Frozen yogurt is all the rage here in Southern California which is pretty stupid if you ask me – suddenly it’s 1991 again, but whatever, my kids LOVE IT. To show them how easy it is to make at home I had them help me out in the kitchen. Since I STILL I had a bunch of cherries in the freezer, this flavor was a no-brainer. This recipe is super simple, and just as good if you ask me. Course I only had one flavor. Um…and no toppings. Or fancy bowls. Or rockin’ music playing overhead. BUT IT’S JUST THE SAME AS A FANCY YOGURT PLACE I TELL YOU. Ugh. Forget it.

ingredients:
2 cups cherries
2/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1-1/2 cup vanilla yogurt

In a blender, combine cherries, sugar and lemon juice. Get a tiny sous chef to help you.

Once blended, fold the fruit mixture in with the yogurt.

Add to your ice cream machine per directions. Spoon into a freezer safe container and freeze until you are ready to serve.

You can change the fruit up in this, or add topping, but straight out of the carton ain’t bad either.

I made the peanut butter brownies from The Peanut Butter & Co. Cookbook. While they tasted fantastic, in no way did they look as cute as the pic in the book. So I did the next best thing and salvaged the ugliness by cutting them into hearts with a cookie cutter THEN filling them with softened homemade vanilla ice cream. Oh yeah. That more than saved them it made them about ten times more appealing.

ingredients:
1/2 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs

peanut butter brownie top
ingredients:
1/2 cup smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 large egg
1/4 cup flour

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep an 8×8 inch baking pan with parchment, brushed with butter.

In a large bowl, whisk the flour and salt and set aside.

In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the butter, chocolate chips and vanilla. Stirring until smooth. Remove from the heat and add the brown sugar, stirring until combined.

Cool slightly, then transfer the chocolate to a large bowl and add the eggs, carefully, one at a time, stirring quickly – you do not want to cook the eggs! Fold the dry ingredients in the mixture and pour the batter into the prepped pan.

Now move on to the peanut butter topping. In another medium saucepan over low heat, stir the peanut butter, butter and brown sugar. Stir until smooth. Remove from heat and transfer to a mixing bowl. Again, cool slightly, then add the egg (don’t cook it – keep stirring!!) then fold in the flour.

Pour THAT peanut butter mixture on top of the brownie batter. Bake for 40 minutes, let cool completely.

Once cooled, using a heart shape cutter – cut out hearts in the brownies. You should be able to see a side view of the thick brownie with the peanut butter topping. I had a cutter with a hole in the center, which proved to be best for filling with softened homemade vanilla ice cream. THE BEST.

I had this very expensive Vanilla infused Sea Salt leftover from some cupcakes I made. The ‘vanilla’ part of the sea salt made me think…what if…ice cream!? It came salty-sweet, in the best possible way. Of course if you don’t like salt – don’t make this.

ingredients:
2 cups heavy whipping cream
2 cups whole milk
3/4 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1-1/4 Tablespoons Vanilla Sea Salt

In a bowl, combine the heavy cream and the milk. Whisk in the sugar and the vanilla.

Pour into your ice cream maker and freeze according to the manufacturer’s directions. When the mixture begins to firm up just a bit, I add the salt. When it is done, transfer to a sealed container and freeze.

This makes for a unique salty-sweet treat.

Part of Food Buzz 24, 24, 24: Cooking with Kids and the Farmer’s Market

Well, it’s cherry season, and ice cream definitely benefits from fresh berries. I decided to use buttermilk to give it a super creamy texture – when you put it between two ginger cookies – it’s a great summer treat.

ingredients:
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup heavy whipping cream
2 cups whole milk
1-1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cups brown sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
2 cups fresh cherries, pitted and rough chopped

In a large bowl mix together the buttermilk, heavy whipping cream, milk, sugars and lemon juice. Pour into prepped ice cream maker according to directions.

Mid-way through, add the fresh cherries. Your ice cream base will turn a very pretty pink.

When it is ready, pour into a freezer safe container and freeze until firm. Sandwich between two cookies. SO GOOD.

I love the tartness of lime paired with cherries. The combination is refreshing and when you slush it up and top it with ice cream? There’s no turning back. It’s the best treat ever.

ingredients:
1 cup cherries, pitted
3/4 cup lime juice
5/8 cup sugar
3/4 cup ice
1/2 cup Pellegrino sparkling water

vanilla ice cream

In a blender, combine the cherries, lime juice, sugar, and ice. Blend until foamy and combined. Add Pellegrino water and stir.

Pour into glasses, and top with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. A nice summer treat!

This is more of a how-to. Our family LOVES root beer, so I thought a perfect combination for dessert would be root beer float cupcakes.

First, I used Baked’s recipe for Root Beer Bundt Cake, BUT made them into cupcakes. I only made 12 cupcakes (half the recipe) and with the rest of the batter…

I made a just made a small cake for munching. Yum.

Then I topped them some homemade root beer sherbet and some whipped cream. Since the cake was so heavy, the very flavorful root beer sherbet was just what was needed to make the perfect ice cream cupcake combo.

I remember eating this as a kid, the fun part is the magical Jello separation. I thought this would be the perfect recipe to go with my baby shower party colors.

While the Broken Glass Jell-o and Layered Jello are gorgeous, this is pretty too in it’s own way, and oh so tasty.

ingredients:
2 large packages (6 oz each) Jell-o (any flavor)
1 packet of unflavored Knox gelatin
4 cups boiling water
half of a container of vanilla ice cream about 3/4 quart

In a large bowl combine the Jell-o, unflavored gelatin and the boiling water. Whisk until dissolved.

Now you want to quickly add the ice cream until it is melted and combined. I’ve found that exactly half of a container works well. Now, they’ve changed the size of these things, believe it or not, so one container of ice cream is now actually 1.5 quarts, it is no longer a half gallon!

Once mixed well, pour into a 9″ x 13″ pan. Refrigerate overnight, cut into squares and serve. If you are doing this for a party, I suggest putting the cut pieces into cupcake liners.

The ice cream will magically float to the top of the jello and you will have a creamy+jello concoction that looks like it took a lot of prep work. GREAT for parties!!

Part of my own personal ‘Iron Chef: Battle Lemons’ series.

This is really light and refreshing and freezes really well. You can even hollow out the lemons and reserve it in the shells! But who has time for that. Just eat it.

Ingredients
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
juice of 3 Meyer lemons
zest of one lemon
1 can pineapple chunks, drained

Prep your lemon zest and set aside. Same with the lemon juice.

First make a simple syrup. Combine the water and sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. When the sugar has dissolved, remove from the heat and allow to cool to room temperature.

Place the lemon juice and the pineapple chunks in a blender and puree until smooth. You’ll end up with a foamy, almost smoothie like substance.

Strain the mixture through a fine-mesh strainer. You want just the best stuff, not the gunk. Add the zest and the simple syrup and stir together. Place in the refrigerator and chill until cold.

When you are ready, freeze according to the instructions for your ice cream maker. Scoop into a freezer safe bowl and store in the freezer until you are ready to serve. This sorbet is always soft and scoopable. Great on a HOT summer’s day.

I had dreams of Girl Scout cookies this year. Dreams of making Thin Mint Ice Cream. Dreams of putting it on top of a cupcake. Dreams of topping it with chocolate. It was a wonderful dream.

You will need 12 chocolate cupcakes for freezing, and some Magic Shell topping.

Thin Mint Ice Cream
ingredients:
2 cups heavy cream
2 cups milk
3/4 white sugar
1 Tablespoon vanilla
1/2 box (1 roll) of Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies

In a bowl, mix together the cream, milk, sugar and vanilla. Cover and put in the fridge.

Now when I thought of making this – I wondered if I’d need to add peppermint extract to bring out the mint-i-ness. Turns out the cookies are sooo minty they are just perfect as is.

Rough chop the cookies into small pieces. I don’t suggest using a blender or bashing them in a bag, because they are covered in chocolate you will just get a gooey mess. How do I know? Trust me…Anyway, get them into small pieces.

Turn on your ice cream mixer according to manufacturer’s directions. Pour in your vanilla base.

When it gets near the end of it’s run, carefully add in the chopped cookie pieces. Pour into a freezer safe bowl, and freeze until solid.

When you are ready to serve your cupcakes, pull the frozen chocolate cupcakes out of the bag, top it with a scoop of the ice cream, then pour on the Magic Shell for a nice candy top. I served these at a party and they held up well. The combination was delicious! Just as I had dreamed…

See, I make a lot of ice cream cupcakes, and over time I’ve come up with the best recipe for a chocolate cake that you want to freeze. I don’t like the cake to be too hard, because you don’t want to lose a tooth for god’s sakes. These are really light and fluffy, almost too light and fluffy to eat unless you are planning to freeze them. I’ve found they make a great base cake or cupcake for an ice cream dessert.

ingredients:
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
3/4 cups Valrhona cocoa powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 xlarge eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep a cupcake pan with liners.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients. With mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine.

Now these will puff up a bit, so I only fill the cups halfway full. You should get 24 cupcakes. Pour the batter into the prepped pan and bake for 35 to 40 minutes. Cool in the pans for 10 minutes, then let them cool on a wire rack.

I often cut off the tops, or hollow out the center just a touch, if I am going to top it with ice cream for ice cream cupcakes but you don’t have to do this. Once cooled, put the cupcakes in a freezer bag and freeze until you need them.