Setting booze as a theme for December’s BSFIC seemed a no brainer! Tis the season to be merry, after all. Or perhaps full on tipsy verging on drunk!
Booze certainly brought out the best in you, with some wonderfully creative and delicious entries:
Both Monica from Smarter Fitter and I made our entries this month during a shared weekend of laughter, friendship, cooking, eating and relaxing. The Brown bread & Guinness Ice Cream she made from The Icecreamists book was wonderful, and she made extra caramelised brown bread to scatter over the top. We had this with home made treacle tart by Chef Legs! Delicious!
I went for a super quick and easy ice cream using ready made chocolate custard and biscuits and a bottle from the booze custard. My Chocolate, Amaretto and Amaretti Ice Cream was a simple but perfect combination and needed only as long as the ice cream machine took to churn it! I’ll be making this one again!
When I saw Michael’s Cognac and Raisin Ice Cream on his blog Me, My Food and I, I asked him whether he’d consider entering it into this month’s BSFIC as it’s such a super fit. As well as macerating the raisins with the cognac, Michael adds cinnamon, orange zest and vanilla to pack flavour into the custard.
Jo from Comfort Bites confesses that she’s previously been a bit too heavy handed adding alcohol to her ice creams and the result has been a sloppy watery mess. This time, she reined herself in and was much happier with the results! Her Malibu Ice Cream sounds like a taste of tropical summer!
As has been the case more than once, Alicia from FoodyCat used the same core ingredient as I did to create a completely different treat! Her Amaretto Nougat Glacé features amaretto, Spanish turrón and dried apricots folded into a Swiss meringue base. Like the condensed milk ice cream I made a while back, this works well served in slices, cut straight from the frozen block.
Claire from Under The Blue Gum Tree combined plump medjool dates (which she had leftover from a delicious sticky toffee run cake) and the zesty taste of oranges in her Cointreau & Date Ice Cream. I love how she’s made generously filled ice cream sandwiches to serve.
Laura definitely knows How To Cook Good Food, as is evidenced by the appeal of her Frozen Zabaglione Tiramisu. She based her tiramisu ice cream cake on a recipe by Bill Granger but substituted the vanilla ice cream he suggests for a more decadent zabaglione ice cream recipe from Epicurious, flavoured with marsala wine. I think tiramisu is a great Christmas day dessert; even more so Laura’s frozen version!
Pete was keen to take part in this month’s BSFIC, given how well the theme fits into Pete Drinks. Having played around with the perfect proportions for a whisky mac earlier in the year, he decided to make a Whisky Mac Ice Cream, substituting bourbon instead of whisky. For the ginger, he used chopped stem ginger and some of the syrup it came in. These were mixed into a no-churn whipped cream base. Having tried it, I can confirm how delicious it was!
Vanesther from Bangers and Mash shared the perfect recipe for using up some of your Christmas leftovers with her Christmas Pudding Ice Cream. All you’ll need is the leftover pudding, some brandy and a pot of vanilla custard! I made something similar a few years ago, and loved it and have made it again since, using ready made custard, as Vanesther does here.
Donna from Beating Limitations has been making wonderful home made frozen treats all year, inspired by BSFIC not to bother with the shop-bought stuff any more. This month, she made her mum’s favourite flavour, Rum Raisin Ice Cream. She used an adapted David Lebovitz recipe and Elements 8 Spiced Rum, which she recommends for it’s spicy and citrus notes.
I love the way Christina from Little Red Courgette echoes her “year of excess” with her very indulgent Chocolate-Baileys Ice Cream with Spiced Pecans. Definitely not a diet recipe, she uses “two different types of chocolate, crunchy smokey-sweet pecans coated in a mixture of brown sugar, cinnamon and smoked paprika, and enough Baileys to fell a horse.” I don’t know about the horse, but I definitely want a taste!
And that’s it for our boozy BSFIC! Thanks, folks!
You can find January’s challenge here.
