New Year's Minty Freshness

I used to think Dreyer's Rocky Road was ice cream heaven. That was before I was introduced to the tangible, icy, refreshing, delectable world of homemade ice cream.

I received the Cuisinart Automatic Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker for Christmas. Quite a surprising gift, I don't think I even asked... oh... yes... maybe once. Or twice. Or, well, quite a few times...

Anyway, it's amazing. I froze the ice cream in 30 minutes flat, and had lovely soft serve to have after dinner tonight. It'll be even better once it's firmed up a bit in the freezer.

Alongside the ice cream maker, I got two cookbooks from my aunt, who hardly even sends anything besides gift cards. I guess she and my mother were in cahoots this year. My favorite is this one, The Perfect Scoop, by David Lebovitz. It's really fun to just read and look at the delicious pictures. There are some crazy recipes in there, including a recipe for Green Pea Ice Cream and recipes for Basil, Parsley, Black Pepper, and Saffron ice creams too. However, I chose to make mint chip.

I was daring, and on my first try, I tried a relatively hard recipe, and even edited it, though adding chocolate chips hardly counts as "editing".

The ice cream is very spearmint-y (because it uses fresh mint instead of extracts or creme de menthe) and you can really taste the heavy cream and milk. I was a little put off by this at first, then I kept going back for "one more bite", and I realized it really was delicious. It tastes a whole lot better than any stuff you get at a supermarket, and it was actually pretty easy.

The original recipe says the milk is supposed to turn "a lovely shade of emerald." Mine stayed resolutely white, and I don't know if this was because I used store-bought mint instead of freshly picked, or the type I used. Spearmint is good, but perhaps peppermint would be better? You can't easily find any other kind of mint in stores, though. I will have to experiment. When summer rolls around, I want to try his peach ice cream. It sounds absolutely delectable and, well... like summer.

FRESH MINT CHIP ICE CREAM

Makes about 1 quart (1 liter)

1 cup whole milk

3/4 cup sugar

2 cups heavy cream

Pinch of salt

80 g (about 2 lightly packed cups) fresh mint leaves

5 large egg yolks

3/4 cup mini chocolate chips

Warm the milk, sugar, 1 cup of the cream, and salt in a small saucepan. Add the mint leaves and stir until they're immersed in the liquid. Cover, remove from the heat, and let steep at room temperature for 1 hour.

Strain the mint-infused mixture though a mesh strainer into a medium saucepan. Press on the mint leaves to extract as much of the flavor as possible, then discard the mint leaves.

Rewarm the mint infused mixture. Pour the remaining 1 cup heavy cream into a large bowl and set the strainer on top. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks. Slowly pour the warm mint liquid into the egg yolks, whisking constantly, then scrape the warmed egg yolks back into the saucepan.

Stir the mixture constantly over medium heat with a heatproof spatula, scraping the bottom as you stir (there will be egg bits coating the bottom), until the misture thickens and coats the spatula. Pour the custard through the strainer and stir it into the cream. Stir until cool over an ice bath.

Chill the mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions. About five or so minutes before the ice cream has reached your desired consistency, add the chocolate chips.