The Early Rounds

This weekend I decided to break into the ice cream attachment and see what I could do. I wanted to start slowly, with a sorbet, and seeing I had strawberries in the fridge, I decided to shoot for a strawberry sorbet. I found a recipe (I wasn't going to go it alone for my first try). After making my strawberry puree I realized that I didn't even have a quarter of the amount that I needed to make the recipe, so I started rummaging through the fridge.

I came up with a partial bag of frozen blueberries and a frozen banana, and in they went. Adding a bit of sugar, a touch of milk and a splash of freshly squeezed orange juice, I thought to myself that this was incredibly simple, and I hoped for the best. I had to chill the mixture for a couple of hours before putting it in the ice cream maker for 20 minutes. After that, into the freezer for a couple more hours. Hmmm....maybe this is the annoying part of ice cream making, and I am NOT a patient person.

After dinner Saturday I busted out the strawberry, blueberry and banana sorbet. Boy, did it taste good. It was however, very strong on the banana flavor, in fact it was mostly banana sorbet (which sounds disgusting, although it was quite tasty) with a hint of blueberry and a touch of strawberry in the background. The texture was great though. Not bad for the first try. Motivated by the results, I stuck the freezer bowl back in the freezer for round 2 on Sunday.

I scoured some of my cookbooks and a few websites for a gelato recipe for Sunday's attempt. In one of my Italian cookbooks I found a recipe for a strawberry gelato and zeroed in on that one. The recipe had three ingredients: strawberries, sugar, and cream (I know, gelato is not supposed to have cream, but it only called for a quarter of a cup, so I went for it). It was, again, super simple to make, although, again requires a few steps which is kind of annoying. Although, I have to say, it is a fantastic weekend activity.

So after our tasty ragu bolognese dinner, we certainly needed an Italian treat for dessert as well, so out came the strawberry gelato. I would call it "gelato," it was tasty, but lacked that characteristic creaminess I love in gelato. Maybe it was because I don't actually really like strawberry ice cream, but I don't think so. So, this isn't going to be as easy as I would have hoped. At least all these trials have been pretty darn tasty. Keeps me motivated. I think I'm definitely going to have to go for a hazelnut trial next. I am having some trouble locating gelato recipes though; I found one that included corn syrup and powdered milk - I'm not sure that gelato, which prides itself (if an inanimate object can pride itself) on having all natural ingredients, is supposed to have corn syrup. Gross. I think I may have to take a trip to the bookstore and see what I can find.

I'm not giving up yet, you can't break me this easily Mr. Ice Cream Maker.