St. Paul Artisan Ice Cream

May 23, 2013

Cherry Torte

Birthdays often carry countless traditions. Over time, some of those traditions fade away, but for my father-in-law, there is one birthday tradtion that has stayed with him since his early childhood. After the first taste of his mother’s cherry torte, it was a request that never faded when his birthday came around. Now years later Charlotte, his mother, has passed away, but my mother-in-law graciously makes Charlotte’s cherry torte recipe, and my father-in-law reluctantly shares his birthday tradition with the rest of his family. So this week, one week after my father-in-law’s birthday, I set out to deconstuct and recreate Charlotte’s cherry torte in FrozBroz fashion; ice cream style! Let’s get started with this week’s flavor: Cherry Torte.

Contrary to my wife’s family’s belief, I actually can reproduce Charlotte’s short bread crust with flawless results. This crust is a key component as it adds texture, nuttiness, and the integral buttery flavor of traditional shortbread. To achieve this, sugar, butter and flour are mixed together before adding crushed pecans, at which point the dough is pressed into a pan and baked. After cooling, the crust is broken up into chunks, and for the ice cream, we toss the chunkers in toward the end of the churn.

Cream Cheese! The second layer of the torte consists of cream cheese whipped with sugar, vanilla, and whipped cream. For the ice cream, we incorpoarte the cheese and vanilla into our pure cane sugar ice cream base during the cooking process. This sets the stage for an ultra rich cream cheese ice cream base.

Next, the cherry topper! This is where I’m going to break tradtion a little. At this point, the torte could essentially be constructed with a can of sweet cheeries in heavy syrup; crust chunkers fill the bottom of a pan, the cream cheese/whipped cream is spread on, and the canned cherries in heavy syrup top it all off. I made the desision to go with tart cherries in water for the ice cream. I wanted the cherries to contrast the sweet ice cream by adding that tart twist. We puree the tart cherries and water, then simmer down with a bit of cane sugar on the stove top until the cherries reach proper viscosity. The cherry jam is still sweet, but brings that element of tartness. We layer it into the pints during packaging.

The result is a rich cream cheese ice cream studded with pecan shortbread chunkers and layered with a tart cherry syrup jam. This is a FrozBroz tradition that is destined to never fade. Happy Birthday Dan!

Want to try it? You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with 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. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 5/24/13 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

May 9, 2013

Sweet Pea Almond with Rye Caramel

Springtime! It’s coming, it’s coming, it’s coming! Right? It is coming, right? Finally, it is actually here; we think. Soon, the fruits of Spring will start showing their colors, and our flavors will start reflecting all that is seasonable in Minnesota. In preparation for such a late start this year, our friends over at Bossy Acres have been busy in their new greenhouse. Last year Bossy was accepted into the Organic Field School incubator program, giving them access to more land, training, and equipment usage. As part of the program, they are allowed to use a portion of the Gardens of Eagen greenhouse, which gives them a big head start with these Minnesota winters. Such a head start, that it’s enough to inspire this weeks flavor: Sweet Pea Almond with Rye Caramel.

We are so itching to get on to Spring and Summer flavors, and we can’t tell you how happy we were to get a message from the great farmers at Bossy Acres letting us know they had pea shoots for us. It couldn’t have come at a better time. Just look at how gorgeous they are. If you haven’t had them, you best find out the next time Bossy is selling at the market, because these pea shoots epitomize Spring with their snappy yet tender and sweet, earthy pea flavor. This is where it all begins…

For the ice cream, I decided I wanted to infuse the sweet pea and almond flavor into our ice cream base. To get the most flavor out of the almonds, we first slow roasted them in the oven and gave them a quick pulse in the food processor.

The pea shoots and crushed almonds are steeped in our cane sugar base, then strained through a fine mesh strainer. The sweet pea and almond-infused ice cream base is ready for churning.

The final component of this week’s flavor is a rye caramel. As soon as I heard “pea shoots”, I immediately had visions of creamed peas on rye bread. Ice cream translation: sweet pea ice cream with rye caramel. For the caramel, we first ground whole rye berries and steeped them in our cream. We then caramelized granulated sugar and made a traditional caramel adding in our rye infused cream after caramelization. The result is a light and subtle rye flavored caramel that gets layered into the sweet pea almond ice cream during packaging.

Springtime! It’s here y’all! At least it’s here in our Sweet Pea Almond with Rye Caramel ice cream with Bossy Acres pea shoots!

Want to try it? You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with 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. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 5/10 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

April 25, 2013

Sumac with Apricot Carrot Jam

This week, it seems appropriate to head back down a path we explored on paper but never really materialized; Sumac. After releasing our Coconut Hibiscus and Lime last week, it felt natural to break out another one of our plant based ice creams. Also, we were flavor-bombed in a Facebook message last week with suggestions like: Cranberry Sumac Sorbet, Wild Rice Pudding with Maple Syrup and Juniper Berry, and Lingonbery-Ginger Snap Swirl. It made it hard not to move some of these ingredients to the top of our list, as they’ve hung in limbo in the past. Andy Wright, we consider those to be damn good suggestions, so just consider yourself an “appreciated flavor genius”, k? But, instead of going down the cranberry sumac sorbet route, we solidified this week’s ice cream flavor into a Sumac with Apricot Carrot Jam. Let’s get it on…

This is a fruiting sumac bush, photo taken at the Hyland Park Reserve in Bloomington, MN(photo cred: unknown). And yes, sumac is the Fall plant we all know so well here in Minnesota that turns fiery red along our highways in September and October. And yes, it’s going into our ice cream. Sumac berries similar to these, but of a different variety, are ground into powder, as shown above, and used quite often in Mediterranean and Middle Eastern cuisine. The ground berries possess a very subtle lemon flavor with some earthy notes that will set a nice backdrop for this week’s flavor. The ground sumac is steeped in our cane sugar ice cream base and strained out before churning.

For the next component, I knew I wanted to utilize these beautiful dried Turkish apricots. It had also been suggested, as of late, that we make a flavor with carrots. Carrots, listen up; we’re just getting started with you; this is only the beginning of a long relationship with you in our ice cream. Had to get that off of my chest. The carrots, together with the apricots, will bring a naturally sweet element to the ice cream, as well as contribute to the driving Mediterranean-esk theme. Everything is falling into place. For the jam, the apricots and carrots get diced and tossed in a sauce pan with water and sugar.

They’re simmered down until soft and caramely, at which time, we used an immersion blender to puree into a jam-like consistency. The apricot carrot jam is layered into the pints during packaging.

Sumac with Apricot Carrot Jam! The sumac provides a subtle backdrop of earthiness, followed by the sweet apricot carrot jam that brings it all together and materializes into something other than old thoughts on paper.

Want to try it? You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with 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. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 4/26 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

April 11, 2013

Bee Pollen

It isn’t often that we release a flavor that rides alone – one ingredient – no further augmentations. I can only think of a handful, out of the one hundred or so flavors that we’ve released over the past two years, since starting this here blog. Those that come to mind: Black Walnut, Fennel Pollen, Tomato, and of course, Triple Chocolate. There comes a time when we just want to know how certain flavors taste, on their own, in ice cream. Well, this week is one of those times. We chose one ingredient to ride alone – Bee Pollen!

This is bee pollen. When a worker bee lands on a flower, it gathers the dusty pollen from the plant. This dust sticks to the back of their legs, and the bee then uses it’s head, along with it’s nectar, to pack down the pollen dust, forming these bee pollen granules. They carry the pollen back to the hive where it is used as protein/food for the colony. Bee keepers have devised ways to knock the pollen off of the bees legs as it enters the hive, therefore bringing these pollen granules to market. Bee pollen is readily sold as a nutritional supplement, as it has been said to be very nutritious and claimed to cure certain health problems. Scientific research over the years has not confirmed this.

So now that you know the basics of bee pollen, let’s make ice cream with it, ok? The different colored granules symbolize the variety of plants the bee visited, which will effect it’s unique aroma and flavor. It’s flavor is sweet and nutty. We steeped the pollen in our standard cane sugar ice cream base, give it a generous salting, and strained through a fine mesh strainer before churning. That’s it!

Bee Pollen Ice Cream!

It’s sweet, creamy, nutty, honey-esk. It’s unique! And that’s why we needed to throw this one out there for a good ‘ol solo run.

Want to try it? You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with 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. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 4/12 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!

March 14, 2013

Coconut Bar Banana Caramel

Ok, so it’s March here in Minnesota and this is where the winter starts really dragging arrss. Fortunately, at the end of January I was able to break up the monotony of winter on a family trip to Mexico. It was there

that my sister-in-law purchased one of these coconut bars from the local grocery. I love coconut, so this bar was absolutely aaamaaazing! It’s ingredients: coconut, sweetened condensed milk, and sugar. Simple. Don’t ask what the pink stuff is on top, but the bar itself, is basically a bar version of a macaroon. The coconut is ground, so the texture ends up being chewy and much less course than a macaroon. It’s everything a coconut lover wants their coconut to be. And this is just the inspiration needed for this weeks flavor: Coconut Bar Banana Caramel. Lets do this…

In keeping with the simplicity of the original coconut bar, we stuck with plain unsweetened coconut and sweetened condensed milk. They both get pulverized in the food processor.

Next, the coconut mixture is pressed into a glass baking dish lined with parchment and baked at a low temperature. Once out of the oven, we puree lime zest and cane sugar in the food processor. The lime sugar is sprinkled over the top of the bars and brûléed with a torch. These bars? These ones are good. Really good! They get chopped up and added into our plain sugar cane ice cream base. Did I mention that we’re gonna add a banana caramel to this thing? Well, we are.

Time to work on the banana caramel. Yes, the banana pictured above doesn’t look that appealing, but it has more flavor than any good-looking banana I’ve ever tasted. It’s actually an overly ripe banana that has been preserved in the freezer. I throw all of our over-ripe bananas in the freeze and they are fantastic for smoothies, banana bread, or any other baking recipe. The bananas get sliced, placed on parchment, and slowly roasted in a low heat oven.

When they come out, we’re left with beautiful caramelized bananas that have lost much of their moisture content, but have retained all of their natural sugars and flavor. We make a traditional caramel by boiling granulated sugar. The caramel is finished with cream, and the bananas are added in after getting mashed, making for banana caramel ridiculousness. It’s just a lovely caramel. Banana caramel. Hot! It gets layered into the pints during packaging.

And here it is! Coconut Bar Banana Caramel! Just enough to make you forget that it’s STILL winter here in Minnesota, and enough to have you start thinking about eating ice cream dripping down your face in the months to come.

Want to try it? You can win one of the only two pints in the world, filled with 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. 2 lucky winners will be drawn randomly on Friday 3/15 at 4pm. Winners must be able to pick up locally and give us feedback. Pints must be claimed by email within one week or we will redistribute. 🙂 Good luck!