Brady’s Ancho Chili Chocolate Ice Cream

Every Christmas, our friend Brady from Yr Doing a Great Job makes the best edible present: Ancho Chili Pepper Jelly.  It’s the kind of condiment that tastes amazing on everything- breakfast eggs, meat, roasted vegetables, tacos, etc.  Our small jar is rationed out over the winter months to make it last as long as possible.  This year, we begged off another jar so that we could use it as a mix-in for chocolate ice cream.  Brady generously shared the family recipe with us, so you can make your own.

We’ve made chocolate ice cream before with different recipes, but the Bi-Rite recipe was the easiest by far and yielded the best tasting and creamiest results.  It’s appropriate that we used a San Francisco creamery’s recipe with Brady’s jelly- he’s a Niners fan all the way.

Candy Cane Bark Ice Cream

We trimmed a Christmas tree (courtesy of our charming landlords).  We checked out the tree at Rockefeller Center with out of town visitors.  We finished our present shopping (well mostly).  We baked speculos cookies, world peace cookies, and blondies.  It was time that we focused our attention on some holiday themed ice cream, and Kira set her sights on a common decoration hanging from most Christmas trees: the candy cane.

Candy Cane Bark Supplies.

Maple Ice Cream

As the hosts for a large Thanksgiving gathering this year, we felt responsible to provide as much delicious food as possible.  And second to a turkey, the most important part of any Thanksgiving meal is the pie.  If pie is the equivalent dessert to turkey, then ice cream is the equivalent to gravy.

Maple Ice Cream atop Pecan Pie

Salted Butter Caramel Ice Cream with Caramel “Chunks”

Our Salted Butter Caramel Ice Cream with Caramel “Chunks”

Things have been quiet over here.  Our ice cream making has been on hiatus this summer as we packed and moved into a new apartment (with a bigger kitchen and plenty of freezer space in the basement!).  While we have not been making ice cream, we have indulged in some frozen delights, which inspired the flavor we made recently.

Strawberry Rhubarb Frozen Yogurt

The recipe made with raw fruit (L) and roasted fruit (R)

The bounty of late spring (now early summer) is upon us- the farmers markets are full of all the green vegetables we have been craving this long winter.  Rhubarb (along with those oh so trendy wild ramps) is one of the first signs of spring.  Luckily rhubarb sticks around long enough to overlap for a brief glorious moment with the advent of ripe strawberries.

Rhubarb stalks have a bright and tart taste which needs to be tempered with sugar to make it palatable.  The plant contains the toxin oxalic acid so never eat the leaves!  There are luckily smaller amounts of the toxin in the edible stalks.  Interestingly enough, its qualities are those of a vegetable, but we consider it a fruit because of how we use it in desserts.

Market fresh strawberries and rhubarb stalks

One of the best pies, in my fair opinion, is a strawberry-rhubarb one.  Strawberries are naturally sweet and balance the tartness of rhubarb.  The bright red color is cheery and reminds us that warmer weather and longer evenings are on the way.  With two fruits and  strained yogurt, it’s easy to tell yourself that this is a “healthy dessert” (almost- if there wasn’t two forms of sugar and all the delicious cream).