This recipe makes rich silky custard the color of your great-aunt’s bathroom suite, with the unparalleled flavor and breathy fragrance of fresh peaches. Best inhaled when it is freshly made, or at least within one week, as the flavor is soon lost.

Serve with Yellow Peach and Basil sorbet (this page) or Wild Blueberry ice cream (this page).

4 large ripe peaches (about 650 g/1½ lb)

Zest and juice of 1 lemon, preferably unwaxed

210 g/1 cup sugar

160 ml/¾ cup whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

4 egg yolks

1. To prepare the ice cream: prepare the peaches by rinsing and then halving them, collecting any juice in a bowl. Remove the pits, quarter, and roughly chop the fruit into the bowl. Add the zest and the juice of the lemon and 50 g/¼ cup of the sugar, stir gently, cover with plastic wrap, and leave to macerate in the fridge.

2. Bring the milk and cream, plus a pinch of sea salt, to a simmer in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and the rest of the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

3. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs, and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool—you can speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled peaches into the custard, then blend the two together with an immersion blender until very smooth—blitz until there are only small flecks of peach skin visible in the mix, at least 2 minutes. Using a small ladle, push the peach custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container, squeezing hard to extract as much smooth custard mix as possible. Discard the peach skin.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions, usually 20 to 25 minutes, or until frozen and the texture of whipped cream.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best consumed when it’s freshly made, or at least within a week, as the flavor is soon lost.

Note—Macerating the peaches, skin on, with sugar and lemon overnight draws the sharp sweet flavor from the fruit, and the color and aroma from the skin (which later gets strained out), giving the ice cream a faintly pink tint and extra perfume.

One of the greatest pleasures I know is to eat along with the characters from books and on TV shows. I spent hours reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Farmer Boy when I was growing up, stomach rumbling in thrall to her mouth-watering descriptions of frontier foods.

I’m pretty sure that I could recite the chapter off by heart where Almanzo Wilder makes ice cream in a tin pail using sawdust, ice, and salt—I’ve tasted it in my imagination a million times. In another Little House book there’s a passage I always found incredible: on a hot day Laura’s ma slices up a ripe tomato, then serves it covered with cream and sugar—to be eaten like a peach!

I mulled over the idea of a tomato ice cream for years (tomatoes are actually fruits, so it ought to make sense) before finally getting a chance to test it out using a real old-fashioned hand-cranked machine on a ranch I was teaching at in Colorado. Hand-cranked ice cream machines are fun and although the tomato ice cream looked delicious—creamy and candy-pink—no one could swallow the stuff; it was just too weird.

I put the difference in taste down to the fact that Laura Ingalls and family were too far from peaches, and had come close to starving in previous years because of drought and crop failure. And we were very far from starving. Also, I suppose tastes change.

Instead, I’ve settled upon this simple and refreshing recipe, unusual rather than flat-out weird, and very lovely. It produces an elegant, shell-pink sorbet with soft sweetness from the tomato and fruitiness from the white peach.

130 g/⅔ cup sugar

130 ml/⅔ cup water

3 white peaches or 4 flat white peaches

2 ripe tomatoes (San Marzano are particularly flavorful)

1. To prepare the sorbet: heat the sugar and water together in a pan to make a simple syrup, stirring to dissolve the grains of sugar. As soon as the syrup starts to simmer, remove it from the heat. Set aside to cool and then chill in the fridge until needed.

2. Rinse the tomatoes and peaches, slice them into a bowl, cover with the cool simple syrup, and chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours, giving it time to really draw the flavor out of the tomato and peach skins.

3. Remove the macerated fruits from the fridge and blend them for 2 minutes until very smooth. Pass the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, discarding the skin and seeds.

4. To make the sorbet: pour the shell-pink purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions, usually 20 to 25 minutes, or until frozen and thick and creamy-looking.

5. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Eat within a fortnight.

Here’s a little secret: despite having claimed in these pages that peach is the best ice cream flavor, in fact nectarines are my very favorite drupes to scoop. (Yes! Drupes! This is a real botanical name given to this group of stone fruits and the reason, if someone tells you that you have a drupey arse, you should be really pleased.) Peaches have a more subtle perfume, but nectarines just pip them with their rich, tart flesh. They make velvety, sumptuous ice cream with well-balanced flavor.

The soft note of sweet anise-flavored tarragon really complements the ice cream—especially if you use white nectarines.

500 g/1 lb ripe nectarines (3 to 4 fruits)

Zest and juice of 1 lemon, preferably unwaxed

190 g/1 cup sugar

100 ml/½ cup whole milk

300 ml/1 cup heavy cream

3 egg yolks

30 g/1 oz fresh tarragon

1. To prepare the ice cream: rinse the nectarines and halve them, collecting any juice in a bowl. Slice the flesh in chunks from around the pit and drop it into the bowl. Add the lemon zest and juice and 50 g/¼ cup of the sugar. Mix this together gently, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and leave to macerate in the fridge overnight.

2. Bring the milk and cream to a simmer in a non-reactive pan, stirring often with a whisk or silicone spatula to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and the remaining sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

3. Pour the hot milk over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat, add the tarragon leaves, and stir to submerge them in the custard. Cover the pan with plastic wrap, then place in a sink full of ice water to cool for 30 minutes. Once the custard is at room temperature, use a spatula to scrape it through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois. Squeeze hard on the tarragon to extract as much flavor as possible. Discard the leaves, cover the container with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled nectarines and all their lemony juices into the tarragon custard, then blitz until as smooth as possible, 2 to 3 minutes, or until there are only small flecks of red nectarine skin visible in the mix. Using a small ladle, push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container, squeezing hard to extract as much smooth custard mix as possible. Discard the bits of nectarine skin.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within a fortnight.

Variation—White peaches will work just as well as nectarines in this recipe.

Wild Blueberry (this page) / Nectarine and Tarragon (this page) / Strawberry Salad (this page)

This Schiaparelli-pink ice cream “salad” is made from a blend of fresh strawberries, Amalfi lemons, and unwaxed oranges—all used whole. Don’t be put off by using every bit of the citrus; the unpalatable bits of seed and pith get sieved away eventually. For best results seek out Amalfi lemons for their thick, mild pith or, failing that, use unwaxed lemons and oranges.

Macerating the berries and citrus together, then whizzing them up smoothly into the custard, is a device to add pectin and just the right amount of acidity to the ice cream base. The results are a full-bodied, elastic-textured ice cream, with tangy multi-dimensional strawberry flavor. Ultra strawberry, in other words.

I learned not to be afraid of using whole citrus after a winter spent working in a pastry shop in Sicily with a sprightly couple of octogenarians who came in to help make marmalades. They ate chunks of raw Amalfi lemon throughout the day, and extolled the virtues of its mild pith and sweet flesh with such twinkle (and such white teeth) I couldn’t help but be curious to try it myself.

Oddly, after all this careful blending and sieving, the results taste very much like strawberry Starburst candy—but that’s okay because the pink ones were always the best. Made to make your mouth water.

400 g/1 lb strawberries

Half a lemon (preferably Amalfi lemon)

Half an unwaxed orange

190 g/1 cup sugar

150 ml/¾ cup whole milk

250 ml/1 cup heavy cream

Tiny pinch of sea salt

5 egg yolks

1. To prepare the ice cream: dip the strawberries into a sink or bowlful of cold water to rinse them, and then lay them out on a clean dish towel to drain. Pull or slice away the green crown of leaves, removing the bare minimum of fruit. Slice the berries in half into a clean bowl.

2. Chop the citrus fruit (peel, pith, seeds, and all) into small chunks and weigh out a 90 g/3-oz mix of lemon and orange. Add this, along with any spilled juice, to the strawberries. Add half the sugar and stir gently to combine. Cover the bowl and leave to macerate in the fridge overnight.

3. Heat the milk, cream, and salt together in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the milk is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and remaining sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

4. Pour the hot milk in a thin stream over the yolks, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling the eggs and keeping a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool it down—you can speed up the cooling process by stirring it every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, cover with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge.

5. To make the ice cream: the following day, add the chilled strawberry salad and any juice to the cold custard and blitz together with a blender until very smooth, at least 3 minutes. Using a small ladle, push the strawberry custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container, squeezing hard to extract as much smooth custard mix as possible.

6. Pour into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

This is how the sky-blue Italian ice cream flavor Puffo (or “Smurf”) ought to taste—but doesn’t. Embarrassingly, my fallback word to define the flavor of this ice cream is simply “blue.” This suggests a lack of imagination—using the word “minerality” would be more elegant. My excuse is that the taste of blueberries is hard to characterize, given that much of the satisfaction gained from eating them comes from their firm, popping texture. So if possible, use wild blueberries (also known as bilberries or huckleberries), as they have infinitely more indefinable flavor than cultivated varieties.

300 g/10 oz blueberries

130 ml/¾ cup whole milk

350 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

4 egg yolks

140 g/¾ cup sugar

1. To prepare the ice cream: cook the blueberries very lightly. If using a microwave, place them in a heatproof bowl along with a tablespoon of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook for 2 to 3 minutes on high. Otherwise simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan with a drop of water just until they are tender, bursting and piping hot (do not boil). Cool in a sink of ice water; once cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

2. Heat the milk and cream together in a pan over low heat, stirring every so often with a whisk or silicone spatula. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

3. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs, and keep a close eye so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled blueberries and their juice into the custard. Liquidize with a blender or immersion blender until very smooth, about 2 minutes—the mix will thicken considerably as though set with gelatin. Use a small ladle to push the thick custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container. Discard any seeds and the fruit skin.

5. Pour the slate-blue custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—As well as being packed full of vitamins, blueberries are high in natural pectin, which has an amazing gelling effect on an ice cream custard; you will notice that it thickens this recipe almost to the point of setting it.

You can use this tip and try adding a few blueberries to more watery fruit ice creams and sorbet bases to help their texture considerably without affecting the flavor much.

 

One of my earliest smell memories is being on a farm in Devon picking blackcurrants, at about age 3, standing on the red earth and swishing the leaves, releasing fumes of their intoxicating white acid drop fragrance—so odd and so different from the taste of the fresh currants. It’s good—like the way sweet, fruity tomatoes and the green smell of their stalks magnify each other’s best qualities. If only somebody would make a perfume of this and stop me having to slather blackcurrant leaf ice cream behind my ears every day.

If you are lucky enough to grow blackcurrants, adding a few leaves to the custard base of this recipe elevates it to a different level. In any case, the flavor of this ice cream is supernatural. The low water content and high amount of pectin in the currants contribute to a very well–behaved ice cream: rich, smooth, and custardy but tangy, too, and deep magenta pink.

150 ml/¾ cup whole milk

350 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

5 to 6 large fresh blackcurrant leaves, washed (optional)

280 g/9 oz blackcurrants

3 egg yolks

160 g/¾ cup sugar

1. To prepare the ice cream: heat the milk, cream, and salt together. As soon as the liquid reaches a simmer, stir in the blackcurrant leaves to submerge. Remove from the heat, cover the pan with plastic wrap, and leave to infuse for 30 minutes in a sink of ice water.

2. Meanwhile, rinse the blackcurrants and pick them from their stalks. The best way to cook them is very lightly in a microwave: add 2 tablespoons of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and zap them for a couple of minutes. Otherwise simmer them very gently in a non-reactive pan just until they are tender and bursting (do not boil). Cool the bowl in a sink of ice water, and once the berries are cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

3. Strain the now-fragrant milk and cream mixture into a clean non-reactive pan and bring to a simmer. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is steaming, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

4. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

5. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled blackcurrants into the custard then liquidize the two parts together with an immersion blender until the mixture turns a gorgeous purple color and is very smooth, 2 to 3 minutes. Using a small ladle, push the blackcurrant custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container to remove the seeds.

6. Pour into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

There’s a short window of about a fortnight every July when the heavily scented loganberry—the most dreamy flavoring for ice cream imaginable—comes into season. (The berries don’t smell, or even taste very strongly raw—the magic happens once they’re cooked.) But, like mulberries, they are too fragile and juicy to supply commercially, and they can prove notoriously difficult to find.

At this point, every pastry chef, jam maker, and cake baker in London with a clue goes quiet—they are just itching for a day off so they can zoom down the motorway to Kent or Essex for a morning fruit-picking—and they keep their cards close to their chest until their haul is safely back in the kitchen. Only at this point do they finally hit Instagram for all they’re worth.

If you know a farm that cultivates these jewels, be careful who you tell about it, and pick as fast as you can when you get the chance. Even if this means you make gallons of loganberry ice cream and eat it for months to come, you won’t have any regrets!

If you can’t get hold of loganberries, then other berries will work well too (see Variations, this page).

320 g/10 oz loganberries

100 ml/½ cup whole milk

300 ml/1 cup heavy cream

4 egg yolks

130 g/⅔ cup sugar

1. To prepare the ice cream: cook the loganberries very gently. If using a microwave, place them in a heatproof bowl with 2 tablespoons of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook for 2 to 3 minutes on high. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a lidded non-reactive pan just until they are tender, bursting, and piping hot. Do not boil. Cool in a sink of ice water. Once cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

2. Heat the milk and cream together, stirring every so often with a whisk or silicone spatula. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

3. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool—you can speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled loganberries into the custard, then liquidize the mixture with an immersion blender until it turns a deep pink and is very smooth, 2 to 3 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove all the seeds.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Variations—You can make blackberry, raspberry, or tayberry (a cross between a blackberry and a raspberry) ice cream using the same quantity as in the recipe.

Loganberry / Strawberry and Whole Lemon

The Lemon Verbena Bush

In a park in Elephant and Castle, behind a very basic concession stand that sells tea from a vending machine, grows a lemon verbena bush the size of a minivan. Throughout winter it’s a skeleton of spindly sticks, then in midspring a green neon mist descends upon it, and it comes to life. By summertime, every year without fail, it is flush with slender lemon-scented leaves. You only need to run a hand along the length of a branch—the leaves are rough and sandy like little cats’ tongues—to release its compelling, oily fragrance.

Nobody pays it any attention as they drink their tea, and I can pick a plastic bagful every now and again without making the slightest impression on the plant. The leaves dry well and can be refreshed in hot water to make a delicious tisane, magically turning bright green as though come to life again. Otherwise they are easy to infuse in ice creams and custards.

I like this one with Leafy Blackcurrant Custard (this page) and Kumquat Custard (this page) or rippled with Citrus Gel (this page).

300 ml/1¼ cups whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

3 egg yolks

125 g/½ cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar

50 g/2 oz lemon verbena leaves (ideally fresh, but if not, dried)

1. To prepare the ice cream: heat the milk and cream in a non-reactive pan, stirring often to prevent it from catching. Once the mixture is steaming, whisk together the egg yolks and sugar in a separate bowl.

2. Pour the hot milk and cream over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling, and making sure it doesn’t boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat, add the lemon verbena leaves, and blitz with an immersion blender until the custard turns pale green, 2 to 3 minutes.

3. Pass the mixture into a bowl through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, squeezing the blitzed leaves with the back of a small ladle to extract as much flavor as possible. Discard the leaves. Cool the bowl of verbena custard in a sink of ice water, then cover and refrigerate overnight.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, blitz the custard for 1 minute using an immersion blender. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Who could resist vitamin-y, prickly green gooseberry and chiffony egg custard, folded with puffs of crisp meringue? Only a fool!

For the meringue

1 egg white

Pinch of sea salt

Superfine sugar (you’ll need double the weight of the egg white)

For the ice cream

400 g/1 lb green gooseberries

110 ml/½ cup whole milk

250 ml/1 cup heavy cream

2 extra-large egg yolks

150 g/¾ cup sugar

1. To make the meringue: preheat the oven to about 300°F and line a baking sheet with parchment.

2. Weigh the egg white into a large, spotlessly clean and dry mixing bowl. It will weigh around 30 g/1 oz. Add the salt and whisk together until very stiff and dry looking. This will take 6 to 8 minutes if done properly, so using a hand-held electric whisk is a good idea.

3. Measure out double the weight of the egg white in superfine sugar (about 60 g/2 oz). Add the sugar to the beaten egg white little by little, sprinkling in spoonfuls at a time all the while continuing to whisk. Once all of the sugar has been incorporated, continue to whisk the mix for about 10 minutes until the sugar has completely dissolved and the meringue is glossy, thick, and voluminous.

4. Scrape the meringue out onto the lined baking sheet, smooth into a bird’s nest shape, and bake for 1 hour 25 minutes, or until very pale gold and crisp. Leave to cool in the turned-off oven. Once cold, store in a dry, airtight container.

5. To prepare the ice cream: rinse the gooseberries. Don’t worry about trimming the flower and stem ends; they will be sieved away later. The best way to cook the gooseberries is very lightly in a microwave: add 2 tablespoons of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook for 2 to 3 minutes on high. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan just until they are tender and bursting and look milky and opaque (do not boil). Cool them in the pan in a sink of ice water. Once cool, cover and chill the gooseberries in the fridge.

6. Heat the milk and cream together, stirring every so often. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

7. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling, and make sure it doesn’t boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool, stirring the mix occasionally. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

8. To make the ice cream: the following day, add the chilled gooseberries and any juice to the cold custard and liquidize for a couple of minutes until smooth and pale green. Using a small ladle, push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container, squeezing hard to extract the maximum custard mix from the seeds.

9. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

10. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Working quickly, sprinkle with broken pieces of meringue as you go and fold in until it is all combined. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Pink dessert gooseberries are softer and jammier than their green cousins, and combining them with hazelnuts has the familiarity of old-fashioned British desserts like gooseberry crumble.

For the hazelnut crunch (makes more than you need)

150 g/⅔ cup freshly ground lightly toasted hazelnuts

100 g/½ cup all-purpose flour, sifted

100 g/½ cup spelt flour, sifted

90 g/½ cup sugar

40 g/¼ cup light brown muscovado sugar

Pinch of sea salt

125 g/1 stick (½ cup) unsalted butter, cubed

For the ice cream

400 g/1 lb pink (sometimes called dessert) gooseberries

110 ml/½ cup whole milk

250 ml/1 cup heavy cream

140 g/¾ cup sugar

2 large egg yolks

1. To make the hazelnut crunch: preheat the oven to 350°F and line a baking sheet with parchment.

2. Combine all the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Add the cubed butter and rub in lightly with your fingertips until the mixture resembles pebbly sand.

3. Sprinkle the mixture evenly over the lined baking sheet and bake until golden and toasty, 20 to 25 minutes. Check the mixture every 10 minutes and turn it if necessary to make sure it cooks evenly. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in a dry place. Once cold, store in a zip-top plastic bag in the freezer until ready to use.

4. To prepare the ice cream: rinse the gooseberries. Don’t bother to trim the tops and tails; they get sieved away later. The best way to cook the gooseberries is very lightly in a microwave; add 2 tablespoons of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook for 2 to 3 minutes on high. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan until they are tender and bursting and look milky and opaque (do not boil). Cool in a sink of ice water. Once cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

5. Heat the milk and cream together, stirring every so often. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

6. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

7. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled gooseberries into the custard, then liquidize the two together with an immersion blender until smooth and very pale pink, 2 to 3 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the gooseberry custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the seeds (discard the seeds).

8. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

9. Quickly transfer the ice cream to a lidded container, sprinkling with 50 g/¼ cup of the frozen hazelnut crunch. Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Pink Gooseberry and Hazelnut Crunch (this page) / Green Gooseberry Fool (this page)

 

If you ever find yourself in Puglia during summertime, hot-foot it to Super Mago del Gelo: a brilliant gelateria in Polignano al Mare, just south of Bari. My dream ice cream shop, it’s fitted in dazzling 1970s Italian style, replete with backlit technicolor landscape photography, pin-up Dolce Vita hotties, pleather banquettes, black marble counter, abundant terrazzo, and last but not least, a beautiful candy-striped Perspex ceiling.

Best of all, its handwritten signs advertise granita di gelso nero, or black mulberry granita. This heavenly slush of ruby-colored ice crystals comes smothered with barely sweetened whipped cream. It’s the best way to enjoy the wonderful flavor of the mulberry fruit in its purest form.

Mulberries aren’t easily available, so make friends with anyone you know who has a tree—or start looking into cheap flights to Bari.

450 g/1 lb mulberries

175 g/¾ cup sugar

500 ml/2 cups water

Zest and juice of 1 lemon

1. Place a large shallow stainless steel baking sheet or dish in the freezer to get very cold.

2. Cook the mulberries ever so lightly, just so that they are piping hot all the way through and juicy and burst. If you have a microwave, just zap them in a bowl for a minute or two. Otherwise, heat them in a non-reactive pan just until the fruit bursts (do not boil). Cool them by placing the pan or bowl in a sink of ice water. Cover and chill in the fridge.

3. Once the berries are cold, blitz them with the sugar, water, and lemon zest until very smooth and the sugar granules have dissolved, 2 to 3 minutes. Use a small ladle to push this mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the seeds. Add the lemon juice to the mulberry purée and whisk to combine.

4. Pour the liquid into the frozen baking sheet and return it to the freezer, carefully placing it flat on a shelf. Once an hour has passed, check the granita: it should have begun to freeze around the edges. Use a fork to break up any frozen bits and stir them back into the mix.

5. Every 45 minutes, return to stir the granita. Keep agitating it to prevent it from freezing solid. The aim is to achieve large, slushy, frozen crystals.

6. The end result after about 3 hours should be a heap of ruby-red ice crystals. Serve in chilled glasses with softly whipped cream. This can be kept covered in the freezer for up to one week, but you’ll need to scrape with a fork before serving to break up any large lumps.

Mulberries reign supreme over all berries—they are one of the greatest-tasting fruits on earth—but they are also difficult to get hold of (literally). Even if you find a tree, too often the fruits have been picked clean by birds or greedy hands—and its Murphy’s law that the superior, blackest berries you want are always out of reach. Ripe mulberries are also so fragile they explode with juice before you can tweak them from the branch—leaving you slurping purple streaks from your outstretched arms, but with your hands empty.

A remarkable discovery was when I realized that steeping mulberry leaves in sugar syrup re-creates the distinct earth-and-rain flavor of the berries almost perfectly. Once you mix the flavored syrup with a tart berry (tayberries are perfect because of their less recognizable flavor, but raspberries or blackberries work, too), then, apart from the irreplaceable ruby color, you can be fooled into thinking you’ve got the real thing. Needless to say, if you can use real mulberries in this recipe then you would be crackers not to.

8 fresh mulberry leaves

190 g/1 cup sugar

240 ml/1 cup water

450 g/1 lb raspberries, blackberries, or tayberries

Juice of 1 lemon

1. To prepare the sorbet: rinse the mulberry leaves (check for silkworms). Stack them on a chopping board and roll them up into a cigar shape, then slice them into ribbons.

2. Heat the sugar and 190 ml/¾ cup of the water together in a pan to make a simple syrup, stirring to dissolve the grains of sugar. As soon as the syrup comes to a boil, add the mulberry leaf ribbons and stir to submerge. Cover the pan tightly with plastic wrap and set in a sink of ice water to infuse for 40 minutes.

3. Strain the syrup, squeezing every drop from the leaves. Discard the leaves, then cover and chill the syrup in the fridge.

4. Lightly cook the berries. If you have a microwave, just zap them in a bowl for a minute or two, until the fruit is very lightly cooked. If not, cook them together in a non-reactive pan just until the berries burst. Cool in a sink of ice water, then chill in the fridge.

5. To make the sorbet: once everything is cold, blitz the berries, syrup, and lemon juice together with a blender until very smooth, 2 to 3 minutes. Pass this purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the seeds. Wash the seeds by rinsing them in the sieve over a bowl with the remaining 50 ml/¼ cup water. Add the pip seed juice to the purée and whisk to combine.

6. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, thick, and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

I like sorbet, but unless it’s a scorching hot day, I like it best with a scoop of ice cream or a spoonful of whipped cream on the side, not only because the combination of fresh fruit and sweet grassy cream is a winner, but because I live in England where we need the extra calories of cream to keep us warm. Realistically, it’s only really hot enough to tolerate ice-cold frozen fruit about three days a year.

This sorbet is destined for one of those days. It’s best made with those big, rich peaches with highlighter-yellow flesh—the kind used for tinned peaches (sometimes called Percoche or clingstone).

Oddly, for such a bold-tasting herb as basil, combining it with peach creates such a wonderful synthesis of flavors—you almost don’t notice that it’s there. Instead, you wonder whether this is the way that ripe peaches are always supposed to taste—like warm skin in the sun, and Italy and summer holidays.

160 g/¾ cup sugar

160 ml/¾ cup water

40 g/2 oz basil leaves

525 g/1½ lb ripe yellow peach (about 3 large peaches)

Zest and juice of 1 lemon, preferably unwaxed

1. To prepare the sorbet: put the sugar and water into a small pan and bring to a gentle simmer to make a simple syrup. The moment it simmers, remove it from the heat and stir in the basil leaves to sub-merge. Cover the pan tightly with plastic wrap and place it in a sink of ice water, allowing the basil to steep in the cooling syrup.

2. Taste the syrup after 15 minutes; it should taste warmly fragrant with basil. If necessary, steep for a further 5 minutes to boost the flavor before testing again. Do not leave it for more than 30 minutes in total—basil is a “wet” herb, and it will begin to taste weedy if left to stew in the syrup for too long.

3. Strain the syrup into a clean container using a fine-mesh sieve or chinois. Squeeze hard on the basil to extract as much flavor as possible, then discard the basil leaves.

4. Rinse the peaches and slice them roughly into the basil syrup. Add the lemon zest and juice, then cover and chill in the fridge overnight.

5. To make the sorbet: the following day, remove the syrupy peaches from the fridge and liquidize for 2 minutes until very smooth. Pass the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, discarding the skin.

6. Pour the bright yellow purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and thick and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within 2 weeks.

 

Italian delis always have a particular warm, dry, baby’s-head smell of egg pasta and Parmesan. Mini-markets in the South of France during July and August smell headily of overripe charentais melon. Happily this means that each time I eat pasta and cheese or a slice of ripe charentais melon I get that same blissful feeling of being on holiday.

Using fresh jasmine to flavor this sorbet is totally over the top, but it’s a good way to live life to excess. You can pick blossoms from a garden or buy inexpensive flowering plants from many supermarkets—rinse them first, though, in this case—or just use jasmine tea. Serve with Fig Leaf Milk Ice (this page) or a plain almond ice cream made using the Pistachio ice cream recipe as a base (this page).

125 g/⅔ cup sugar

125 ml/⅔ cup water

Large handful of jasmine (about 20 g/1 oz blossoms)

or 2 tablespoons loose jasmine tea

½ teaspoon citric acid

1 small ripe melon (charentais or cantaloupe)

Juice of 1½ lemons

1. To make the jasmine syrup: bring the sugar and water to a boil in a medium pan, stirring occasionally to make sure the sugar dissolves. Place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool.

2. Pour the cool syrup into a clean lidded container, then stir in the jasmine blossoms to submerge. Cover the syrup at surface level with a layer of plastic wrap. (This is so that no air can get in—to avoid oxidization of the jasmine.) Place a tight-fitting lid on the container and chill in the fridge for 4 to 5 days.

3. After the elapsed time, strain the syrup through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, squeezing hard to extract as much flavor as possible from the blossoms. Discard the jasmine and whisk the citric acid into the syrup until dissolved. Keep in the fridge or freeze until needed.

4. To prepare the sorbet: peel the melon, trimming away all the green parts. Don’t bother to deseed it. Slice into chunks over a bowl to catch the juice.

5. Add the lemon juice and jasmine syrup to the melon, as well as any of the juice. Liquidize until very smooth, 2 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois and discard the seeds.

6. To make the sorbet: pour the melon purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and thick and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Variation—Replace the jasmine blossoms with a tablespoon of oolong tea leaves and make a cooling Melon and Oolong sorbet. Bring the sugar syrup to a boil and then allow it to cool for a couple of minutes before stirring in the tea leaves. Leave these to steep for 5 minutes then strain the syrup. Cool and chill the oolong syrup and proceed as above.

 

Sometimes called “poor man’s rose,” rose geranium grows pretty happily anywhere there’s light. I gave a couple of pinched cuttings to Mr. Piddington, my ice cream shed next-door neighbor. He has the most vigorous front garden in the street thanks to spending the greater part of his weekly state pension on Miracle-Gro.

Within a couple of months the plants were shoulder height and bust-ing through the iron railings. Brushing the leaves with the edge of my jacket as I walk past every day releases fumes of what seems like essence of Turkish delight. Capturing this flavor and combining it with wild blackberries makes a wondrous sorbet—as delicious as (free) frozen fruit and water can get.

I like to freeze the churned sorbet in ice-pop molds, and once they’re hard frozen, dip them in thick melted milk chocolate before refreezing.

150 g/¾ cup sugar

200 ml/¾ cup water

6 rose geranium leaves

400 g/1 lb blackberries, wild if possible

Juice of 1 lemon

1. To prepare the sorbet: heat the sugar and 150 ml/⅔ cup of the water together in a pan to make a simple syrup, stirring to dissolve the grains of sugar. As soon as the syrup comes to a boil, stir in the rose geranium leaves. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and set in a sink of ice water to infuse for 30 minutes. Once cold, chill in the fridge with the leaves still in the syrup.

2. Lightly cook the blackberries. If using a microwave, place them in a heatproof bowl with a tablespoon of water, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook on high for 2 to 3 minutes. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan just until they are collapsed and piping hot (do not boil). Cool the bowl in a sink of ice water, then cover and chill in the fridge.

3. To make the sorbet: remove the syrup from the fridge and strain it over the blackberries, squeezing every drop from the geranium leaves. Discard the leaves and add the lemon juice to the fruit.

4. Blitz the blackberries, syrup, and lemon juice together until very smooth, 2 to 3 minutes. Pass this purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the seeds. Wash the seeds by straining the remaining 50 ml/3 tablespoons water over them then add this pip juice to the blackberry purée.

5. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, thick, and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

This is a romantic kind of sorbet to make in midsummer, when the apricots (of your dreams) are overripe and the roses are blowsy (or the blouses are rosy). Look for pink-blushed fruits that dent like memory foam when you press them. The more deeply orange the insides the better—they make a wild-colored sorbet.

This recipe calls for rose petals to steep in sugar syrup for a week to capture their delicate fragrance. If you don’t have the time, substitute shop-bought rose water or syrup (see this page), but the scent you get from fresh petals is the best, particularly in combination with apricots—like taking a deep sniff from an armful of flowers.

For the rose petal syrup (makes more than you need)

160 g/¾ cup sugar

160 ml/¾ cup water

50 g fresh/2 oz scented rose petals (organic, not sprayed)

¼ teaspoon citric acid

For the sorbet

525 g/1 lb 3 oz ripe apricots (about 12 large apricots)

260 ml/1 cup rose petal syrup

Juice of ½ lemon

1. To make the syrup: bring the sugar and water to a simmer in a medium pan, stirring occasionally to make sure the sugar dissolves. Place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool.

2. Pour the cool syrup into a clean lidded container, then stir the rose petals in to submerge. Cover the syrup at surface level with a layer of plastic wrap. Do this so that no air can get in, to avoid oxidization of the rose petals. Place a tightly fitting lid on the container and chill in the fridge for 1 week.

3. After a week, strain the syrup through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, squeezing hard to extract as much flavor as possible from the petals. Discard the petals and whisk the citric acid into the syrup to dissolve. The syrup can be stored in a clean glass bottle or jar in the fridge for up to a week (or it can be frozen in a suitable container).

4. To prepare the sorbet: slice the apricots in half and remove the pits. Cook the apricots very lightly just until the fruit collapses. If using a microwave, place the fruit in a heatproof bowl with a tablespoon of water. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and cook on high for 2 to 3 minutes until tender. Otherwise, simmer the apricot halves gently in a non-reactive pan just until they are cooked through and piping hot (do not boil). Cool in a sink of ice water, then cover and chill in the fridge until completely cold, 2 to 3 hours.

5. Carefully measure out 260 ml/1 cup rose petal syrup. Add this to the apricots along with the lemon juice and liquidize them together for 2 minutes, until very smooth. Pass the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, discarding the skin.

6. To make the sorbet: pour the apricot purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and thick and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within 2 weeks.

Note—Alternatively, make the syrup using 160 g/¾ cup sugar plus 100 ml/½ cup water and 2 tablespoons of rose water.

Elizabeth David wrote once about being served a perfect Pêche de Vigne for dessert in a restaurant in Paris in the 1940s—cygnet gray skin concealing sharp raspberry-rose fleshed fruit within. It came presented in its own box: lined with black satin and sitting on a pink velvet cushion. It was the speciality of a town called Montreuil.

From the sixteenth century onward, pêches sanguines (blood peaches) were trained to grow in the walled fruit gardens of Montreuil along a maze of sun-trapped bricks. These gardens are peach-less now but still exist—I looked them up!

Here in my flat in Elephant and Castle my heart actually aches for a walled fruit garden. You too may spend an unreasonable amount of time dreaming about moving to Montreuil to open a Pêche de Vigne ice cream kiosk after tasting this ice cream…

4 or 5 ripe Pêche de Vigne or blood peaches (alternatively use 4 regular peaches and 100 g/4 oz fresh raspberries, about 650 g/1½ lb total weight)

Zest and juice of 1 lemon, preferably unwaxed

1 teaspoon raspberry vinegar (optional)

210 g/1 cup sugar

150 ml/¾ cup whole milk

350 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

4 egg yolks

1. To prepare the ice cream: cut an X in the bottom of each peach and then lower them into boiling water for about 20 seconds. Dip the peaches into cold water again to refresh them, and then let them cool. The skins should slip right off (see Note).

2. Halve the peeled peaches, collecting any juice in a bowl underneath. Remove the pit, quarter, and roughly chop the fruit into the bowl. Add the lemon zest and the juice, the raspberry vinegar (if using), and 50 g/¼ cup of the sugar. Stir gently, cover with plastic wrap, and leave to macerate in the fridge.

3. Bring the milk, cream, and salt to a simmer in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and the rest of the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

4. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill.

5. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled peaches into the custard, then liquidize until as smooth as possible. Using a small ladle, push the peach custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container.

6. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—Pêche de Vigne is an old-fashioned variety of peach. It has thick, fuzzy skin that has been bred out of more modern cultivars. You need to remove this, otherwise it will spoil the finished texture of the ice cream.

You can replace the Pêche de Vigne with Nectarine de Vigne for an equally delicious ice cream: simply rinse, slice, and macerate—no need to peel.

Fig Leaves

Figs—at least ones grown in this country—usually need the protection of a walled garden and a good couple of weeks’ consistent warmth to get their juices going and to give the fruit a chance of ripening properly. Fig leaves have a gorgeous smell, though, whatever the weather, and can be used to impart flavor in lots of ways in the kitchen. If you keep your eyes peeled, you’ll see the trees growing in all sorts of places.

I was once told that fig trees flourish near water sources within Victorian towns, and have noticed this to be true as I often see them growing near canals and small streams in places like London and Cambridge. The reason for this is supposed to be that the seeds of dried figs (having been eaten and then…um…passed) make their way through old sewage systems then out to the countryside until they find a likely-looking place to germinate.

Cycling through St. James’s Park on a sunny afternoon, by the lake that leads up to Buckingham Palace, I was stopped in my tracks quite literally by the warm smell of figs. Towering over the pelicans, and figgier than a £60 candle, grew a…majestic tree. Could it be the consequence of a fantastic box of Turkish figs enjoyed by Queen Victoria many Christmases ago? I picked a modest few of its lovely leaves to make my first fig leaf ice cream, and have been doing so ever since. Now’s the time to admit this—forgive me, Your Majesty.

Raspberries provide the acidity and brightness necessary to complement fig leaves’ soft, dusky flavor. Try serving this alongside Pigeon Fig and Pineau des Charentes (this page) or Green Walnut ice cream (this page).

2 fresh fig leaves

190 g/1 cup sugar

240 ml/1 cup water

450 g/1 lb raspberries

Juice of 1 lemon

1. To prepare the sorbet: rinse the fig leaves and cut out the core stem. Stack the leaves, roll them up, and cut them into wide ribbons.

2. Heat the sugar and 190 ml/¾ cup of the water together in a pan to make a simple syrup, stirring to dissolve the sugar. As soon as the syrup comes to a boil, add the sliced fig leaves. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and set in a sink of ice water to infuse for 40 minutes.

3. Strain the syrup, squeezing every drop from the leaves. Discard the leaves and add the syrup and raspberries to a bowl. Either microwave the mix for a minute or two or cook together in a non-reactive pan just until the raspberries burst. Cool in a sink of ice water.

4. Liquidize the raspberries and lemon juice until very smooth. Pass this purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the seeds. Rinse the seeds with the remaining 50 ml/¼ cup water, add this pip juice to the purée, and whisk to combine. Cover and refrigerate.

5. To make the sorbet: remove the purée from the fridge and whisk well to combine, in case it has separated slightly. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Green Walnuts

One stormy spring day in Lambeth, I discovered a big old walnut tree growing behind the council garage where I park my ice cream van. Typically, I smelled the tree first with my constantly alert, food-seeking hooter, before looking up and noticing it. A few of its unripe nuts had been blown onto the concrete forecourt and after being reversed over and crushed a few times by my Piaggio Ape, had scented the air with a deliciously spicy zephyr. Before you could say Squirrel Nutkins, I persuaded my long-suffering husband to scuttle up the tree and pick a carrier bagful to take back to the ice cream shed.

Nocino Liqueur

In Italy, tender green (or unripe) walnuts are traditionally harvested in midsummer to make dark, espresso-colored nocino and have to be picked before the shell has had time to form. If you want to be really precise about it, they ought to be plucked from the tree by barefoot maidens on the eve of the feast of St. John the Baptist (June 24). The walnut has always maintained an aura of legend in Italy, linked to the presence of witches and spells, and happily the alchemy would seem to be transmitted into this bewitching elixir.

To make your own nocino, fill a clean 2-liter bottling jar (or two 1-liter jars) with a liter of cheap vodka, 500 g/2 cups sugar, 10 cloves, 2 cinnamon sticks, ½ teaspoon black peppercorns, ½ vanilla pod, and strips of zest from one unwaxed lemon. Stir together until the sugar dissolves, then add 30 quartered green walnuts (wear gloves when slicing them—the juice will stain your hands nicotine brown!). Shake the jar gently to expel any air bubbles, then seal it, write the date on the tape, and stick it on the side.

Leave the jar(s) in a sunny, bright spot in your kitchen and turn every few days to expose the walnuts to the light. Continue to do this for 6 weeks. After 6 weeks, strain the walnuts and spices from the liquid, and pass the liquid through coffee filters or a jelly bag into clean bottles. Once your nocino has been bottled, store it out of sight somewhere dark—it musn’t be drunk until November 3 at the earliest, and gets darker and more delicious the longer you leave it.

Sip it as a curative digestivo after heavy winter dinners, pour it over vanilla ice cream as you would with affogato, or, best of all, use it to make ice cream.

Fig Leaf and Raspberry (this page) / Green Walnut (this page) / Pigeon Fig and Pineau des Charentes (this page)

This is one of my very favorite ice creams. The flavors echo maple, butterscotch, and espresso but are resolutely unique. It would be the one to serve at a banquet (if you ever had a banquet)—a perfect accompaniment to Fig Leaf and Raspberry sorbet (this page) and Pigeon Fig and Pineau des Charentes ice cream (this page).

300 ml/1¼ cups whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

6 egg yolks

90 g/½ cup sugar

4 candied green walnuts, drained and chopped (about half a 450 g/1 lb jar)

3 tablespoons nocino liqueur

1. To prepare the ice cream: heat the milk and heavy cream in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it catching. When the liquid is steaming hot, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

2. Pour the hot milk and cream over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling the eggs and keeping a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat, add the chopped green walnuts or raw walnuts (see Note), and blend these into the custard with an immersion blender, then place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Stir the custard every so often to help it cool more quickly. Once the custard is at room temperature, stir in the nocino liqueur. Scrape the mixture into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge overnight.

3. To make the ice cream: the following day, use an immersion blender or food processor to blitz the custard again at high speed until very smooth and emulsified, 2 minutes.

4. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—Look out for jars of fudge-like preserved walnuts (they look like big black olives) in Turkish, Greek, and Middle Eastern shops, where they are known as ceviz tatlısı or glyko karydaki and are traditionally eaten for dessert with kaymak—water buffalo clotted cream. Alternatively, you could substitute the candied walnuts for 30 g/1 oz raw shelled walnuts and add an extra 2 tablespoons of nocino liqueur. Nocino or vin de noix can be found online.

 

I had almost given up on the notion of a watermelon sorbet—why overcomplicate the beauty of an icy slice of ripe watermelon? Then one Indian summer day I found myself with some figs to use up. I couldn’t bear to waste them—they were lovely squashed ones I’d picked on holiday in Sardinia but there weren’t enough to make fig ice cream or sorbet. I struck upon the idea of using them with watermelon—also plentiful at that time of year.

The figs give body and sap to the watery pink watermelon juice, dulling its color a deep blue-red. It’s a wonderfully refreshing but easy-to-scoop sorbet. If you can’t pick wild figs I won’t hold it against you—just use the ripest, blackest ones you can find.

225 g/½ lb ripe black or Turkish figs (about 6)

700 g/1½ lb watermelon flesh (red part only)

110 g/½ cup sugar

Juice of 1 lemon

1. To prepare the sorbet: rinse the figs then slice in half and place them in a bowl, sprinkled with a tablespoon of water. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and cook in a microwave on high for 3 to 4 minutes. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan just until they’re tender, juicy, and piping hot (do not boil). Set aside to cool; once cold, cover and chill in the fridge along with the cubed watermelon flesh (in a separate container) until completely cold, 2 to 3 hours.

2. Once the figs are thoroughly chilled, liquidize them with the watermelon, sugar, and lemon juice long enough for the sugar granules to dissolve, 2 to 3 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois. Save a couple of teaspoons of the seeds if you like and add these back to the purée for texture.

3. To make the sorbet: pour the dark red purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and thick and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

4. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within 2 weeks.

 

Plums have a dependable quality I like. Even unripe, unexciting ones—in fact, even those rock-hard purple tennis balls you get year-round at the supermarket. They undergo a kind of alchemy once they’re cooked and the tannic depths of flavor are drawn from their skins, becoming lusty and slurp-able. This makes them a very good choice for ice cream.

Next time you get a glut of wasp-eaten windfalls—or a netted plastic tub of plums from the supermarket—try making this inexpensive, sweet, and lovely ice cream. I like it best as part of a triple scoop with Pêche de Vigne ice cream (this page) and Pear, Myrtle, and Ginger sorbet (this page).

450 g/1 lb plums (varieties like Victoria, Jubilee, Marjorie’s Seedling, and Quetsche d’Alsace are all good)

140 ml/½ cup whole milk

200 ml/1 cup heavy cream

½ vanilla pod, split lengthwise

3 egg yolks

160 g/¾ cup+ 1 tablespoon sugar

1. To prepare the ice cream: cook the plums lightly. If using a microwave, halve and pit the plums and place them in a heatproof bowl. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and cook for 3 to 4 minutes on high. Otherwise simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan just until they are tender, pulpy, and piping hot (do not boil). Set aside to cool; once cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

2. Heat the milk, cream, and split vanilla pod gently, stirring every so often with a whisk or silicone spatula. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl for a few seconds to combine.

3. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, pick out the vanilla pod and squeeze out all the little black seeds, adding them back to the custard. Use a spatula to scrape the chilled plums into the custard, making sure there are no bits of pit still attached. Liquidize for 2 to 3 minutes, or until very smooth. Use a small ladle to push the pink custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container. Discard any remaining seeds and fruit skin.

5. Pour the plum custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within a couple of weeks.

Note—If you get a big haul of plums it’s worth remembering that they freeze beautifully when halved, pitted, and bagged up in zip-top bags. They can be cooked like this frozen, and will see you through winter with delicious fruity ice cream.

I have adored grappa ever since I was a sad 16-year-old foreign exchange student on a trip to Italy and took to ordering caffè coretto con grappa (espresso with grappa) because I thought it was cool and because I discovered it was cheaper to order standing at the bar. (Ah—I miss my teenaged self now.)

Grappa is a grape-based brandy with a high alcohol content. Its flavor catches you at the back of your throat, making you feel breathless and reducing your voice to a husky rasp. It is a natural partner for the deeply dusky damson plum, lightly correcting the fruit’s natural dryness.

This is one of the best recipes in the book—it is thick, satiny, and splendid, and has a papal purple color fit for a pair of pope’s socks.

300 g/½ lb damson plums

160 ml/⅔ cup whole milk

240 ml/1 cup heavy cream

3 large egg yolks

130 g/⅔ cup sugar

1 tablespoon grappa

1. To prepare the ice cream: rinse the damsons, then slice them in half and pit them. Put them in a bowl and sprinkle a couple of tablespoons of water over the top. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and cook in a microwave on high for 3 to 4 minutes. Otherwise, simmer them gently in a non-reactive pan just until they’re tender, pulpy, and piping hot (do not boil). Set aside to cool; once cold, cover and chill in the fridge.

2. Gently heat the milk and cream, stirring every so often with a whisk or silicone spatula to prevent it from catching. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl for a few seconds to combine.

3. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it to a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a spatula to scrape the chilled damsons and any juice into the custard—check that there are no bits of pit still attached. Add the grappa and liquidize for 2 to 3 minutes, or until very smooth. Use a small ladle to push the plum-colored custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container. Discard any remaining pits and fruit skin.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, about 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—If you have a Mouli rotational grater and the damson plums prove too hard to pit, it can be easier to cook the fruit whole, and then pass them through the Mouli when they are done to remove the pits.

Prickly Pear

I first saw prickly pears growing in Sardinia; it was late September and the Mediterranean island was a dusty rock by the time we visited. This comical-looking cactus plant, pinned with dabs of sunset fruits and flowers, lined every roadside along with monstrous overgrown fennel, myrtle, figs, olives, and grapes. The vigor of all this wild food growing in the rubble was dazzling and made me feel depressed about my window box.

On the last day of the trip, with the car packed to head back to the airport (I’d filled my luggage with squished figs, newspaper wraps of fennel pollen, and tins of tomatoes), I remembered the prickly pears. The thought of going home without having tried a purple-fleshed fico d’India was unthinkable, but—too lazy to do it myself—I persuaded my husband to hop out of the car and pick a couple for me.

“Really?” asked John in a slightly tiresome, anxious way.

“Yes—it’s fine! Just twist them off the branch!”

I sat in the car, passenger windows wide open to the late afternoon sun, and watched as Johnny, silhouetted in front of me, plucked a couple of fruits from a high paddle-shaped palm. As the plant pinged back, it released an infinitesimal cloud of needle-like microscopic hairs. They drifted across the sky, settling over a screaming John and then on through the car window where I was sat in my shorts—before hooking in to me, too. The shards embedded themselves like fiberglass in very difficult places for several long days before disintegrating. They left me not only with a big grudge against prickly pears, but more than that, with a question: who can be bothered with them and what is the point?

I’ve tried prickly pear sorbet occasionally since then, tempted back by its extra-ordinary magenta color and wondering if I’ve missed a trick. The flavor always leaves me nonplussed. It’s not that the fruit itself is tasteless—they can be pleasant and somewhat floral, a little like watermelon. But once you add sugar or milk, the delicate flavor is lost. My conclusion is that the best way to eat them is like they do in Mexico; stuck on a stick by someone wearing gloves, frozen, and then delicately peeled to reveal the sweet, refreshing flesh—a kind of whole fruit ice pop.

Choco Ice (this page) using Damson and Grappa with Almond Nougat (this page)

Pears are gorgeous little beasts, but they’re ripe for half an hour, and you’re never there…

This quote from Eddie Izzard pretty much sums up how I feel about pears. My best advice is to buy a couple of the ripest ones you can find, then leave them in a brown paper bag on a high shelf where they can lie untouched and in the dark for three or four days.

Follow your nose here: rather than squeezing and bruising the pears, go for the absolute strongest white-pear-drop smelling ones. Although this is still not a guaranteed tip, as there is always the possibility that you will forget about them and they will implode, the core turning to brown mush while your back is turned. But it is my only one!

With some luck your efforts will be successful and you will be rewarded with this soft, fiery sorbet that hums with pear flavor and has a luxuriant, snowy texture like the center of a fondant crème.

Myrtle is probably easier to find than you think—it’s a brushy shrub with small evergreen leaves and starry white flowers. Often planted in hedges and gardens, it has a fragrance a bit like bay, only sweeter and spicier. If you can’t find it, it can be left out or replaced with a couple of bay leaves.

Serve with Ricotta and Canditi ice cream (this page) or make a Pear Colonel—a scoop of sorbet with a shot of frozen Poire Williams (pear brandy) poured over the top.

125 g/⅔ cup sugar 275 ml/1 cup water

3 ripe pears (about 540 g/1¼ lb total weight)

25 g/1 oz freshly picked myrtle leaves

Juice of 1 lemon

8 cm/3-inch piece of fresh ginger

1. Put the sugar and the water into a non-reactive pan. Heat gently until the sugar dissolves.

2. Wash the pears and peel them so their peelings and any juice drop directly into the warm syrup. Quarter the pears, cut the cores away from the flesh, and slip the quarters into the syrup along with the myrtle leaves. The pears brown quickly after being exposed to the air, but if they are immersed in the syrup you won’t need to hold them in acidulated water beforehand (which can make them soggy).

3. Increase the heat and cover the pears and myrtle with a circle of baking paper (a cloche). Simmer the fruit very gently for a couple of minutes, until the pears are opaque and piping hot all the way through. (Lightly cooking the pears kills the enzyme that makes them go brown.) Cooking them too much will spoil the fresh flavor, so this is to be done with care.

4. Scoop the pear quarters out of the pan and into a clean bowl. Add the lemon juice and then strain the syrup over them, squeezing hard to extract as much flavor as possible. Throw away the peelings and myrtle leaves. Leave to cool then cover and chill in the fridge.

5. To make the sorbet: grate the ginger (I love my microplane) into a small bowl or dish. With clean hands, squeeze the juice out of the grated ginger and add it to the pears (throw away the tough fibers).

6. Blitz the pears, syrup, ginger, and lemon juice with an immersion blender until very smooth. Push the resulting purée through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois.

7. Pour the mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions or until frozen and thick and snowy, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

8. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—Much of the aroma of apples and pears is contained in their skins. Steeping the pear peelings with the sugar syrup releases some of this essence and improves the flavor of the finished sorbet.

A gently aromatic ice cream with spice from fresh glossy bay leaves, a little acidity from the apple, and a bite of dark crispness from the buttery rye bread crumbs at the end.

It’s slightly discouraging that customers almost always mishear this flavor for one containing Baileys (as in the Irish cream liqueur) rather than bay leaves. I’ve gotten used to their disappointed reactions. But what can you do? You can’t always go with the money.

For the rye crumbs

2 slices of 100% rye sourdough bread (preferably a few days old)

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 tablespoon soft brown muscovado sugar

For the ice cream

1 extra-large Bramley apple (about 400 g/12 oz total weight)

150 ml/½ cup whole milk

200 ml/1 cup heavy cream

3 egg yolks

150 g/¾ cup sugar

6 fresh bay leaves roughly chopped

1. To make the rye crumbs: trim the crusts from the rye bread, tear the slices into pieces, and put these into a food processor and grind them into coarse bread crumbs. Tip into a heavy-based pan and gently toast the crumbs over medium-low heat for 5 to 6 minutes, or until they have dried out somewhat.

2. Add the butter and sugar to the pan. Once it melts, stir it into the bread crumbs so they start to fry and caramelize at the same time. Fry them for another 5 minutes, or until they are crisp. Remove them from the heat and pour onto a piece of parchment to cool in an even layer. Once cold, store them in a zip-top bag in the freezer.

3. To prepare the ice cream: I like cooking Bramleys in a microwave: score a circular line around the stem end and the flower end (see this page) with a sharp knife, then place the apple in a Pyrex bowl or jug with a tablespoon of water, cover with plastic wrap, and cook for 4 to 5 minutes on medium-high. The apple, if ripe, should explode into fluffy purée. Once it has cooled down you will find it’s easy to scrape the cooked apple from the skin and core with a spoon. Otherwise peel, core, and slice the apple and simmer gently in a non-reactive pan with a tablespoon of water, just until it’s soft and tender. Leave to cool, then measure out 300 g/12 oz cooked apple into a clean container, cover, and chill in the fridge.

4. Heat the milk and cream together in a pan, stirring every so often with a whisk or silicone spatula to prevent it from catching. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

5. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat and stir in the fresh bay leaves. Cover the pan with plastic wrap and place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it (along with the bay leaves) into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

6. To make the ice cream: the following day, strain the custard over the apple purée, discard the bay leaves, and liquidize the custard and apple with an immersion blender until very smooth, 2 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container.

7. Pour the apple custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

8. Working quickly, scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container, sprinkling with spoonfuls of frozen buttery rye crumbs as you go until you think you’ve used enough. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best eaten within about 10 days, while the crumbs are still crisp.

This electric mauve “grape color” sorbet bursts with crazy bubblegum-flavored fruit. Uva fragola are a seasonal Italian grape variety similar to Concord grapes, with an intoxicating smell and flavor.

I love this flavor blended with ice and prosecco. Otherwise, it is best served with a creamy scoop of peanut ice cream made like pistachio ice cream, but with toasted peanuts substituted for pistachio nuts (this page), PB&J style.

550 g/1¼ lb uva fragola or Concord grapes, washed

½ small green or unripe lemon, finely diced

1 teaspoon vitamin C powder

150 g/¾ cup sugar

200 ml/¾ cup water

1. To prepare the sorbet: rinse the grapes and pick from the stem. Put the grapes, diced whole lemon, vitamin C powder, sugar, and water in a bowl and blitz together roughly with an immersion blender. Cover the bowl and chill in the fridge overnight.

2. To make the sorbet: the following day, thoroughly liquidize the grapes (around 3 minutes), making sure any sugar granules have been dissolved and the mixture looks smooth.

3. Pass this mix through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois. Use the back of a ladle to squeeze as much flavor as possible from the skins. When the skins look dry you are done and they can be discarded.

4. Pour the grape purée into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions, 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Eat within about 2 weeks.

Note—The use of vitamin C powder (you can find it at the pharmacy) draws the strong flavor out of the thick grape skins and prevents the blended fruit from oxidizing and turning brown.

This recipe is adapted from a creation by the French pastry chef Pierre Hermé, who was a good friend of Lionel Poilâne. I bought Pierre Hermé a box of Poilâne apple tarts one day and in return he gave me a copy of his book Desserts, which is where I first read about this rather unusual method of cooking an ice cream base. The base is gently oven-baked to a set custard, then cooled and blended to re-liquefy. It’s not an exaggeration to say it transforms it into the richest, silkiest ice cream base ever—the staff at St. John Bread & Wine would mass around like a swarm of bees when it came to scooping the churned stuff out of the machine—I never saw it cleaned so fast.

If you can leave the ice cream a week or so in the freezer it becomes even more irresistible—the shards of crunchy burned sugar melting and pooling into rivulets of liquid caramel.

For the caramel (makes more than you need, but it keeps!)

200 g/1 cup superfine sugar

For the ice cream

1 vanilla pod

200 ml/¾ cup whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

55 g/⅓ cup sugar

Pinch of sea salt

5 egg yolks

55 g/¼ cup soft brown unrefined sugar

1. To make the caramel: sprinkle the bottom of a heavy-based pan with an even layer of the superfine sugar. Place it over medium-high heat and cook slowly and without stirring until it begins to melt and caramelize. Swirl the pan to achieve even caramelization. If the caramel starts crystallizing, turn the heat to the lowest setting. The sugar will all eventually melt, and get darker and darker in color.

2. Cook the caramel to a dark copper color—it needs to be cooked long enough for the sugar’s sweetness to be replaced with dark caramel flavor, usually a second or two after it begins to smoke.

3. As soon as you reach this stage, carefully pour out the caramel onto a large heatproof silicone mat or onto buttered waxed paper and leave to cool until hardened. Once cold, place the caramel in a sealable airtight bag.

4. To prepare the ice cream: preheat the oven to 275°F.

5. Split the vanilla pod using the tip of a sharp knife, scrape out the seeds, then add both seeds and pod to a pan along with the milk, cream, sugar, and salt. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, whisking often to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and brown sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

6. Pour the hot milk mix over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Pour this mix into a shallow baking sheet, ideally about 24 × 30 cm/9 x 12 inches. Transfer the tray to the oven and bake very gently until just set in the middle but still wobbly (don’t worry if the edges are a little more cooked), 20 to 25 minutes, depending on the depth of your pan.

7. Remove the custard from the oven, pick out the vanilla pod, scrape the mixture into a blender, and whizz until smooth and liquid again. Strain the mix through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, then chill in the fridge.

8. To make the ice cream: the following day, remove the custard from the fridge and blend with an immersion blender for a minute to re-liquefy. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

9. While the ice cream is churning, lightly smash the bag of caramel into smithereens with a rolling pin.

10. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container, sprinkling with spoonfuls of the smashed caramel as you go. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Best kept a few days in the freezer before eating.

In Turkey and the Middle East in the autumn and through winter, it’s normal to find street vendors selling fresh, foaming pomegranate juice by the glass (or plastic bagful). You will usually be given the luxury of choosing between two types: sweet and sour. The pressed juice isn’t clear and berry red like the expensive stuff you buy in the supermarket; until it settles it has the cloudiness of an unpolished garnet. The flavor cannot be duplicated: it’s the most deep, dry, grown-up juice.

Combined with Seville orange juice it makes an invigorating granita that tastes like something from the underworld, and can be tempered just slightly by smothering in zest-spiked, sweetened whipped cream.

65 g/⅓ plus 2 tablespoons sugar (or up to 30% more if using sour pomegranate)

65 ml/¼ cup water

1 Seville orange, leafy orange, or chinotto (or use 1 large normal orange)

2 large pomegranates

1. Place a large, shallow stainless steel baking sheet or dish into the freezer to get very cold.

2. Heat the sugar and water together, stir to dissolve the sugar granules, and bring the syrup to a simmer.

3. Rinse the orange, then zest it directly into the hot syrup. Set aside to cool.

4. Cut the pomegranates in half horizontally, then hold each half cut-side down over a large bowl. Bash the curved side of the fruit with a rolling pin until the seeds tumble out between your fingers and into the bowl. Pick out and discard any pieces of pith.

5. Once the syrup is cold, pour it over the seeds with the juice of the orange and liquidize everything together until as smooth as possible, 2 to 3 minutes. Use a small ladle to push this mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the pomegranate seeds.

6. Pour this mix into the cold baking sheet, and place it flat on a freezer shelf. Stir with a fork after the first hour, then again every subsequent 45 minutes, paying particular attention to the outer edges to prevent hard lumps from forming.

7. The end result after about 3 hours should be a heap of garnet-colored ice crystals. Serve in chilled glasses with softly whipped cream. Can be kept covered in the freezer for up to a week.

Note—When shopping for pomegranates it’s not easy to tell which are sweet or sour just from looking, so taste the seeds when you get home and adjust the recipe according to what you’ve bought. In any case, look for fruits with round, shiny skin as tight as a drum, as though chilblained. Fresh ones should crack open with the pressure of a knife the same way ripe watermelons do.

Pomegranate and Bitter Orange Granita (this page) / Sheep’s Milk Yogurt and Wildflower Honey (this page) / Quince Custard (this page)

This recipe isn’t a low-fat alternative to ice cream; it is delicious in its own right, tasting clearly of tangy sheep’s milk yogurt and rich, floral wildflower honey.

Yogurt has a much lower fat content than cream, which can make frozen yogurts thin and gritty. But sheep’s milk is higher in protein and fat than cow’s—when it’s the thick, strained kind, more so. Protein adds body to the ice cream, improving the texture and adding structure without the need for fillers like dry milk powder (a staple of most commercial frozen yogurts).

Raw honey is added for flavor and scoop-ability. Serve with Pomegranate and Bitter Orange Granita (this page) and Quince Custard ice cream (this page).

550 g/2½ cups strained, full-fat sheep’s milk yogurt

30 g/2 tablespoons raw wildflower honey

70 g/⅓ cup sugar

¼ teaspoon iota carrageenan (optional; see Note)

100 ml/½ cup whole milk or sheep’s milk, chilled

1. To prepare the frozen yogurt: blend the yogurt and honey together using a food processor or an immersion blender until fully combined; chill in the fridge.

2. Whisk the sugar and carrageenan (if using) together in a bowl, then whisk in the cold milk until fully combined and lump-free.

3. Heat the milk mix to the simmering point, whisking frequently to prevent lumps of carrageenan forming—a microwave does this best, as the amounts are so small. Otherwise, use the smallest pan possible and a mini whisk. Leave the mix to cool in a sink or bowl full of ice water. Once the milk gel is cold, scrape it into the yogurt mix and liquidize for a couple of minutes until fully combined. Pass the mix through a sieve to make sure it’s lump-free.

4. To make the frozen yogurt: pour the yogurt into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and creamy-looking, 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Transfer the frozen yogurt to a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve. Eat within a week.

Note—If you’re a sucker for the super-smooth texture of soft-serve frozen yogurt (and I can’t deny I love it, too) then carrageenan (a gel derived from natural seaweed) can be added to the mix. It makes up somewhat for this ice missing the emulsifying quality of egg yolk, helping to bind the fat and water molecules together to make the ice extra smooth and silky. If you aren’t using carrageenan you can replace the milk with cream or half-and-half.

Quince

A working day on the pig farm in Urbino started at 6 a.m., when I would catch a ride on the blue tractor down the hill to feed the pigs, cows, rabbits, and chickens. Afterward we would sit and have breakfast in the front yard to catch the easterly sun. Coral-colored quince stewed in a pool of juice, served with thick yogurt, followed by bread and butter and honey and several pots of coffee.

The bread was homemade every few days from a starter, or madre, kept in a floury wooden dresser. Butter first had to be wiped clean from where the cat had been licking it in the night and then it could be mashed onto the bread with honey. We swapped our homemade strutto (lard) for sheep’s yogurt with the German couple down the road who had moved to Italy in the 1980s to start making cheese. The quinces were stolen from the neighboring agriturismo—who to Gigia’s disgust served Mulino Bianco biscuits for breakfast despite having planted bewitching ornamental trees around the swimming pool, which were heavy with the Naplesgold fruit in October.

Choose quinces whose waxy yellow skin smells intensely of pineapple cubes. Look out for them in the autumn, often sold alongside fresh chestnuts, pomegranates, and unbrined olives.

Quinces are hard work—prepping them requires an effort comparable to chopping wood, but long, slow cooking transforms their oddly spongy flesh into glowing wonder food with the rich fragrance of citrus and apples and pears.

I like adding chunks of frozen apple pie to this custard base. Serve alongside Sheep’s Milk Yogurt and Wildflower Honey ice cream (this page) or Pomegranate and Bitter Orange Granita (this page).

Juice of 1 lemon

200 ml/¾ cup water

650 g/1½ lb whole quinces

Zest and juice of 2 clementines

200 ml/¾ cup whole milk

200 ml/1 cup heavy cream

3 large egg yolks

1 tablespoon honey

180 g/1 cup sugar

1 slice of Bramley apple pie, frozen and chopped (optional)

1. To prepare the quince: preheat the oven to 350°F.

2. Add the lemon juice to a bowl with the water and then peel the quinces, saving the peelings. Quarter and core all the quince, discard the cores, and toss the quarters in the lemony water to prevent them from going brown.

3. Sprinkle the quince peel over the bottom of a small shallow baking dish or in a microwavable dish. Slice the quarters in half on top. Add the clementine zest and juice and then pour over the lemony water. Cover the dish snugly with a sheet of parchment, then foil (shiny side down to reflect the heat). Scrunch the foil tightly around the edges of the baking tray to prevent steam from escaping. If you are using a microwave, cover the bowl with plastic wrap.

4. Bake the quince in the oven for 2 hours. Otherwise you can microwave it on medium-high for 8 to 10 minutes, although a long, slow cooking is preferable. Remove from the oven and check the quince, which should be cooked to a coral-pink color and perfectly tender. Allow to cool, still covered with foil.

5. Once cold, transfer the quince pieces to a clean container and strain any remaining juice over the top, cover, and chill in the fridge (it will keep like this for about 5 days).

6. To prepare the ice cream: bring the milk and cream to a simmer in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, remove from the heat. Whisk the egg yolks, honey, and sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

7. Pour the hot milk over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat, then place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool. Once the custard is at room temperature, cover with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge overnight.

8. To make the ice cream: the following day, scrape the quince and its juice into the custard, then blitz with an immersion blender until completely smooth, about 2 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the grainy bits.

9. Pour the quince custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream. The mixture is so thick it won’t take long—15 to 20 minutes.

10. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container, sprinkling with frozen chunks of apple pie as you go (if using). Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—This ice cream has a texture like thick, granular honey but the high amount of fiber in quince means that it freezes very hard. It needs a good 15 minutes in the fridge before it’s soft enough to scoop.

Pistachio Ice Creams

Pistachio nuts feel chic—when I was growing up in late-seventies England they were considered too expensive for children (fair enough), and the very few times I saw them at home the bowl was kept as far beyond reach as if they were green chips of jade.

Needless to say, these days I am hopelessly addicted. The shells, as pretty and as clattery as a plateful of clams, only serve as tiny obstacles to be overcome at speed, the aim being to cram as many nuts into my mouth as possible in a vain attempt to one day reach pistachio satisfaction. This compulsion must be what helps make pistachio ice cream so popular, both at home and abroad.

There will always be a place in my heart for the pistachio ice cream bought from Bar Italia in Soho—as green as their 1960s neon tube signage, with an intangible melon flavor and extra almond extract, served with a scoop of Tutti Frutti on the side.

A favorite afternoon delight is a cup of stretchy Syrian milk ice cream, or éma’a, from the sweet shop Damas Rose on the Edgware Road. The éma’a is pounded with pine-scented mastic (resin) and salep (orchid root) until thick and chewy. The ice cream is then smothered in a layer of chopped pistachio nuts before it’s rolled up, sliced, and served with a flourish. Delicious and dense enough to last the walk down to catch a matinée at Curzon Mayfair.

Pistachio gelato gets better all the time, and you can recognize the quality by its dense matte texture and khaki color. My favorite version is from Gelateria da Ciccio (Fatty’s) in Palermo, served in a fist-sized brioche. I had to fashion a bib from a pink sheet of Gazzetto dello Sport to stop it dripping over my lap. Pro tip: If you choose two or more flavors, a true gelatiere will always have been taught to make pistachio the smaller portion because it’s so expensive. Beat the system and order a double scoop of the good stuff…

The flavor you get from green-gold freshly roasted pistachios is incomparable—no paste or purée can better it no matter how fancy it might be. Timing is important; the hot toasted nuts should hiss as they hit the scalded milk and the vivid green oil is extracted from them—this way you ensure that all the flavor goes into your ice cream custard.

Best served for breakfast—slapped into a big squishy brioche and dipped in cappuccino.

100 g/4 oz raw shelled pistachio nuts

250 ml/1 cup whole milk

180 ml/¾ cup heavy cream

Generous pinch of sea salt

3 egg yolks

150 g/¾ cup sugar

1 teaspoon mild honey

1. To prepare the ice cream: preheat the oven to 350°F.

2. Toast the pistachios, spreading them out on a baking sheet in an even layer. Move them around every 4 or 5 minutes—you don’t want them to color, only to crisp, but this could take up to 15 minutes so in the meantime you can start making the custard.

3. Heat the milk, cream, and salt together, stirring with a whisk or silicone spatula. When the liquid reaches a simmer, whisk the egg yolks, sugar, and honey together in a separate bowl until combined.

4. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat and set aside.

5. Take the toasted pistachio nuts from the oven and slide them, hot, directly into the hot custard. If you’ve timed it right the hot nuts should make a seething noise as they hit the custard. Pour this mixture into a food processor and liquidize for 2 to 3 minutes, watching the color slowly change to a vivid shade of green-gold. Scrape the custard into a clean container and place it in a sink of ice water to cool. Once the custard is at room temperature, cover tightly with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge.

6. To make the ice cream: the following day, remove the custard from the fridge. Liquidize it with an immersion blender and then pour into an ice cream machine. Churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Variations—You can substitute the pistachios for the same quantity of other kinds of nut with good results. Peanuts and blanched hazelnuts both make great alternatives. Pine nuts would be a luxurious choice. Walnuts are a favorite too, but keep a very close eye on them as they roast (the same goes for pine nuts). If they color anything beyond palest blond they will be too bitter to use in ice cream. Once you remove them from the oven, rub in a clean dish towel to remove the bitter skins before adding them to the custard.

Firm-fleshed, with poster-paint green peel and bright orange insides, satsuma Miyagawa are sharp, radiant, and full of fragrance. Like all green-skinned citrus fruit, they have highly aromatic zest, as seductive as a great aftershave. Make as much of it as you can—its oil makes all the difference in this sorbet.

Originally hailing from Japan but arriving in Europe and the United States via New Zealand, satsuma Miyagawa are the first citrus in the northern hemisphere to be ripe. Over a period of a few weeks its peel will begin to change from green to yellow, becoming baggy and less toothsome, so it’s a good idea to seek out this citrus at the very beginning of the season.

I like to keep a few green fruits whole: slice off little “lids” and remove every drop of juice and pith before freezing the shells and refilling them with freshly churned sorbet. Replace the lids and hard freeze the whole lot. Serve wrapped in crinkly cellophane and tied with shiny ribbons for a retro dessert that has lost none of its power to impress.

I’ve always had a soft spot for lemon sorbet eaten out of its shell (in guscio) although you rarely see it in modern Italian restaurants. In Italy itself, I’ve only ever seen this dessert for sale in gas stations. Surprisingly, Italian gas (and railway) stations can often double up as quite good cafés—but are nonetheless odd places to find sorbet-stuffed frozen lemons.

This is also delicious served with Chocolate and Green Mandarin ice cream (this page).

160 g/¾ cup sugar

160 ml/¾ cup water

8–12 satsuma Miyagawa (or use firm-fleshed clementines, satsuma, or mandarins)

1 lemon

1. To prepare the sorbet: heat the sugar and water together in a small non-reactive pan, stir to dissolve the sugar granules, and bring the syrup to a simmer. Remove from the heat.

2. Rinse and pat dry the citrus fruits. Zest the satsumas and the lemon directly into the pan of warm syrup, cover the pan with plastic wrap, and place in a sink full of ice water to cool.

3. Juice all of the citrus, and measure out 600 ml/2½ cups juice (drink any that is left over—yum!). Stir the juice into the cold syrup. Chill the mix for 2 to 3 hours in the fridge to chill thoroughly.

4. To make the sorbet: strain the liquid mix though a fine-mesh sieve or chinois and use a small ladle to squeeze the zest and extract as much juice and flavor from it as possible.

5. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, thick, and snowy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Transfer the sorbet to a suitable lidded container (or into the pre-frozen satsuma shells). Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze for at least 2 hours, or until ready to serve.

 

This is an exquisite almond sorbet flavored with spices popular in Renaissance Italy. I used to make it with raw almonds, ground and squeezed and pressed into milk. Now I’ve discovered there are really great quality almond butters available to buy that taste better, so I use them instead—saving myself a lot of washing up.

Look for white almond paste made from fatty and delicious Marcona almonds. Finely ground, this melts in your mouth in a silky, expensive way, rather than being too crunchy. It’s worth seeking out an organic brand this time—only the organic trees still contain strains of wild almond, and these nuts in particular contribute the powerful and necessary bitter almond flavor.

If you prefer to keep things dairy-free, then this is super on its own, or try it with a shot of iced espresso poured over the top like the Pugliese drink caffè in ghiacchio. Otherwise, scoop this twinned with Montmorency Cherry Sherbet (this page) or topped with whipped cream and maraschino cherries, a scrap of gold leaf added for festivity.

Piece of cinnamon bark

1 bay leaf

5 black peppercorns

Dusting of nutmeg

Zest of ½ unwaxed lemon

150 g/¾ cup sugar

550 ml/2 cups water

1 tablespoon honey

150 g/⅔ cup organic white almond butter (I use the Biona brand)

2 drops of orange flower water

1. To prepare the sorbet: bash the spices and lemon zest in a mortar and pestle for a few seconds until lightly bruised.

2. Put the sugar, water, honey, and bruised spices into a pan and bring to a simmer, stirring until the sugar dissolves. As soon as the sugar syrup reaches the simmering point, remove it from the heat, add the almond butter and orange flower water, and whisk it in to incorporate, then place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool. Cover and chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours or overnight.

3. To make the sorbet: the following day, whisk the almond syrup briskly, then strain the mix through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, discarding the zest and spices.

4. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, thick, and creamy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze for at least 2 hours, or until ready to serve. Best eaten within a week.

 

Coffee ice cream is the greatest: one part of the holy trinity of flavors that used to make up my unbeatable regular order from the classic Giolitti caffè in Rome (the other two being zabaglione and pistachio, since you ask).

I’ve tried many different ways of making it, from experimenting with cold brew (so messy) to using shots of espresso (flavor gets lost) to sprinkling ground coffee in the mix (so grainy—don’t do it). But the best results are achieved by this simple method of steeping good-quality, freshly roasted coffee beans in a custard base. You can control the desired strength by the length of time you steep the beans. My preference is for a bitter, strongly brewed frozen custard—pure heaven served in espresso cups with a spoonful of thick double cream on top.

300 ml/1¼ cups whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

6 egg yolks

80 g/⅓ cup light brown muscovado sugar

20 g/2 tablespoons sugar

65 g/⅓ cup freshly roasted coffee beans

3 to 4 brown sugar cubes—the La Perruche brand is perfect and crunchy (optional)

1 tablespoon strong espresso, cooled (optional)

1. To prepare the ice cream: bring the milk, cream, and salt to a simmer in a non-reactive pan. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and sugars together in a separate bowl until combined.

2. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat, add the coffee beans, and stir to submerge them in the custard. Cover the pan with plastic wrap and place in a sink full of ice water to cool. Set aside until cold, 30 to 40 minutes.

3. The longer you leave the beans in the custard, the stronger the flavor. Taste the custard: if once the mix has cooled the custard tastes like strong café crème, pass the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, squeezing the beans to extract as much flavor as possible into the custard. Otherwise, chill the beans in the custard overnight and sieve the following day.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, sieve the coffee beans, if you haven’t already done so, and then liquidize the custard with an immersion blender for a minute until smooth.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. If using the sugar cubes, place them in a cup and pour the espresso over the top, allowing it to be absorbed by the sugar, then swirl the wet, treacly sugar into the churned ice cream.

7. Scrape the churned ice cream into a clean lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—Make sure the cream and milk you use are very fresh, otherwise there is a danger that the acidity of the coffee beans will curdle the mix. Leaving the coffee beans whole results in a white ice cream; roughly grinding them will turn the custard coffee colored.

Chestnuts

About three weeks into my stay on the pig farm, on a day that Carlo was away, Gigia got a tip-off about some chestnut flour (i.e., perfect pig food) being given away by friends who lived on a farm in the Apennines, north of Modena. We bundled off in the car on a day trip, driving up higher and higher while the temperature dropped, until our breath fogged up the windshield. The “farm” was not much more than a wooden cabin divided into three rooms where a pair of ancient twin brothers lived and worked. A kitchen and a bedroom formed the ground floor; the attic space with its slatted floorboards was reserved for drying the sweet chestnuts they harvested above a big wood fire in an adjacent lean-to.

The brothers welcomed us after our long drive with lunch cooked on a 1970s range stove of great charm in an otherwise empty room, bar clean linoleum floor, table, and four chairs. We drank dark, fizzy chestnut beer and ate nubbins of peppery salami, followed by plates of fine eggy homemade chestnut tagliatelle and wild boar ragù and finally the obligatory espresso and a smoky square of deeply savory castagnaccio (most probably baked in strutto, or pork fat) and scattered with pine nuts, rosemary, and raisins. The ingredients used to cook the entire meal can’t have numbered more than half a dozen.

I dream of reproducing that lunch—right down to the floor, the fairy tale brothers, and the flavors that reminded me of the smell from those misty hills and surrounding woods. We drove home with half a dozen 25 kg/50 lb bags of free chestnut flour for the pigs. The brothers had been persuaded to pack the flour in plastic sacks for the first time after many years of previously having used hessian, and their annual harvest had gone rancid. Simple and good wins every time for me.

 

This is a simple, nourishing ice of few ingredients. Whole milk enriched with roasted chestnuts and sugar creates a light texture and subtle woody flavor. Cremolate is the name given in Italy to eggless ices that are only partly frozen. Softer and less icy than granita, the flavor is bright and very pure, but they are best eaten straightaway.

Because it is so simple it’s worth using the grassiest, creamiest milk you can afford. Roasting the chestnuts either on a wood fire or coals will make the ice cream taste smoky. Otherwise, here’s a secret: you can save yourself the time it takes to peel 400 g/1 lb chestnuts (a long time) and use unsweetened chestnut purée instead—and it’s still delicious. Serve with whipped cream laced with rum and vanilla.

400 g/1 lb fresh whole chestnuts (or 220 g/8 oz unsweetened chestnut purée)

500 ml/2 cups whole milk

170 g/¾ cup + 1 tablespoon sugar

1 vanilla pod, split

Pinch of sea salt

50 g/¼ cup dark chocolate, grated

1. To prepare the cremolata: preheat the oven to 400°F.

2. Using a small, sharp knife, score a long cross through the skin of each chestnut. Take care to do this properly, as it will make the nuts easier to peel once they are roasted. Roast them on a baking sheet for 30 minutes.

3. Warm the milk, sugar, vanilla, and salt in a medium pan or in the microwave, stirring to dissolve the sugar. When the milk is steaming and the sugar has dissolved, remove it from the heat and set aside.

4. Remove the chestnuts from the oven and peel them while they’re hot. Use a dish towel to hold them and wear rubber gloves if necessary. Weigh out 220 g/8 oz of the peeled chestnuts (or unsweetened chestnut purée) and add this to the warm milk. Liquidize for 2 minutes until perfectly smooth, and then use a small ladle to pass the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove any bits of skin and the vanilla pod.

5. Pour the chestnut milk into a clean container, then place this in a sink of ice water to cool. As soon as it reaches room temperature, cover and chill in the fridge.

6. To make the cremolata: the following day, liquidize the cremolata with an immersion blender for 1 minute to emulsify completely.

7. Pour the mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

8. Transfer the cremolata into a suitable lidded container, sprinkling it with grated chocolate as you go. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze, ideally for just an hour before serving. Best eaten the same day.

Grassy, salted Breton butter, burnt sugar, and prunes—stirring these good things up together makes one delicieux ice cream. Prune haters (if you are friends with any) need never know they are contained within. Their addition just adds a fruity toffee depth to the custard which, once churned, is rippled with a salty butterscotch sauce. Adding butter to an ice cream base increases the amount of protein, creating body and slight chewiness (it’s how the delicious Scottish version of fiore di latte—brilliantly called “white” ice cream—is made).

For the butterscotch ripple (makes more than you need)

200 g/1 cup sugar

85 g/¾ stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter

120 ml/½ cup heavy cream, at room temperature

1½ teaspoons fine sea salt (sel de Guérande)

For the ice cream

20 g/2 tablespoons salted Brittany butter

100 g/½ cup soft light brown sugar

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

240 ml/1 cup whole milk

5 egg yolks

60 g (about 4) Agen prunes (stone in weight), pitted and chopped

1. To make the butterscotch: sprinkle the bottom of a heavy-based pan (ideally stainless steel) with an even layer of the sugar. Place it over medium heat and cook slowly (not stirring) until it begins to melt and caramelize. Swirl the pan for even caramelization. If it starts crystallizing into sugary chunks, turn the heat right down and wait. The sugar will eventually melt and get darker and darker in color.

2. Cook the caramel to a rich amber color, then whisk in the butter until melted and combined. Remove from the heat and whisk in the cream and sea salt. It will bubble up, so be careful. Whisk vigorously until all the cream is incorporated into a smooth caramel sauce.

3. Set the pan aside and allow to cool before pouring half of the butterscotch into a thick plastic piping bag. Fasten the wide end shut with a clip or tight knot. Save the extra butterscotch in a clean lidded jar. It will keep in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.

4. To prepare the ice cream: melt the butter in a small sturdy pan over low heat. Stir in half the brown sugar until it’s wet. Stir every so often until it looks like molten lava. It will take about 5 minutes.

5. Watch closely as the mixture starts to caramelize: the brown sugar will begin to look and feel more like liquid and less like thick wet sand. At this point, whisk in the cream and vanilla, turn the heat to medium so that the mixture cooks at a controlled simmer, and whisk every few minutes for a total of 10 minutes.

6. Add the milk and whisk in to combine. Mix the egg yolks and remaining brown sugar in a bowl, then pour the warm liquid over in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling, and making sure it doesn’t boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove the pan from the heat, add the chopped prunes and stir them in, then place the pan into a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill.

7. To make the ice cream: the following day, liquidize the cold custard until as smooth as possible, 2 to 3 minutes. Pour the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container.

8. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

9. Snip the tip off the piping bag of butterscotch. Transfer the ice cream into a suitable lidded container, piping thick squiggles of butterscotch over the ice cream as you go. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

 

Sadly, I can’t make this ice cream that often because it annoys me too much the way people see the words “sea salt” and literally screech to a halt in front of my ice cream van when it’s on the menu. What is it with sea salt? Sprinkle it on strawberry yogurt if you love it that much—I’ll be just fine here with all the fresh peach ice cream that no one pays any attention to. Pine nuts, though, I can get excited about. I’ve joined Facebook groups for them! Fatty and addictive, they have a smokiness that pairs well with sweet and savory flavors. In this recipe, liberally salted pine nut brittle is stirred into rosemary-scented caramel custard ice cream and it’s utterly delicious. Try it served alongside Roast Chestnut Cremolata (this page).

For the pine nut and rosemary brittle

100 g/4 oz pine nuts

100 g/¾ cup sugar

1 heaping teaspoon glucose syrup (makes caramel easier to manage)

20 g/2 tablespoons butter

15 g/1 oz rosemary leaves

¼ teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon sea salt

For the ice cream

120 g/⅔ cup sugar

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

300 ml/1¼ cups whole milk

Pinch of sea salt

6 egg yolks

20 to 25 fresh rosemary leaves

1. To make the pine nut and rosemary brittle: toast the pine nuts over very low heat in a pan for 10 minutes, until warmed and just colored, then pour them into a bowl and cover with a clean dish towel to keep them warm.

2. Heat the sugar, glucose, and a tablespoon of water together slowly in a pan until the grains of sugar have dissolved. Swirl the pan to mix; do not stir. Add the butter, bring the mix to a boil, and boil steadily until it reaches 150°C/300°F on your digital thermometer.

3. Meanwhile, pick the rosemary leaves, adding them to the bowl of pine nuts along with the baking powder and sea salt, then mix well, ensuring there are no lumps of baking powder. Have a whisk or heatproof spatula at hand.

4. As soon as the sugar reaches 150°C/300°F, or a dark caramel color, tip in the pine nut mix and whisk well to combine. The mixture will bubble up because of the baking powder, so use a long heatproof spatula or whisk to keep your hands safe from burns. Allow the rosemary to sizzle and the nuts to toast to a pale gold color in the caramel, then remove from the heat.

5. Pour the hot brittle evenly onto a silicone baking mat. Cover with another non-stick baking mat or a double sheet of buttered parchment, and roll quickly and firmly with a wooden rolling pin to evenly spread the brittle into a half-centimeter layer. Leave to cool.

6. Break the brittle into large pieces and store between sheets of wax paper in an airtight container, or roughly smash into chunks ready to add to the freshly churned rosemary-caramel ice cream.

7. To prepare the ice cream: sprinkle the bottom of a heavy-based pan (ideally stainless steel) with 100 g/½ cup of the sugar in an even layer. Place it over medium heat and cook slowly and without stirring until it begins to melt and caramelize. Swirl the pan to achieve even caramelization.

8. Cook the caramel to a dark color until just smoking, then pour in the cream and milk to stop the cooking process. Add the sea salt and warm the liquids over a medium heat to dissolve the caramel; this may take 10 minutes. Stir, but do not boil, as you don’t want to evaporate the liquid too much. Once the caramel has dissolved, whisk the remaining 20 g/2 tablespoons sugar with the egg yolks until combined.

9. Pour the hot liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over a low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling the eggs and keeping a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat, add the fresh rosemary leaves and stir them in, then place the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, transfer it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill.

10. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container.Discard the rosemary leaves, then liquidize the cold custard with an immersion blender, about 1 minute.

11. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions, until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

12. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container, sprinkling in generous handfuls of crushed pine nut brittle as you go (you will need about half the amount you made). Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—You can store any extra brittle between sheets of wax paper in an airtight container. I always save silica gel sachets and slip one of these in too for good measure (to help keep the brittle crisp).

Black malt is the name given to roasted grains of malted barley—traditionally the grain used in the brewing industry to make porter (and, as a consequence, easily available online for the home brewing crew). Steeped overnight in an egg custard base, it produces a creamy, biscuit-colored ice cream with rich complex toasted coffee and nut flavors, which are enhanced by thick malt syrup and vanilla bean. It’s a real spoon-licker. Serve with Banana, Brown Sugar, and Rum ice cream (this page), if you like.

1 vanilla pod

220 ml/1 cup whole milk

300 ml/1¼ cups heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

5 egg yolks

45 g/¼ cup sugar

40 g/¼ cup light brown muscovado sugar

20 g/1 tablespoon malt extract

30 g/2 tablespoons black malt

1. To prepare the ice cream: split the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape out the seeds, adding both the seeds and pod to a non-reactive pan along with the milk, cream, and salt. Bring the mixture to a simmer, stirring often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks, sugars, and malt extract together in a separate bowl until combined.

2. Pour the hot liquid over the egg mix in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat and stir the grains of black malt into the custard. Place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool, stirring the mix occasionally to speed up the cooling process. Once cold, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

3. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois. Squeeze hard to extract as much toffee-colored custard from the malt as possible. Discard the malt and keep the vanilla pod to rinse and dry later (see this page), then liquidize the custard with an immersion blender until smooth, about 1 minute.

4. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Transfer the churned ice cream to a clean lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Black Malt Vanilla (this page) / Banana, Brown Sugar, and Rum (this page)

Chocolate Ice Creams

It can be useful sometimes to understand the chemistry behind a recipe to see what makes it work.

The difficulty in making chocolate ice cream is that natural vegetable fats (the fats contained in the cocoa butter within the chocolate) freeze hard—much harder than the animal fats (in cream and egg yolks) that are usually present in ice cream. This can make homemade chocolate ice cream hard to scoop, and dry and chalky once frozen.

The first way to remedy this is to use a good-quality cocoa powder instead of real chocolate. It might seem counterintuitive (surely using real chocolate gives a better-tasting result?), but in fact using chocolate adds cocoa butter and sugar to your base, both of which mute the intense chocolate flavor once mixed with the other ingredients. Using a good-quality cocoa will give you all the rich flavor without upsetting the balance of your recipe.

Another trick is to caramelize the sugar. Caramelizing sugar changes its composition, making it act a bit like glucose syrup and making the ice cream much softer to scoop, while also adding depth of flavor and a touch of bitterness. A generous pinch of sea salt will balance things nicely.

Velvety chocolate pudding–flavored ice cream. Eat this with a friend so she can wrestle the tub from you before you polish it off in one go.

Cooking the cocoa out properly in the milk is really important so it ends up silky rather than chalky and doesn’t have that raw taste. Don’t skimp on this step—it needs 6 full minutes of simmering. A sprinkle of grated chocolate in the freshly churned ice cream at the end makes every mouthful of this feel slightly different, thus keeping your tongue interested.

350 ml/1½ cups whole milk

30 g/⅓ cup best possible cocoa powder

250 ml/1 cup heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

150 g/¾ cup sugar

4 egg yolks

1 tablespoon golden syrup or malt syrup

30 g/1 oz chocolate, grated or cocoa nibs

1. To prepare the ice cream: pour a little of the cold milk into the cocoa powder, stir to make a paste, and whisk in the rest of the milk. Add the milk to a pan and bring to a boil, stirring constantly, then simmer gently for exactly 6 minutes. Keep stirring, as the cocoa can easily burn, then after 6 minutes whisk in the cream and salt.

2. Sprinkle the sugar in an even layer into a non-stick frying pan or non-reactive pan. Heat until melted, swirling the pan occasionally, and caramelize until the color of a horse chestnut and just beginning to smoke. Stop the caramelization at this point by pouring the caramel into the chocolate milk (take care, as it will bubble and sputter). Whisk or stir over low heat until all the caramel is dissolved in the milk. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg yolks with a little of the warm chocolate milk and the golden syrup until combined.

3. Pour the rest of the hot chocolate liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat, then place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool. Set aside until cold, about 30 minutes. Once the custard is cold, pour into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge overnight.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, liquidize the chocolate custard with an immersion blender until smooth.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the instructions or until frozen and the texture of whipped cream. The mixture is so thick it shouldn’t take long—15 to 20 minutes.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Sprinkle in the grated chocolate as you go. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

A deep, dark, delicious variation on the Chocolate Caramel ice cream recipe (this page). Treacle toffee (known in Olde Worlde Englande as Bonfire Toffee) is frozen and smashed into pieces before being added to the churned ice cream. These dark, glassy shards will eventually melt into sticky molasses nuggets. Beware of flying shards of frozen toffee when you make this, which will embed themselves in hair and sweaters and mysteriously spread to all corners of the kitchen floor and walls—you will still be finding bits weeks later. In other words, the gift that keeps on giving!

For the treacle toffee (makes more than you need)

450 g/2 cups light brown muscovado sugar

125 g/½ cup hot water

115 g/⅓ cup black treacle or molasses

115 g/⅓ cup golden syrup

1 teaspoon white wine vinegar

75 g/5 tablespoons unsalted butter

For the ice cream

350 ml/1½ cups whole milk

30 g/⅓ cup best possible cocoa powder

250 ml/1 cup heavy cream

Pinch of sea salt

140 g/⅔ cup sugar

4 egg yolks

1 teaspoon black treacle or molasses

1. To make the treacle toffee: butter then line a 20 × 30 cm/8 x 12 inch baking sheet with parchment.

2. Measure all the ingredients into a deep, heavy-based pan. Place over medium heat and stir occasionally until the butter is melted and the sugar has dissolved. When the mixture is smooth and well combined, increase the heat and bring the mixture to a really fast boil. Cook until the mixture reaches 140°C/275°F, about 30 minutes, then pour the mixture carefully into the lined baking sheet.

3. Let the toffee cool completely, then break into large pieces with a toffee hammer (toffee-hammer!) or rolling pin. Freeze the toffee first if necessary.

4. Place a large piece of toffee weighing about 40 g/2 oz into a sturdy zip-top bag in the freezer. Keep frozen until ready to use. Once your ice cream is churned, smash the toffee into small shards using a rolling pin. Store the rest in an airtight container, with individual layers of toffee separated by parchment. If left exposed to humidity, the toffee will soften and stick together.

5. To prepare the ice cream: pour a little of the cold milk into the cocoa powder, stir to make a paste, then whisk in the rest of the milk. Add the milk to a pan and bring to a boil, stirring constantly, then simmer gently for exactly 6 minutes. It is really important to cook out the cocoa so it ends up silky rather than chalky. Stir or whisk constantly, as the cocoa burns easily (a heart-spring whisk is really useful for this), then after 6 minutes whisk in the cream and salt.

6. Sprinkle the sugar in an even layer into a non-stick frying pan or non-reactive pan. Heat until melted, swirling the pan occasionally, and caramelize until the color of a horse chestnut. Stop the caramelization by pouring the caramel into the chocolate milk. Whisk or stir over low heat until all the caramel is dissolved in the milk (this may take a few minutes). In a separate bowl, whisk the egg yolks with a little of the warm chocolate milk and the black treacle until combined.

7. Pour the rest of the hot chocolate liquid over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling the eggs and keep a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat, then place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool. Set aside until room temperature, about 30 minutes. Once the custard is at room temperature, pour into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge overnight.

8. To make the ice cream: the following day, liquidize the chocolate custard with an immersion blender until smooth.

9. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the instructions or until frozen and the texture of whipped cream—the mixture is thick, so it shouldn’t take long, 15 to 20 minutes.

10. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container, sprinkling in the smashed treacle toffee as you go. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Variations—For a Chocolate and Green Mandarin ice cream, follow the previous recipe but caramelize the sugar to a lighter amber color, then “stop” it by whisking it into the chocolate milk. Once the custard is completely cool, use a microplane to grate in the zest of three green mandarins (or use one fragrant orange or any of your favorite citrus fruit). Whisk the zest into the custard, cover, and chill overnight. The following day, strain the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the zest before churning.

To make Chocolate Ristretto ice cream, add a tablespoon of very strong hot espresso and a heaping teaspoon of soft light brown sugar to a bowl and stir until the sugar dissolves. Leave to cool. Whisk the cold, sweet ristretto into the chocolate custard before churning.

For a Chocolate and Caper ice cream, follow the previous recipe but caramelize the sugar to a lighter amber color, then “stop” it by whisking in the cream and salt (omit the sea salt from the recipe). Soak 1 tablespoon of salted capers (not the brined ones!) in 500 ml/2 cups warm water for half an hour. Remove the capers from the water and squeeze them very dry in your fingers. Blend the capers into the cold custard for a couple of minutes before churning, for a salty tang.

Before I moved to New York I had no idea anywhere could be that hot. It was exciting—stepping out of an air-conditioned building and into the street had a kind of sink-or-swim feel about it and you just had to dive in. But it was also disgusting—I had no air conditioning in my tiny studio apartment and it was there that I discovered that sweat has a color.

Working in the kitchen of a pizza restaurant was almost worse; I would come up from a trip to the sweltering basement changing rooms looking like I was fresh out of the shower, hair plastered to my head like a hot-faced baby.

But it’s in temperatures like this that granita really comes into its own. We usually had a couple of different fresh fruit flavors on the go in the kitchen, spinning away in big slushed ice machines looked after by the Sri Lankan bar-back Dinesh. At 5 p.m., when my shift was over, he would let me fill a 16-ounce wax paper cup with a mixture of fragrant lemon and tangerine granita, crushed ice, and soda water. Sipped slowly through a straw, this lasted just long enough to see me home along baking concrete sidewalks.

This clementine granita has a soft citrus flavor like a summertime glass of orange squash, but is given bite with the addition of its own dark, spicy perfumed leaves.

2 kg/4 lb leafy clementines (about 20)

90 g/½ cup sugar

40 ml/¼ cup water

1 lemon

1. Place a large, shallow stainless steel baking sheet or dish in the freezer to get very cold.

2. Rinse the clementines and any leaves, then pat them dry with paper towels (it’s impossible to zest them otherwise).

3. Heat the sugar, water, and clementine leaves together in a small pan, stirring until the grains of sugar have dissolved and the syrup starts to simmer. Remove the syrup from the heat. Using a microplane (rather than a cheese grater, which would bite through the pith), zest half of the clementines directly into the hot syrup, then set this aside to cool.

4. Juice all of the clementines and the lemon, then measure out 550 ml/2 cups juice and add this to the cold syrup. Use a small ladle to push this liquid through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois to remove the leaves, zest, and any seeds. Squeeze hard to extract as much flavor from them as possible.

5. Pour the liquid into the frozen sheet and return it to the freezer, carefully placing it flat upon a shelf. Once an hour has passed, check the granita; it should have begun to freeze around the edges. Use a fork to break up any frozen bits and stir them back into the mix.

6. Every 45 minutes, return to stir the granita. Keep agitating it to prevent it from freezing solid. The aim is to achieve large, slushy frozen crystals.

7. The end result after about 3 hours should be a heap of sparkling ice crystals. Serve in chilled glasses with softly whipped cream. This can be kept covered in the freezer for up to a week, but you’ll need to scrape it with a fork before serving to break up any large lumps.

Note—If you can’t find clementines with leaves attached use fresh kaffir lime leaves instead, or go without for a simpler tasting but ultimately equally refreshing granita. You could also substitute the clementines for tangerines, satsumas, or blood oranges, if you prefer.

Looking for a Date

Date shakes are a specialty of Palm Springs, California, and are made from a mixture of sticky dates, cold fresh milk, vanilla ice cream, and crushed ice. These ingredients are blended until frothy, dusted with nutmeg, and served from road stands, perfect alongside a piece of pineapple upside-down cake and perhaps a handful of tangerines.

They are one of those must-do foods that make perfect sense in the place they are being eaten—like drinking from a cool green coconut on the beach in Brazil or…um…eating a crunchy apple in England in the autumn. (Why hasn’t anyone started a “street food” company of refrigerated apple carts here in London—not exciting enough?).

In fact, when I went to California with my husband, John, and 6-month-old baby, Jean, to make my highly anticipated road trip along route 111, we managed to pass by every date shake stand. After U-turns in the dust, and driving back and forth over the same bit of highway, GPS swirling, Johnny had had enough and I never got my date shake.

So, until we can get back to Shields Date Gardens, I order a big box of Palm Springs dates every year and make Date Shake ice cream. Medjool and Deglet Noor dates have a natural caramel flavor and are so sweet that you barely need to add any extra sugar, and the added fiber from the dates makes the ice cream extra rich and thick.

I also make a Date & Espresso ice cream that takes its inspiration from the Egyptian café in the Piazza della Madonna in Monti in Rome, where I ordered coffee and date ice cream, really wanting it to be delicious. It wasn’t—much too sweet—but my recipe is! To adjust the following recipe, just add 2 tablespoons of hot, strong ristretto and 2 teaspoons of soft light brown sugar to a bowl and stir until the sugar dissolves, then leave to cool. Whisk the cold, sweet espresso into the date and vanilla custard just before churning.

Serve this with Novellino Orange Jelly (this page), Espresso con Panna ice cream (this page), or a slice of pineapple upside-down cake, if you know what’s good for you.

225 ml/1 cup whole milk

225 ml/1 cup heavy cream

1 vanilla pod, split lengthwise

Pinch of sea salt

Dusting of freshly grated nutmeg

3 large egg yolks

50 g/⅓ cup sugar

60 g/2 oz Medjool dates, pitted

1. To prepare the ice cream: bring the milk, cream, split vanilla pod, salt, and nutmeg to a simmer in a non-reactive pan. Stir often to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together in a separate bowl until combined.

2. Pour the hot milk over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F. Stir constantly to avoid curdling and make sure it doesn’t boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, remove from the heat and stir the dates into the custard. Place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool, stirring the mix occasionally. Once cold, cover with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge.

3. To make the ice cream: the following day, pick out the vanilla pod from the custard, squeeze out the seeds, and add these to the custard. Liquidize the custard and dates together with an immersion blender until very smooth, about 2 minutes. Use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois, removing any lumps.

4. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

5. Scrape the churned ice cream into a clean lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Date Shake (this page) / Espresso Granita (this page) / Amalfi Lemon Jelly (this page)

Working the evening shift in the kitchens of the American Academy in Rome meant I could spend my mornings down the hill in Bar San Calisto. Here, as well as great coffee and dizzyingly strong sgroppino, you could buy paper cups of homemade espresso or lemon granita for a euro a pop. If you nodded yes to the question “Vuoi panna?” the granita would come enveloped in a kind of puffer jacket of whipped cream. Apart from being completely delicious, and tempering the bitterness of the syrupy black slush, this worked like insulation on the granita, preventing it from melting too quickly as I sat reading old copies of The New Yorker and watching the world go by on the Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere.

I’ve tried to nail this recipe, but encourage you to take a relaxed view toward any discrepancies given that it’s difficult to define “strong coffee.” People have different ideas about how strong “strong” is and the different ways of making espresso—unless you are a barista it might taste different every time. Taste the unfrozen mixture first—it should be bracingly sweet and strong but not unpleasantly bitter. If you want to add a little extra water or sugar or coffee, go right ahead, just don’t veer too far from the original.

130 g/¾ cup sugar

130 ml/½ cup water

1 Amalfi or unwaxed lemon (optional)

490 ml/2 cups freshly brewed espresso (about 8 double shots) or very strong coffee

1 tablespoon nocino, grappa, or anisette liqueur (optional)

1. Place a large shallow stainless steel baking sheet or dish in the freezer to get very cold.

2. Heat the sugar, water, and a couple of strips of lemon zest (if using) together in a small pan, stirring until the grains of sugar have dissolved and the syrup starts to simmer. Remove the syrup from the heat.

3. Add the coffee to the syrup, remove any pieces of zest, and stir in the ammazzacaffè (translates as “coffee-killing”) liqueur if you like the flavor. Leave the liquid to cool in a sink full of ice water.

4. Once cold, pour the liquid into the frozen tray and return it to the freezer, carefully placing it flat on a shelf. After an hour has passed, check the granita; it should have begun to freeze around the edges. Use a fork to break up any frozen bits and stir them back into the mix.

5. Every 45 minutes, return to stir the granita. Keep agitating it to prevent it from freezing solid. The aim is large, slushy frozen crystals.

6. The end result after about 3 hours should be a heap of tobacco-colored ice crystals. Serve in chilled glasses with softly whipped cream. This can be kept covered in the freezer for up to one week, but you’ll need to scrape it with a fork before serving to break up any large lumps.

 

Hidden within the Sunday morning wasteland of Naples’ commercial ferry port lies a local secret…

If you weave your way in past the empty shipping containers and manage to locate it you might be surprised to find a tiny pasticceria, brimming with shouty Neapolitans, anxious to possess the heavily laden boxes of Sicilian pastries—fresh off the boat from Palermo that morning—to bring to Sunday lunch.

I would buy a carefully wrapped gold cardboard tray of cannoli and cassata (truly wonderful words) and wander up the hill toward Palazzo Reale to find an espresso bar to sit outside. Here I could watch the boats chugging off toward Capri while sinking my teeth through the various delights of thick green marzipan, pan di spagna, wobbly sheep’s milk ricotta, and golden cannolo shells, the authentic ones having the crunch that only something fried in lard can lay claim to.

This ice cream reminds me of all of those good things. The salinity and slightly grainy texture of the ricotta ice cream provides a cool background for the rich mixture of bitter chocolate chips, pistachio nuts, and luminous candied citrus peel.

200 g/1 cup buffalo or sheep’s milk ricotta

15 g/1 tablespoon tapioca starch (or use cornstarch)

120 g/⅔ cup sugar

400 ml/1½ cups whole milk

1 tablespoon dry Marsala wine

1 teaspoon mild honey

2 teaspoons orange flower water

Pinch of ground espresso

25 g/1 oz chopped candied citrus peel

25 g/1 oz chopped dark chocolate

25 g/1 oz chopped lightly toasted pistachio nuts

1. To prepare the ice cream: set the ricotta to drain in a sieve over a bowl. Meanwhile, whisk the tapioca starch or cornstarch and sugar together in a bowl.

2. Heat the milk to the simmering point, then pour it in a thin stream over the tapioca, whisking constantly to prevent lumps forming. Return this mix to the pan, and bring it back to a simmer to cook out the starch. Whisk constantly, as it can catch and burn easily at this point.

3. Remove from the heat, then whisk the ricotta, Marsala, and honey into the milk before placing the pan in a sink of ice water to cool. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mixture every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, stir in the orange flower water, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge overnight.

4. Mix the espresso, chopped peel, chocolate, and toasted nuts together and place in the freezer in a lidded container (this is so that they won’t melt the ice cream once they are added to it).

5. To make the ice cream: remove the custard from the fridge and blend it well for about a minute to re-liquefy the mix and make it easier to pour into the ice cream machine.

6. Pour the mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of softly whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Transfer the ice cream to a suitable lidded container, sprinkling with the frozen “canditi” as you go until they are used up. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.

Note—This is a milk-based ice with no eggs to better allow the delicate flavor of the ricotta to shine. The tapioca starch thickens and somewhat emulsifies the ice cream base. Tapioca looks gloopy but I like the chewy effect it has on the base—otherwise cornstarch works similarly. This ice cream will freeze hard because of the starch, so remove it a good 10 minutes before you want to serve it.

Variation—To make Ricotta and Maraschino Cherry ice cream, make up a batch of the ricotta ice cream but substitute the orange flower water with a teaspoon of vanilla extract. Once churned, stir in maraschino cherries and a little of their syrup before hard freezing.

This sorbet has all the twinkle and fresh, green vim of a top-shelf gin and tonic, only it’s better as it doesn’t contain any booze. Alcohol affects the texture of sorbet—lowering the freezing temperature and making it sloppy textured. Excellent for sgroppino (aka alcoholic slush puppy), but that is not always what you want.

This sorbet is uplifting: the smell of lime zest, along with simmering botanicals—juniper, angelica, coriander, and cinnamon—fills the kitchen with fresh herbaceous essences. You can’t help but suddenly feel more positive about the immediate future as you make it.

Juicing limes can feel less uplifting, especially if you’ve bought the hard, unyielding kind—so select thin-skinned, juicy ones. In any case, your labors will be worth it for this refreshing and festive sorbet. This makes a favorite non-alcoholic drink served in a tall glass with bubbly soda water and extra ice, particularly if you can find a spoon-straw to go with it.

5 juniper berries

2.5 cm/1-inch piece of fresh or candied angelica

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

1 cm/½-inch piece of cinnamon stick

1 teaspoon anise seeds (optional)

1 teaspoon caraway seeds (optional)

170 g/¾ cup sugar

550 ml/2 cups water

9 limes, preferably unwaxed

1. To prepare the sorbet: bash the juniper berries, angelica, coriander, cinnamon stick, and anise and carraway seeds (if using) in a mortar and pestle for a few seconds until bruised.

2. Put the sugar, 170 ml/¾ cup of the water, and the bruised spices into a pan and bring to a simmer, stirring until the sugar dissolves.

3. Wash, pat dry, and zest the limes. As soon as the sugar syrup reaches the simmering point, remove it from the heat, add the lime zest, and place the pan in a sink full of ice water to cool.

4. Juice the limes, then add the juice and the remaining 380 ml/1½ cups water to the spiced syrup. Cover and put into the fridge for at least 3 hours, or until completely chilled.

5. To make the sorbet: strain the mix though a fine-mesh sieve, discarding the zest and spices.

6. Pour the sorbet mix into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen, thick, and snowy-looking, usually 20 to 25 minutes.

7. Scrape the sorbet into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze for at least 2 hours, or until ready to serve.

Note—I cut lengths of wild angelica in the summer and freeze them to use in this sorbet. You can look for emerald-green candied stems online or in the cake decorating section of specialty shops.

This is a light and not-too-sweet ice cream, with a delicious old-fashioned flavor. It’s my signature vanilla and is popular all year as it’s refreshing in summer yet also excellent served alongside more wintry desserts—I’m thinking of Christmas desserts in particular. This ice cream gets its name from its three defining ingredients: unrefined sugar, vanilla, and rum.

1 vanilla pod

350 ml/1½ cups whole milk

Pinch of sea salt

6 egg yolks

60 g/⅓ cup sugar

60 g/⅓ cup light brown sugar or muscovado sugar

250 ml/1 cup crème fraîche

1 tablespoon dark rum

1. To prepare the ice cream: split the vanilla pod using the tip of a sharp knife, scrape out its seeds, and add both seeds and pod to a non-reactive pan, along with the milk and sea salt. Stir often, using a whisk or silicone spatula, to prevent it from catching. Once the liquid is hot and steaming, whisk the egg yolks and both sugars together in a separate bowl until combined.

2. Pour the hot milk over the yolks in a thin stream, whisking continuously. Return all the mix to the pan and cook over low heat until it reaches 82°C/180°F, stirring all the time to avoid curdling the eggs and keeping a close eye on it so as not to let it boil. As soon as your digital thermometer says 82°C/180°F, place the pan in a sink of ice water.

3. Add the crème fraîche and rum and whisk into the custard. Speed up the cooling process by stirring the mix every so often. Once the custard is at room temperature, scrape it into a clean container, cover with plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge.

4. To make the ice cream: the following day, use a small ladle to push the custard through a fine-mesh sieve or chinois into a clean container. Reserve the vanilla pod (see this page), then liquidize the cold custard with an immersion blender for a minute.

5. Pour the custard into an ice cream machine and churn according to the machine’s instructions until frozen and the texture of stiff whipped cream, 20 to 25 minutes.

6. Scrape the ice cream into a suitable lidded container. Top with a piece of wax paper to limit exposure to air, cover, and freeze until ready to serve.