A simplistic approach to ice cream. Photo: Sir Mildred Pierce
It's National Ice Cream month, and who -- the lactose-intolerant aside -- doesn't like ice cream?
Well, Southerners. America's favorite dessert is still a third-tier treat below the Mason-Dixon line, where cakes and puddings have a firm hold on the region's collective sweet tooth. Even in the most sweltering of Southern summers, New Englanders out-gorge their Southern neighbors. (Heck, New Englanders hang onto their ice cream eating edge straight through the winter, when their freezers are sometimes warmer than the air outside.)
Nobody's quite sure why Southerners never took to ice cream, although North Carolina food writer Sheri Castle confirms the phenomenon: "It's just not a big thing," she says. She suspects the relative paucity of milk cows might have contributed to ice cream's historical absence from the local food scene.
But a few serious ice cream makers are bent on tweaking the Southern tradition. Shops such as Ultimate Ice Cream in Asheville, N.C., and Morelli's in Atlanta are now providing a gentle -- and delicious -- introduction to the genre.
Hydrox is one of the ingredients. Photo: Chazz Layne/flickr
In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
When I was a kid, Creme de Menthe was a pretty big deal. A local restaurant used to make parfaits that were loaded with the stuff, and the mix of vanilla ice cream and super-sweet mint liqueur soon entered my pantheon of top childhood delights.
When it came time to update my Aunt Evie's recipe for Grasshopper Cake, I played with the idea of kicking it up a notch, but higher level mint liqueurs and Godiva chocolate liqueur seemed excessive, like putting truffles on a hamburger. In the end, half of the joy of this boozy, sweet concoction lies in the humble nature of its ingredients.
While my family traditionally made this dish in a pie plate, I opted to go for a springform pan. The crust, which I deliberately left uneven, rose and fell to reveal the bright green filling, and the crumbled cookies on top offered a coarse yet tantalizing finish. Needless to say, this one disappeared pretty quickly!
Get the recipe for Grasshopper Cake after the jump.
You've seen that sliced-up green apple sitting up top aside the Slashfood logo. Perhaps you've pondered its culinary potential -- the crisp snap of that bright green skin, the half-sweet/half-tart flavor that is the special domain of the Granny Smith apple.
Voila. Slashfood sorbet!
In sorbet, a single element is distilled into an intense burst of flavor. It should be so vivid that only a bite is necessary. Perhaps you're most familiar with it as an intermezzo to cleanse the palate, in a fluted paper cone to hold while walking alongside your companion and his gelato or in scoops piled high in a frosty parfait glass almost too cold to touch.
After the jump, an original recipe for a gorgeous green apple Slashfood Sorbet. We challenge you to only eat one bite.
Try saying this three times fast: Chocolate Mousse, Salted Caramel Ganache, Peanut and Banana Caramel Tart. As difficult as it may be to say, it looks like a breeze to eat (three times fast, of course).
Baked by Aran at Cannelle et Vanille, these diminutive beauties have almost as many complex layers as the Earth's surface. The chocolate shells are filled with a layer of banana caramel with peanuts, another layer of triple chocolate salted caramel ganache, and then crowned with a cloud of chocolate mousse.
The whole is garnished with cocoa powder, chocolate shavings and chopped peanuts. Eat. Await indescribable bliss.
In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
When I came across a recipe for "Swiss Squares" in my family's cookbook, I got excited. Although the dish seemed like a basic chocolate cake recipe, it used sour cream for leavening. As this is a pretty uncommon choice, I wanted to see its effect on the product.
Overall, I found that the bars were a bit richer than expected, with a nice moist crumb. In my finished version, I massively increased the chocolate and dolled up the frosting. Still, at its heart, this is a recipe for a rich chocolate cake. Then again, even the simplest cake can be pretty profound!
Margaritas are lovely, yes, but sometimes the liver needs a break. And Mexico, of course, is no one-trick culinary pony. In fact, while ambling through the famously taco- and torta-laden neighborhood of Sunset Park, Brooklyn, last weekend, a compadre proselytized wildly about a maple-walnut popsicle right before running into traffic to lead us to the deli where it lived.
Traditionally no friend to the walnut unless it is candied, we were inclined to pass. Then we noticed that in this popsicle, walnuts were a minor player relegated to the stick end of the treat. We politely accepted a small bite. And then another.
And then we turned on our heel and ran back to the deli to rummage frantically through the cooler gleaming on the sidewalk: mango-lime, pistachio, egg nog. Egg nog?! Walnut! Where was it? Pops flew everywhere as, like a dog frantically chasing a mole burrowing underground, we went shoulder-deep into the icy cooler. Thank the stars, a lone, innocuous "nuez" pop remained.
Whoopie pies are one of those wonderful concoctions of debatable origin and undebatable deliciousness. A few months ago, a piece in the New York Times proclaimed it was having "its moment," though plenty of its champions knew full well that the perennial classic needed no such official declaration.
This photo of a mint whoopie pie from This Chick Bakes beautifully illustrates the treat's timeless appeal, and looks like it has all of the hallmarks of whoopie pie greatness, with cakey chocolate layers sandwiching just the right amount of creamy mint filling. The chocolate-mint combination points to the endless flavor possibilities that the treats present to the adventurous sweet tooth. Though originally simple snacks created by the Pennsylvania Amish, today's bakers take them in all sorts of inspired directions. And if this photo is any hint, this could taste like the best peppermint patty on the planet, unquestionably worthy of the shout of joy its name entails.
"Babycakes: Vegan, Gluten-Free, and (Mostly) Sugar-Free Recipes from New York's Most Talked-About Bakery"
By Erin McKenna
Photographs by Tara Donne Clarkson Potter -- 2009 Buy It at Amazon
Note: While testing the vanilla frosting recipe, we accidentally used soy flour instead of the the soy milk powder the recipe called for. The two are easily confused but not interchangeable, as our results demonstrated.
When Erin McKenna opened BabyCakes NYC in 2005, her gluten-free, vegan baked goods became a huge success, giving hope to the gluten-intolerant and converting legions of dairy-worshipping skeptics. Her new cookbook is both a how-to guide and winning, chatty account of McKenna's journey from junk food junkie to gluten-free goddess (she changed her Twinkie-loving ways in 2004, when she was diagnosed with wheat and dairy allergies). Pretty much everything in the baked good pantheon is here -- cupcakes, blueberry corn muffins, scones, cake and cobbler -- ensuring that while the gluten and dairy may be missing, absolutely nothing else is.
Takeaway Tips: McKenna writes in a clear, humorous and reassuring voice that makes you feel like you're baking in the company of, if not an old friend, then an endlessly understanding and forgiving teacher. She provides ingenious advice on making simple, natural food coloring (who knew that a pinch of turmeric made gorgeous yellow icing?), and her incredibly helpful ingredients glossary at the beginning of the book (from agave nectar to xantham gum) removes a lot of the considerable intimidation factor inherent in gluten-free, vegan baking.
See what we tested and whether the book's worth buying after the jump.
Why aren't egg creams more popular? They're easy, they're cheap and they're one of the less hazardous methods of getting one's chocolate fix (low-carb fans take note). In New York City, they're practically an official beverage, with such august practitioners as Gem Spa on Second Avenue, Ray's on Avenue A and, of course, Junior's out in Brooklyn. You can even buy an egg cream kit!
This delightful beverage is hard to find beyond Gotham, however, and the few bottled varieties out there simply don't measure up. No, best to mix it up yourself: All you need is about one-half cup of milk, a few tablespoons of chocolate syrup (many swear by Fox's U-Bet, but Hershey's will do in a pinch) and about a cup of seltzer. There is some dispute as to whether to pour the syrup or the milk into your glass first, but mix them up with a long-handled spoon, then add the seltzer straight down the middle. Other flavors can be made by changing up the syrup, although again, the purists would squawk. Don't even go into the squabbles of who invented it or how -- the only thing egg cream fans can agree upon is that we'll have another.
Looking at this makes us want to dive headfirst into a vat of thick, luxurious ice cream and spend the entire summer there.
The idea of ice cream on its own is refreshing enough, but the idea of ginger ice cream -- presented here by the lovely duo behind Rec(ession)ipes -- is a particularly palate-cleansing one. Ginger, a digestive aid, has been soothing stomachs and clearing sinuses for centuries. It's the perfect foil for the rich, heavy cream and eggs called for in most ice cream recipes. Texture-wise, too, it makes a happy bedfellow: biting down on a chunk of candied ginger is a curiously satisfying experience, like finding the prize in a box of Cracker Jacks. Altogether, the idea of ginger ice cream leaves us so ferklempt that we call upon poet Wallace Stevens to find the words that we cannot: "The only emperor," he once wrote, "is the emperor of ice cream."
In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
Looking back on my childhood, I can remember few potluck dinners that didn't feature some version of Jell-O. While my mother somehow missed out on this particular 1970s cultural phenomenon, every one of our neighbors and friends had some unique, idiosyncratic method for serving the famous gelled fruit dessert. Moreover, since I didn't get it at home, every bizarre concoction was an exciting culinary thrill for me.
Searching through my family cookbook, I was pleased to find what I am now convinced is the ultimate Jell-O dessert. The creator, Karen Mono Little, wasn't a blood relative, but her close friendship with my Aunt Evie (and amazing kitchen wizardry) gained her a place in our collection of family recipes. Although my updated version of her dessert is more naturally flavored and has much less sugar, I have to admit that it also lacks some of the savage, addictive intensity of the original. After the jump, I've included Karen's recipe as well as my own. Enjoy!
Hooray for the Dairy Queen Blizzard, the dessert that combines ice cream, candy and sometimes even cookies all in one (swiftly melting) creation.
The sweet treat is given even greater pride of place on the DQ menu thanks to its "Blizzard of the Month" feature. Former BoMs have included caramel cheesecake and turtle Oreo (pictured), but it's the divine midnight truffle -- a blend of vanilla ice cream, chocolate syrup and truffle bits -- that's enjoying an April shout-out.
If contrasting crunchiness is preferable in the creamy Blizzard, then the softness of the truffle chunks are a bit of a letdown. But if maximum richness is the goal, then their melt-in-your-mouth texture works quite nicely with the smooth chocolatiness of the ice cream. Fight the current heat wave to slurp this sucker down before it turns from a Blizzard into slush.
This may be the cherriest piece of cherry pie we've ever laid eyes on.
The cherries are so big and bright and alive they're practically winking at us. We know food porn when we see it, and in this case we applaud Danny from Food in Mouth for going there somewhat fearlessly, transforming a slightly garish-looking slice from the Little Pie Company into this bit of in-your-face decadence. The best part is the plastic fork: Actual silverware would have implied that the pie was consumed in a delicate and restrained manner. If this photo is any indication, it certainly was not. "This," the photo seems to say, "is pie made for gobbling." Preferably on a checkered picnic blanket, crumbs flying everywhere, or standing in front of the fridge scooped into the palm of your hand when silverware just seems too far away.
In the 1970s the handy little ovens we now use to reheat leftovers and frozen dinners experienced a brief golden age, with folks employing them for cooking everything from turkeys to cheesecake. This recipe dates from the glorious reign of microwaves.
Like many of Aunt Evie's recipes, her microwaved sweet-and-sour chicken is easy, convenient and surprisingly flavorful. However, it relies on hard-to-find, annoyingly coarse-textured pickling spice and employs an unnecessary amount of margarine. For the modern incarnation we selected only certain pickling spices and ground them up, resulting in a far more evenly flavored and pleasantly textured dish.
This was an interesting experiment with the tiny oven: Microwaving, which essentially cooks meat from the inside out, didn't really yield chicken that has fully absorbed its sauce (or its savory flavor). Consequently, this recipe yields meat that is tender but bland. With that in mind, stove-top directions are at the end of the recipe. Regardless of which cooking method you use, this is a fun, easy and surprisingly tasty dish. Go, Aunt Evie!
Most photos of cupcakes make us smile for the same reason photos of puppies and Joseph Gordon Levitt do: They're just so revoltingly cute.
This carrot cupcake makes us smile for an additional reason, however. It's got dulce de leche buttercream slathered on top. How often do you come across a member of the carrot cake family that isn't topped with cream cheese (or, unforgivably, vanilla) frosting? Though Joy the Baker, the mastermind behind this inspired combo, gives her blessings to those who tilt towards cream cheese classicism, we think the jar of dulce de leche called for here is a vision that struck from another, more otherworldly realm. We also can't decide what's better -- the idea of a batch of these cupcakes or the idea of sitting on a counter, jar in one hand and spoon in the other, waiting for the cupcakes to come out of the oven.
Try saying this three times fast: Chocolate Mousse, Salted Caramel Ganache, Peanut and Banana Caramel 
"Babycakes: Vegan, Gluten-Free, and (Mostly) Sugar-Free Recipes from New York's Most Talked-About Bakery"
In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
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