Erik – Page 10 – FROZBROZ

March 27, 2014

Seaweed

We’re just going to come out and say it right away this week. We made seaweed ice cream. Most people are probably going to think that this is a crazy and totally disgusting idea, but in all actuality, it is a pretty tasty ice cream. This is where the future of ice cream is going folks. Don’t you want to know what a savory ice cream tastes like? We are just getting your feet wet now, so it’s easier for you to dive in later to the savory flavors of our future. So let’s get started with this week’s flavor: Seaweed…

I don’t know if you’ve ever watched the PBS show Mind of a Chef, so if you haven’t and you are into food, you should try and catch an episode. In particular, I’ve really enjoyed the series featuring chef David Chang. The episode where he is in Japan is really where this idea of seaweed ice cream came to be. Chang was perusing through a Japanese market where he was explaining the different types of seaweed and their uses in Asian cooking. He talked about his favorite nori (seaweed) being a Korean variety that is traditionally raosted and seasoned with sesame oil. I think it was the chip-like crunch and sesame seasoning that hooked me, when I saw Chang take a bite. United Noodles Asian Market isn’t far from my house, so I headed over and grabbed a few packages. United Noodles is another whole story, but go check them out if you live in the Twin Cities and love Asain food and groceries. It’s unbelievable in there.

Each package contained a carton of about ten ultra-thin sheets of dried, roasted and seasoned seaweed. The seaweed was salty and the sesame seasoning reminded me of a night out eating sushi. Of course my next thought was, this could be good in ice cream…had to try it.

For the ice cream, we took the sheets of Korean seasoned seaweed and blended them up with our organic cane sugar base. The base is cooked and cooled, and the seaweed remains in the ice cream.

Just going to come out and say it…we made seaweed ice cream. It’s probably unlike any ice cream you’ve ever eaten before. It’s savory and tastes exactly like the some of its parts. It is a flavor that you may only eat a spoonful or two of at a time, but it will keep you coming back for more wondering what it tastes like again, because the experience is so unfamiliar. Come on, get your feet wet.

Like to try some? You can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 3/28/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

March 12, 2014

Stout with Irish Coffee Syrup

St. Paddy’s Day party favor preparation is in full swing here at FrozBroz central headquarters. Last year it was our Irish Soda ice cream, and similarly, this year we are throwing down another beer flavored ice cream for the party. Let’s get started with this week’s flavor: Stout with Irish Coffee Syrup…

For this week’s flavor we decided to back to our roots; Wisconsin, to find a smooth, easy drinking stout to flavor our ice cream base. We chose Central Waters Brewing Satin Solitude Imperial Stout. It’s not a traditional Irish stout, but it possess those deep dark malty qualities that we were looking for. For the ice cream, we reduce the beer down to a syrup like consistency and add it into our organic cane sugar ice cream base. The ice cream is ready for the churn.

Next, Irish coffee syrup. Like many of our components, coffee syrup has been on the list of conceptual possibility list for some time now. It began with concept of a black cherry ice cream with a coffee syrup, but at that time, cherries weren’t in season so the idea got pushed aside. Recently, ideas surrounding St. Paddy’s Day came up including creating a flavor based on a coffee stout, and that’s when the coffee syrup came back into the fold. And since it’s the Irish holiday, why not throw in some Irish whiskey for good cheer! I mean come on, its St. Paddy’s day! It’s meant to be. For the Irish coffee syrup, we start by simmering down some Peace Coffee Yeti Coldpress with cane sugar. After our desired flavor and honey-esk consistency are achieved, we take it off the heat and spike it with another Minnesota original, 2 Gingers Irish Whiskey. The result is a nice balance of bitter coffee and sweet Irish whiskey. The syrup is layered into the pints during packaging.

Stout with Irish Coffee Syrup! It’s malty caramely stout ice cream with ribbons of sweet Irish coffee. Party preparations complete! It’s not just ice cream, its St. Paddy’s Day all churned up and frozen into a pint…of ice cream.

Like to try some? You can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 3/14/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

This flavor will be offered along with a few others, in limited quantities, at our next pint sale, Thursday March 20, 2014. Click HERE for details.

February 26, 2014

Pine Nut with Rosemary Caramel

We often talk about how we come up with inspiration for flavors, so we won’t go there again today, but much of how a flavor is conceived begins with writing a concept down on paper. We have a list of concepts that may just be one flavor or a combination of flavors, but that list is a work in progress. Every time I look at that list, I might stare at one concept and come up with five more ideas from that one. Once a flavor is born, we often move on from the core concept and concentrate on developing others. This week, we’ve developed one of these concepts into a flavor that we thought would be worth taking from paper to the pint. Let’s get started with this week’s flavor – Pine nut with Rosemary Caramel.

Pine nuts have been on our list of conceptual ideas for a long time. We’ve contemplated many a combination, but there was something that struck me about using pine nuts and rosemary. Although rosemary is an herb from the mint family, it is characterized by it’s evergreen-esk needles and pine-needle-like flavor. At the very least, we’re giving you the illusion that this flavor is made from a nut and needle from the same family.

For the ice cream we start with raw pine nuts and toast them in the oven. The toasted pine nuts go into a blender with our brown sugar ice cream base and are pureed until smooth. During this process, the nuts release their oils into the ice cream base. The base is then cooked, steeped, and strained through a fine mesh strainer. The pine-nut-infused base is now ready to be churned.

Just like our ice cream, caramels can be infused with flavor as well. For the caramel, we start by infusing our cream with fresh rosemary by heating the cream, steeping, and straining out the rosemary. Next, we start our caramel by caramelizing our sugar in a sauce pan over high heat. Once the sugar has boiled and turned a deep amber color, we add our rosemary- infused cream. The caramel is seasoned with salt, cooled, and then layered into the pints during packaging.

Buttery pine-nut- infused ice cream layered with a rosemary-infused caramel. Another concept taken from paper to pint.

Like to try some? You can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Two winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 2/28/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

Don’t forget we have another pint sale coming up this Saturday, March 1st – see here for details on menu, and timing, etc.

February 12, 2014

Chamomile Fennel Pollen w/ Meyer Lemon Gin Honey

It’s almost Valentine’s Day, and in preparation, I wanted to make an ice cream inspired by a boozy beverage. Because, what better way to celebrate the love of your life than with booze. Trying to find a little inspiration via the interwebs, I found myself looking at a lot of vodka martinis with either strawberries, raspberries or cherries. You know, because it’s valentine’s day, and I guess that’s what everybody wants…every year…the same thing…every year. And I was almost buying into it, until I ran across a beverage created by Lara Creasy of Junction Kitchen and Bar in Atlanta, GA. She created a gin martini paired with a chamomile infused vermouth, a touch of lemon and honey, and finished with a pinch of fennel pollen. By no means does this sound like something that “everybody” wants, but everything about this beverage screams ice cream…and trust me, this is going to be good…really good. Which brings me to this week’s Valentine’s Day boozy beverage inspired flavor – Chamomile Fennel Pollen with Gin Lemon Honey. Let’s get started.

In the original beverage, Creasy used a house made chamomile-infused vermouth, but for the ice cream, I am making my own house made concoction – ice cream infused with chamomile tea and fennel pollen. Chamomile has a mild sweet floral aroma, which comes from the daisy-like flowers it is made from. The floral tones of the tea pair extremely well with the delicate sweet mellow anise flavors of the fennel pollen. The two of them are steeped in our ice cream base, along with a splash of sweet vermouth during the cooking process. The tea and pollen are strained out with a fine mesh strainer. The infused ice cream base is cooled and churned.

For the gin meyer lemon honey, we are using Honey B, a Minneapolis local honey from Northeast Minneapolis. Our friend Britt is working on getting her hive going again after losing much of it last year. This is a good start. The honey is brought to a simmer with a small amount of meyer lemon juice, and then finished with a splash of gin. The honey has a nice tang with a tich of bitterness from the juniper in the gin. It is layered into the ice cream during packaging.

The final result is a Valentine’s dream…floral chamomile and sweet fennel pollen, paired with a tangy meyer lemon gin honey. It’s fresh and new and not the same as last year, or the year before, or the year before that. You get it. HVD! Love, FrozBroz

Like to try some? You can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Two winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 2/14/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

January 27, 2014

Salt Vanilla with Grapefruit Marmalade

I’m sure you’ve all noticed, but if you haven’t, it’s winter. Winter here in Minnesota means that it’s citrus season in parts of the US like Florida, Texas and California. We’ve played around with flavor profiles that include the likes of oranges, lemons, and limes, but grapefruit isn’t one that we’ve messed around with. Grapefruit is probably the least popular of all the citrus fruits, but it packs a bold bittersweet punch. It is that bold flavor punch that we always strive to create in our flavors, which made this one seem like a no brainer. I decided to pair up the grapefruit with another flavor we don’t often use on its own…vanilla. This time, we’re salting it down to produce a sweet/salty/bitter ice cream we like to call Salt Vanilla with Grapefruit Marmalade.

For this flavor we’re using a natural sea salt, providing a mellow salt flavor, which fuses all the flavors in this ice cream together. We’re using two forms of vanilla for this one. First we split open a Madagascar bourbon vanilla bean and scrape the seeds into our base. Second, we use a Madagascar Bourbon vanilla extract to bring out a more pronounced vanilla profile. Both are mixed into our standard organic cane sugar base, then cooked, cooled, and ready to churn.

Next the marmalade. There are numerous methods for marmalade making, but I decided to try one that I saw used on a cooking show. I started with two large Ruby Red grapefruits thrown into a large pot of water so they are floating. The water is brought to a boil and the fruit is simmered for a few hours until the skin is tender. The whole fruit is cooled.

Next, slicing and dicing, and into a sauce pan with brown sugar, cane sugar, and lemon juice. This mixture is slowly brought to a boil and simmered down until the grapefruit rinds become translucent and jelly like. And bang…we have grapefruit marmalade. For the ice cream, I decided to give the marmalade a little ride in the blender to break down some of the larger chunkage. The marmalade is layered into our salt vanilla ice base during the packaging process.

Salt vanilla ice cream with a hit of bittersweet grapefruit marmalade. If you hadn’t noticed, it’s winter, but that’s not stopping us from making delicious craft made ice creams.

Like to try some? You can be one of two lucky winners of this fabulous, scratch made craft ice cream in our weekly pint giveaway. Enter your name in the comments section here, or on our facebook page under the posted contest. Two winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 1/31/14 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally. Prizes must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

Don’t forget, our next pint sale is coming up Saturday, February 8th. Click here for details.