Saturday, May 30, 2009

Making Frozen Deliciousness

About three weeks ago I was walking through Target, minding my own, determined to buy a new mop and a first communion card. While on my journey to the back of the store I walked by one of those end of isle displays where they stack the sale items. It's hard for me to describe how much I LOVE the end of isle sale items at Target. So many great things for my house have been purchased from those shelves, organic cotton hand towels, table lamps, candle holders for the mantel, the mirror in the living room, and so many more essential and cute things that make a house feel like a home. That day the sale display in the housewares section had Rival ice cream makers on sale for $24.99. I was intrigued but kept moving, onward to the back of the store, to buy a mop as my old mop had broken part way through cleaning my kitchen floor.

A few days later I was back at Target, undoubtedly buying something I did need like dish soap and a whole pile of stuff I did not need but could use, like 4 boxes of Kashi GoLean cereal. Again I walked by the ice cream makers. I stopped to inspect the boxes but kept moving. I tried to telll myself there was no need to buy it, but I kept think about how I could perfect sorbets of all kinds and make vegab cookie dough ice cream, and maybe not be jealous of small children who get to have soft serve with jimmies on top. Ah the longing.

I thought about the ice cream maker for a week. Then I started to talk about it to the Husband. A LOT. Eventually, he was either tired of hearing me talk about it, or just really wanted to taste one of these creations and said something to the effect of "Go buy it already!". And that was all I had to hear. I believe the silly thing was purchased within two hours of that conversation.

And so now I bring you my first try with said machine. I used my rampant knowledge of the google to narrow down a great chocolate sorbet recipe and after reading about 25 of them I found Smitten Kitchen's post which seemed delicious and ironic, since I read her blog daily and should have thought of it in the first place! Head over there to check out the recipe she posted from The Perfect Scoop.

I deviated from the recipe on little bit. The only chocolate I had was a dark bar with espresso beans in it, so I though it fitting to replace half the water with espresso in the recipe. The result is some serious chocolate goodness with a hint of coffee. And the bonus is that this recipe is vegan to begin with, so there was no mussing and fussing with conversions.

My slight adaptation is as follows:
Chocolate-Espresso Sorbet
1 1/2 cups water
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
3/4 cup Espresso
6 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a large saucepan,whisk together the water with the sugar, cocoa powder, and salt. Bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Let it boil, continuing to whisk, for 45 seconds. Remove from the heat and stir in the chocolate until it’s melted, then stir in the vanilla extract and the espresso. Transfer the mixture to a blender and blend for 15 seconds. Chill the mixture thoroughly (I left mine over night since it was too late to run the machine) then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. If the mixture has become too thick to pour into your machine, whisk it vigorously to thin it out.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This sounds heavenly! Gorgeous presentation! Yum!First i am going to bought a Ice machine as i dnt have and after visiting many sites on net get a good site where i get a Ice Making Machine after that i tried for ur receipe and it was reallyyyyyyyy very very yummyyyyyyyyy..............thnx for such a nice post