Lavender Lemon Balm Ice Cream

I have been an ice cream making fiend this weekend. Art works hard to grow all this great stuff, it’s my job to turn it into yummy ice cream!

Most of my friends are asking about the Rose Petal ice cream, which I’ve made 3 batches of so far.

My favorite is the mint chocolate chip. It’s hard to imagine how good mint infusing in cream smells. I guess if you eat some of the ice cream, you can get the idea.

The total ice cream count so far is:

• Rose Petal: 3 Batches
• Mint Chocolate Chip: 2 Batches
• Lavender Lemon Balm: 2 Batches
• Locust Blossom: 2 Batches

Phew! I need more freezer space.

Here’s last year’s ice cream report, in case you missed it.

[tags]ice cream, herbal ice cream, cooking, spring, flowers[/tags]

Making Half-sour tomatoes!!!! Not quite ready yet.

Me? I make ice cream.

When spring rolls around and the herbs in the garden start to flower, I’m thinking about all the delicious ice cream I can make. It started with a recipe for rose petal ice cream about six years ago. Once I realized how easy it was to infuse the rose petals in cream, I started wondering what would happen with other garden goodies. Now, every spring, I gather up the bounty from Art’s garden and make pint after pint of ice cream.

Here’s the tally so far this spring:

• 3 Quarts of Rose Petal
• 1 Quart of Red (Crimson) Clover
• 2 Quarts of Chocolate Mint Chocolate Chip
• 1 Quart of Locust Blossom
• 1 Quart of Strawberry

The red clover ice cream was a new one this year, and it was quite a hit. The crimson clovers smell kind of sweet and melony, and created a really nice flavored ice cream. I was sad that the color didn’t transfer over at all — which happens with the mint. I looked at red clover tea recipes, not realizing I was using a slightly different type of clover, and many recommended adding a little mint to the tea. So for two cups of crimson clover heads, I added twelve mint leaves, which equaled about 4 clovers for each mint leaf.

The locust blossom ice cream was the other experiment this spring. Art and I had noticed how sweet the locust blossom flowers scent was, so we did some research and found that they are indeed edible. Some people equate the scent with a sweet vanilla. We have a small locust tree in the yard, but there is a really big one in the traffic divider across the street from our house. The city hasn’t sprayed for mosquitos this year, so we knew we’d be able to use them for ice cream. The flavor of the ice cream turned out to be a rich flowery honey.

We have a big patch of chocolate mint, so I was able to make a couple of batches of that. And, yes, you read that right. The herb actually has a chocolate mint flavor. The chocolate is subtle, but it’s definitely there. I use chunks of bittersweet chocolate for the chips, and the process of infusing the herbs in the cream usually transfers some of the green color too.

The strawberry ice cream is actually in the ice cream maker, as I type this. I opted for Philly-style strawberry, which means it’s just cream, sugar, and strawberries. I generally make the custard-based ice creams, but I wanted to see if the really simple Philly-style would bring out the berries without the extras.

Since I have two ice cream cookbooks, I don’t think I’ll ever run out of recipes to try. Mainly, I love to take whatever is fresh and use that — but that nougat ice cream recipe is still calling me. hmmm….

And for those wondering about the effect of all this ice cream on our waist lines — I should say that I brought 3 quarts to a party and this is why Art drags me hiking all summer.

[tags]ice cream, herbs, herbal ice cream, recipes, crimson clover, chocolate mint, locust blossom, gardens, simple pleasures[/tags]

Along the front fence and the side we have pink pearl and calville blanc apples. They are both heritage breeds. I don’t know which one this is a picture of, but isn’t it a yummy looking apple?

The peaches are Perigrine. They are white peaches. We thought we were getting “UFO” or donut peaches — but they sent us the wrong thing. There’s so many on the tree it’s amazing!

We have tons of sunflowers that we didn’t even plant. They are all “volunteers” planted by the birds from our feeder, which is full of sunflower seeds/

Here’s Art working in the garden. Did I mention that it’s organic? No chemicals — just hard work and compost.

This is the herb garden that runs along the front of the house in a raised bed. The house is below the street level, so this is protected from the sidewalk. In the foreground you see sage. There’s also thyme, echincea, native honeysuckle, roses, and other things. There’s more herbs in the main garden, but this is a nice cluster.

[tags]urban, gardening, heritage, apples, peaches, summer, garden, washington dc[/tags]