oven to 350°F.

 
Brush the pains au chocolat again with egg wash.  Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, rotating the baking sheet once halfway through baking and separating the pains if they are touching, until the tops are a rich golden brown and no portions, particularly between the layers, look undercooked.  Set the baking sheet on a rack and cool completely.

 
*At this point I froze some of the shaped pains.  The night before I wanted to eat them, I took them out of the freezer and let them thaw and proof at room temperature overnight.  In the morning I brushed them with egg wash before baking as instructed above. 

Three years ago:  Sweet Potatoe Gnocchi with Maple Cinnamon Sage Brown Butter
Four years ago:  Scallion Pancakes

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Pretzel Ice Cream Pie with Homemade Magic Shell

Can you handle one more pie from Momofuku Milk Bar?  Because I think I've done the impossible:  I've improved a recipe from the Momofuku Milk Bar.  Yeah, I know, right?

This Pretzel Ice Cream Pie is pretty similar to the Cereal Milk Ice Cream Pie except that, you guessed it, you substitute the cornflakes for pretzels.  This time I actually followed the Preztel Ice Cream recipe from the Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook because I had all the ingredients, and the best part is, it didn't use any eggs.  Instead, it thickens the ice cream base with gelatin.

The only thing is, after tasting the ice cream, it tasted a little too salty for me.  Now I'm all for salty sweet combos, but this was just a little too much.  But then I thought, what if I added some chocolate, like chocolate covered pretzels?  (It's kind of funny because chocolate covered pretzels were my first introduction to salty sweet snacks, and now I add salt to almost every sweet, even chocolate ice cream!)

I remembered that an easy recipe for homemade Magic Shell, that liquid chocolate sauce you pour on top of ice cream which hardens into a "magic shell", had made it's way around the internets a while back and thought it would be a perfect topping for this pie.  And it was!  In fact, if I were to make this again, I might pour a layer of Magic Shell on top of the Pretzel Crunch pie crust before adding the ice cream because it would help keep the pie crust together better, I think.

 
Pretzel Ice Cream Pie with Homemade Magic Shell (from Momofuku Milk Bar)
makes 1 pie

Pretzel Crunch Pie Crust

• 2 cups pretzels (about 1/4 of a 16 oz. bag)
• 1/4 cup light brown sugar, tightly packed
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/4 cup milk powder
• 1 tablespoon malt powder (if you can find it; if you can't, like me, substitute with flour)
• 7 tablespoons butter, melted
•  

Heat the oven to 275°F.

 
Pour the pretzels in a medium bowl and crush them with your hands to one-quarter of their original size. Add the milk powder, malt powder, sugar, and salt and toss to mix. Add the butter and toss to coat.

 
Spread the clusters on a parchment- or Silpat-lined sheet pan and bake for 20 minutes.  Cool completely.

Using your hands (or a food processor if you prefer), crumble the pretzel crunch clusters to half their size.

 
Toss the melted butter into the crumbled pretzel crunch, mixing well. Using your fingers and the palms of your hands, press the mixture firmly into a 10-inch pie tin, making sure the bottom and sides of the pie tin are evenly covered.

 
Pretzel Ice Cream

• 6 cups pretzels (about 3/4 of a 16 oz. bag)
• 2 cups milk
• 2/4 teaspoon powdered gelatin
• 1/4 cup corn syrup
• 2 tablespoons light brown sugar, tightly packed
• 1 1/2 oz. cream cheese
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda

Heat the oven to 300°F.

 
Spread the pretzels on a sheet pan and toast for 15 minutes, until the pretzels have slightly darkened in color and your kitchen smells pretzely. Cool completely.

 
Put the pretzels in a large bowl, pour the milk over them, and stir while steeping for 2 minutes.

 
Strain the milk mixture through a fine-mesh sieve and discard the soggy pieces of pretzel.

Bloom the gelatin in 2 tablespoons of cold water.

 
Warm a little bit of the pretzel milk and whisk in the gelatin to dissolve. Add the remaining pretzel milk, corn syrup, brown sugar, cream cheese, salt, and baking soda and use a hand or immersion blender to whisk until all of the ingredients are fully dissolved and incorporated.  Chill the mixture.

 
Pour the mixture into your ice cream machine and freeze according to the manufacturer's instructions.

 
Use a spatula to spread the ice cream into the pie shell.  Put the pie in the freezer to chill while you make the magic shell.

 
Homemade Magic Shell
3 tablespoons chocolate chips
1 1/2 tablespoons coconut oil

 
Combine the chocolate chips and coconut oil in a small bowl and microwave at 50% power for 30 seconds.  Stir, and continue to microwave at 50% power, stirring every 15 seconds until thoroughly melted.

 
Drizzle over the pie and then freeze the pie for at least 3 hours, or until the ice cream is frozen hard enough so the pie is easy to cut and serve. Wrapped in plastic wrap, the pie will keep for 2 weeks in the freezer.

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World Peace Cookies

The story behind these cookies is that Dorie Greenspan's neighbor had told her that the cookies were so good that, "in our house, we call them World Peace Cookies, because we're convinced that a daily dose of the cookies is all that's needed to ensure planetary peace and happiness." I've been meaning to make these cookies for quite a while, but it wasn't until the Boston Dragon Boat Festival dock staff kept bugging me for some homemade cookies that I finally decided to make them to appease the two Petes.

These are basically chocolate shortbreads, or sables, with chocolate chunks and a dash of salt. I made a whole batch, meaning to bring them to a party, but they were so good I decided to keep most of them for myself. They're perfect eating with a glass of cold milk, and if I had had any vanilla ice cream on hand, I would have totally made ice cream sandwiches with them.

World Peace Cookies (from Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours)
makes about 36 cookies

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 stick plus 3 tablespoons (11 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel or 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chips, or a generous 3/4 cup store-bought mini chocolate chips

Sift the flour, cocoa and baking soda together.

Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter on medium speed until soft and creamy. Add both sugars, the salt and vanilla extract and beat for 2 minutes more.

Turn off the mixer. Pour in the dry ingredients, drape a kitchen towel over the stand mixer to protect yourself and your kitchen from flying flour and pulse the mixer at low speed about 5 times, a second or two each time. Take a peek — if there is still a lot of flour on the surface of the dough, pulse a couple of times more; if not, remove the towel. Continuing at low speed, mix for about 30 seconds more, just until the flour disappears into the dough — for the best texture, work the dough as little as possible once the flour is added, and don't be concerned if the dough looks a little crumbly. Toss in the chocolate pieces and mix only to incorporate.

Turn the dough out onto a work surface, gather it together and divide it in half. Working with one half at a time, shape the dough into logs that are 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours. (The dough can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months. If you've frozen the dough, you needn't defrost it before baking — just slice the logs into cookies and bake the cookies 1 minute longer.)

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 325°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.

Using a sharp thin knife, slice the logs into rounds that are 1/2 inch thick. (The rounds are likely to crack as you're cutting them — don't be concerned, just squeeze the bits back onto each cookie.) Arrange the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving about 1 inch between them.

Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 12 minutes — they won't look done, nor will they be firm, but that's just the way they should be. Transfer the baking sheet to a cooling rack and let the cookies rest until they are only just warm, at which point you can serve them or let them reach room temperature.

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