For most of my life I’ve made soup. No carcass can escape my soup-ambition; buy a cooked roast chicken at the store for an easy dinner and it ends up being simmered for hours for it’s marrowed, hearty, brothy goodness. Since stock to me is the culinary equivalent of a blank canvas, following recipes can really ruin the fun. It’s much more exciting to see what I have leftover or lurking in the freezer, and combine it with what’s fresh at the market. So, when I purchased my first ice cream maker last week, naturally I wondered if I could “make stuff up” like I do with my soups and stews. Sure, being new at ice cream, I made my first batch shackled by a recipe–a mango sorbet. It was delicious but, in the end, creatively un-gratifying. This evening I went rogue, recipe-cally speaking. I decided to create a healthy frozen dessert to go with the suddenly hot weather and the broken air conditioner in the house we’re fixing-upping–and to do it sans step-by-step directions. I glanced at the previous recipes I’d searched to get a general idea of the proportions involved, but once confident I could have a little fun, off I went! I threw several handfuls of fresh-frozen blueberries into about 2 cups of cream substitute made from cashews and almonds that I buy in the health food store. (I long ago made a pledge to keep my cholesterol at a healthy level despite the genes that want to push it sky high but do it without resorting to statins. It’s not easy but I manage to. So I figured if I used the pretend cream I keep on hand instead of whole milk or real cream, I could have ice CREAM without clogging my arteries!) Then about 1/3 cup simple syrup, a splash of lime juice, rose water, and Grand Marnier, finished up with the last of the flax/oatmeal cookies I’ve had frozen in the freezer for too long. I crumbled the cookies, prepared the ice cream maker and let ‘er roll. A half an hour later I had a batch of ice cream tinted the prettiest shade of lavender. Not too sweet, rich, with the texture contrast of the fruit and cookie and the tantalizing hint of rosewater and orange liquor. It tastes better than anything I could have bought in the store–and it’s low fat and high fiber. Delicious! Do any of you just “make stuff up” in the kitchen?
Found a little place to eat breakfast this morning by the bus terminus near the Wan Chai Star Ferry dock. No name of the place in any form I could recognize but it looks out at where the busses park. The congee was hot and thick with corn and delicious shredded pork–best I’ve had in a long time. The turnip cakes not so much. Even spiced with chili sauce I was bored with them. Tomorrow will return for just the congee and the coffee (was also very good). All at a cost of only about $2.50!