caramel attempt one

I was craving caramel apples last week so I looked up a few recipes. 101 cookbooks website had a delicious-looking recipe and this one on epicurious looked amazing. I compromised and used ingredients from both, although I can't quite remember the ratio. I added half&half, butter, brown sugar, honey, and salt. I had a heck of a time... the mixture looked really curdled after it came to a boil. I'm not sure if it's because I used half&half instead of heavy cream, brought it to a high temperature too quickly, or because I only made 1/2 cup of caramel sauce. Regardless, it looked gross when I took it off the heat but really came together after setting the pan on ice water and cooling while whisking. I ate it all. I'll keep working on this recipe because I think it'll be worth it once done just right :).

Banana Cupcakes

Lately I've just been wanting simple, easy food- basically lots of pasta, salads, and soup. I got Moosewood's Simple Suppers from the library the other day, and love it. The first (and only) thing I've tried at this point, are the banana cupcakes with chocolate cream cheese frosting. I thought they were delicious, but a little sweet. My husband said "I want to be buried in these" :)

moosewood's banana cupcakes with chocolate cream cheese frosting
wet ingredients
1 1/2 c mashed bananas
1/2 c veg oil
1 1/3 c brown sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 c plain yogurt
dry ingredients
1 1/2 c flour
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
icing
8 oz cream cheese (room temp)
3 T butter (room temp)
1 c powdered sugar
1 T cocoa
(I also added about 1 T strong coffee)

Use an electric mixer to combine wet ingredients until smooth, sift dry ingredients together then add to wet and mix on slow speed until completely combined. Spoon into 2 lined cupcake pans, filling each cup 2/3 full. bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes.

For icing- mix all ingredients with electric mixer until smooth, ice cupcakes after they cool.

**A note about my icing: I realized as I was beating the butter and cream cheese that we didn't have powdered sugar, so I used about 2/3 c granulated sugar that had been food processed. it didn't get very fine, and the icing ended up looking a lot like melted chocolate ice cream, but it was really, really good.

experimenting with ice cream

Two good friends surprised me with an ice cream freezer for my birthday about a month ago. Since then, I've been experimenting weekly using Jeni Britton, David Bovitz, and the contents of my fridge as inspiration. So far I've tried vanilla, lemon yogurt, lemon-raspberry yogurt, chocolate, white chocolate ginger, and just plain frozen yogurt. The best, so far, was the white chocolate and ginger.
The original recipe can be found here, but I made a few minor changes in both ingredients and methods. Here's my version:

White Chocolate and Fresh Ginger Ice Cream

4-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
2/3 cup white sugar
2 cups 2% milk
1 cup heavy cream
8 ounces white chocolate chips, spun through food processor
5 egg yolks

1. Blanch the ginger for a minute, drain, and add sugar and milk to saucepan. Stir occasionally over low heat for about 15 minutes. Remove from heat.

2. Put white chocolate into medium bowl and set aside

3. Whisk egg yolks in medium bowl and, while whisking, slowly drizzle warm ginger/milk mixture into bowl.

4. Return to saucepan once combined and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until thickened enough to coat a spoon (about 5-8 minutes?)

5. Add hot mixture to white chocolate and stir until chocolate melts. Add the cup of heavy cream, cover, and refrigerate while making and eating delicious dinner (about 4 hours).

6. Pour through strainer (or large slotted spoon) to catch the big pieces of ginger, and freeze the mixture in your ice cream freezer for about 40 minutes until really, really thick. Eat and share what you can, put the rest in a plastic airtight container. Cover the top of the ice cream with plastic wrap to avoid ice crystals.