Double Nutella Kulfi (basically, Indian-style ice cream)

From this website, sent to me by my friend Aimee. The pictures are helpful.

serves 8, in conical kulfi moulds 9 cm high

Ingredients

• 300 ml of fresh cream to whip
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 275 ml of evaporated milk (I used full fat, but if you try this with low fat, let me know how it goes)
• 250 gms Nutella (or or taste) plus 4 tbsp melted Nutella in 1 tbsp of hot milk to drizzle

Directions

1. Whip cream and sugar together to stick peaks
2. Stir in Nutella and evaporated milk. You'll lose your peaks and it'll look foamy.
3. Pour into Indian Kulfi molds, yogurt containers, ramekins, or anything else. If you don't use the kulfi molds, put plastic wrap over the containers and press against the cream so you don't get ice crystals.
4. Freeze overnight
5. Before serving, top with 4 Tbsp melted Nutella mixed with hot milk. Toasted hazelnuts are also good.

Results
I made this for my birthday yesterday. I actually halved the recipe (which was difficult considering I was also doing ml to oz conversions--I gave up on trying to figure out how much Nutella to put it), which I decided is more like frozen mousse than ice cream, although it's close enough to ice cream that one wonders why anyone would ever need ice cream. It turned out VERY rich, Chris and I together couldn't finish half a serving. I wonder if a lighter evaporated milk would help, but then I also wonder what that would do to the consistency of the finished product. Let me know if you try it. In the future, I think I'm not going to worry as much as I did about getting the Nutella completely mixed in. It's impossible to do, for one thing. For another, the parts that didn't get mixed in ended up being really delightful crunchy bits in the ice cream. All in all, really easy, really good, and really rich, and no special equipment required.

Cold Corn Soup

From the Washington Post:

This is a distilled flavor of high summer. The coconut milk accentuates the sweetness of the corn.
Serve with salad and a glass of chardonnay. The soup tastes better with a day's refrigeration.

4 servings
Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons sweet butter
• 3 or 4 medium shallots, cut into thin slices
• Pinch curry powder
• Kernels from about 8 ears white corn (4 cups)
• 4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 4 whole black peppercorns
• 6 whole coriander seeds
• 3 stems parsley
• 1 cup unsweetened coconut milk, preferably low-fat (may substitute whole milk)
• Salt

Directions:

1. Melt the butter in an uncovered Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the shallots and cook for 3 to 4 minutes, stirring occasionally, until they are softened but but not browned. Add the curry powder and cook for 1 minute, stirring to coat evenly.
2. Add the corn and chicken broth, stirring to combine.
3. Tie the peppercorns, coriander and parsley in a small cheesecloth bundle, then add to the soup. Reduce the heat to low and cook for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat.
4. Stir in the coconut milk. Cover, and let the soup rest for 20 minutes.
5. Discard the cheesecloth bundle.
6. Reserve 1 cup of the soup. Puree the remaining soup in a blender (working in batches) or with an immersion (stick) blender until smooth.
7. Set a strainer over a bowl; strain the pureed soup, gently pressing on any solids to extract as much liquid as possible. Add the reserved 1 cup of unpureed soup to the bowl (for texture); mix well. Season with salt to taste, keeping in mind the soup will be chilled.
8. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate until well chilled before serving.

RESULTS:
This wasn't all that much different from the other cold corn soup that I posted up here a while ago and am too lazy to link to now, but I did really like the combination of coconut, coriander, and ground ginger (which I used because I didn't remember that I had curry powder until just typing this sentence now...). I thought the whole cheesecloth thing was unnecessarily fussy, so I just tossed the spices in there and figured, if I get a whole peppercorn, so be it.

Miso and citrus dressing

Something to do to use that miso that's sitting in my fridge.

Update: I think this has potential. The proportions need to be tweaked to get them right. The one I made was way heavy on the lemon juice. I think it could have also benefited from some secondary flavors. Soy sauce? Sesame oil? Hmmmm....

Harper in the window seat

One of the big selling points of this house when we bought it two years ago was the window seat. We tried to justify it by saying that it would be extra seating for parties, that it would be nice for me to read in, blah blah blah. The truth was that we knew Harper would love it. It faces due east and gets full sun in the mornings. We've recently added some sheers that trap juuust a little bit of morning heat, so it's like a nice sauna in there for her, and because it faces the street, she can keep an eye on all the comings and goings and alert us if any ne'er do wells (like her arch nemesis the UPS guy) come up to the house. When the curtains are closed, it's impossible to tell if she's in there, so that's the first place I look when I can't find her. It's nice to know that she appreciates the house we bought for her.

This is what happens when social scientists work from home during the summer

Apparently, Harper came up with #2. Chris is unsure about her reasoning, but didn't want to hurt her feelings so he put it up there anyway.

Raspberry Rhurbab Lattice Pie

From Martha. Again. There's a whole section of rhubarb recipes on her site. 

Ingredients 

• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
• 1 1/2 pounds rhubarb, trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch pieces (4 cups)
• 2 cups raspberries
•  1 1/4 cups sugar, or more to taste
• Freshly squeezed juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1 tablespoon cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 2 tablespoons heavy cream

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
   On a lightly floured surface, roll out one half of dough for bottom crust. Fit into an 11-inch pie plate. Trim pastry using scissors or a sharp paring knife, and chill. Keep remaining half of dough, which will be used to make the lattice, refrigerated and wrapped in plastic.
2. Combine rhubarb and raspberries in a large bowl. Sprinkle with sugar, flour, and lemon juice. Toss gently so as not to break raspberries. Spoon into pie shell, and dot with butter. Refrigerate while preparing lattice top.
3. In a small bowl, combine egg and heavy cream, whisking lightly; set aside. On a lightly floured surface, roll out remaining piece of dough for lattice, and cut it into 1-inch strips. Weave strips together over filling, and place an extra strip or two along the edge, where the bottom crust joins the lattice top; press this strip with tines of a fork to seal well. Brush lattice and all pastry edges with egg glaze, sprinkle top with sugar, and place pie on a parchment paper's lined baking sheet.
4. Bake until pastry is golden brown and juices in center of pie are bubbling, 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours. Transfer to a wire rack to cool before serving.

RESULTS:
Tiff, this is for you! I made this for a backyard bbq that was tons of fun, even when torrential rain drove us inside. last I heard it was 4 inches in 2 hours! Chris and I saw Noah and his ark on the way home on Clairemont, he was stopping to assist the passengers of a car that stalled out. Anyway, back to the food. I sort of followed this recipe. I used the full Pate Braise recipe for the pie crust. I think the filling is variable, I used it mostly as a guide to sugar amounts, cooking time and temp, and "total fruit volume." I only had about 1 cup of raspberries, so I made the rest up with more rhubarb. Briefly considered using some of the farmer's market strawberries I brought home that morning, but decided that would be a waste of amazing strawberries. I also wondered what blueberries would taste like in there. Anyway, after consulting my Flavor Bible, I discovered that rhubarb also loves vanilla and ground ginger, so I put a splash and a pinch of both in, respectively. Next time I might make it two splashes and two pinches. I completely forgot about doing the cream and egg wash, as I usually do. Despite that, the pie turned out great, especially with some friends' homemade buttermilk lemon sorbet. 

Celery

I'm intrigued...let me know if you make any of these before I do...