Persistence pays off
This post has been brewing for a while. Originally it was going to be called “What’s wrong with my custard?” or “Gourmet gone bad” or something along those lines.
Early in the week, I attempted to make this luscious-sounding caramel ice cream with flaky sea salt from the July 2006 issue of Gourmet magazine. I made a deep caramel, I added it to a custard that I thickened to a precise 175 degrees and then strained through my finest seive. I cooled it in a metal bowl over an ice bath, then moved the chilled custard to the fridge overnight to temper.
The next night, I hauled out the trusty Cuisinart ice-cream maker, and poured in the custard to freeze during dinner. I can’t even remember what we ate… I was so distracted by the thought of this dessert. So you can imagine my disappointment when I peeked into the freezer bowl 30 minutes later and found nothing more than some very chilly custard. Hmm…
I let it keep on spinning for another half hour, until the chiller bowl started to be not very chilly. I spatula’d the whole thing back into the storage container, and vowed to try again tomorrow.
Two nights ago, I tried it again, with identical results. I decided that this was as frozen as it would get in the ice-cream maker, scraped the contents into the storage toot, and put it into the freezer to try and firm it up.
Last night: Ta-dah! It wasn’t really ice cream, but it definitely was frozen to a desserty consistency. And really, the serving shown in the photo was probably excessive — Cameron even said that one scoop would be plenty for a dinner party. And that’s probably good, since it didn’t make very much ice cream.
Comment by Anita
I see now following the recipe link that other readers had the same problems I did with getting the ice cream to set — I had suspected the corn syrup but wasn’t feeing confident enough… Moral of the story: I should have checked Epicurious sometime before today! 😀
Posted on 08.11.06 at 9:45AM
Comment by shuna fish lydon
Caramel lowers the freezing temp. of ic considerably. And if you’re making caramel just so it goes in ic base than there is no need to use corn syrup.
My advice? Use less caramel next time. A little goes a long way, especially if you cook it until it’s dark.
Posted on 08.20.06 at 1:50PM