Saffron Pistachio Kulfi … craving kulfi

“Ice cream is exquisite. What a pity it isn’t illegal.”
Voltaire
Here’s an ice-cream with a difference…an Indian dairy-based frozen dessert. Guess what? You don’t need an ice-cream machine for this!! This is a popular end to Indian meals, a rich & creamy ice-cream, which can be made in many ways, & many flavours. Mango is fast becoming a flavour of choice as far as the kulfi goes, but traditional flavours remain cardamom, saffron & pistachio. This particular recipe works with reducing the quantity of milk to a third by cooking. Another recipe I often use has condensed milk…faster & as delicious. I tried this method since I had run out of condensed milk .
Crushing cardamom is therapeutic & releases the most wonderful aroma…makes me think of Jasmine, the Cardamom Addict.

Both my hub & son are quite addicted to cardamom…my daughter, on the other hand, will willingly have anything sweet…anything!! The kids have just finished the last of my frozen kulfis & are now in lala land. The daughter is off for a school trip at 4 tomorrow morning. The 7th graders are going for an adventure camp tucked away in the foothills of the Himalayas…‘The Himalayan Bear Stream Camp’ . She’s driven me up the beanpole with the lists of stuff she has to carry, & I have to bake or get together. I gave her some kulfi…& told her to CHILL!!

Kulfi is a popular flavoured frozen dessert found in the Indian subcontinent made with milk. It is a kind of ice cream. It is a distinct category of frozen dairy-based dessert. Unlike other ice-cream, kulfi takes a very long time to melt. It comes in various flavours, including pistachio, malai, mango, cardamom (elaichi), saffron (kesar), the more traditional flavours. Unlike Western ice cream, which are whipped and filled with air, kulfi is not whipped, which results in a solid, dense frozen dessert. Traditionally in the South Asia, kulfi is sold by street vendors called kulfiwallahs who keep the kulfi frozen by placing the moulds inside a large earthenware pot called a “matka”, filled with ice and salt. It is garnished with ground cardamom, saffron, or pistachio nuts. Kulfi is also served with faloodeh (vermicelli noodles).

Saffron Kulfi
Home made ice-cream, rich & distinctive
As adapted from the ‘Indian Menu Planner’
Ingredients:
Whole milk – 1 litre / 4 1/2 cups
Cardamom seeds – of 8-10 cardamom pods / crushed
Saffron – 1/2 tsp
Flaked pistachios – 1/4 cup
Sugar – 3/4 cup
Beaten silver leaf/paper, flaked pistachios, flaked almonds for garnishing

Method:
  • Crush the cardamom & soak the saffron strands in a tbsp of warm milk.
  • In the meantime, put milk & sugar into a large, heavy bottom saucepan & boil until reduced to a third, & the mixture is thick & creamy. Stir often.
  • Add the cardamom, flaked pistachio & saffron. Simmer for 5 minutes, take off heat & allow to cool to room temperature.
  • Spoon the mixture into moulds, cover tightly with foil & freeze overnight. (If you don’t have kulfi moulds, any ice-cream moulds work fine. I made some in the ice-cream lollie moulds too.)
  • To release from moulds, warm the outside by rubbing between the palms for a few seconds & ease out. Alternatively hold under warm water for 2-3 seconds, or wrap in a warm towel for a minute. Invert onto individual serving plates.
  • Garnish with silver leaf, flaked almonds & pistachios; some cardamom powder if you desire.

Just back from dropping our daughter to school…YAWN!!

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MANGO GINGER BASIL SORBET…YES, IT’S THE PERFECT SCOOP!!

“Don’t limit my taste. There’s some jazz that I like and there’s some opera. I’ve been listening to what was essentially country music, but it crossed over to rock.”

Rick Moranis

Caught sight of a fabulous, lip-smacking, refreshing mango sorbet teasing me at different times…enticing, delectable, torturous at times. Got tortured by Cynthia @ Tastes Like Home, by Nic @ Cherrapeno (yellow for Bri), then by Mike @ Mike’s Table, where he had a chilling good frozen event.

For some very strange reason I never attempted a mango sorbet the entire mango season. And then, when the mangoes decided to say goodbye, panic set in & silly me decided that was the last mango thing on my list of things to definitely do. Turned out to be a very expensive sorbet, because I paid for the mangoes through my nose. In retrospect, it was worth every penny… I’m glad I made this fantastic sorbet.

Pure sorbet pleasure from David Lebovitz‘s book The Perfect Scoop. I don’t own the book, but borrowed the recipe from Nic’s blog, & adapted it a bit to add a burst of flavour. Was just far out & I can’t wait for next summer to get here quick…a whole year & a really long wait! Then again, time seems to be flying, & the pages of the calendar are disappearing as I stare at months whiz by. Summer shall be back again…stone-fruits & all. Until then, I shall begin to explore pip fruits!! They’re here already, apples & pears, heralding the beginning of fall. And life goes on…


Mango Ginger Basil Sorbet
Adapted from Nic @ Cherrapeno (who adapted it from The Perfect Scoop)
(I doubled her recipe)

Ingredients:
Mangoes – 5 large, ripe(4lbs)
Ginger – 2″ piece ; finely minced (I microplaned it)
Basil – 12-14 fresh leaves; chopped fine
Sugar – 1 1/3 cup
Water – 1 1/3 cup
Fresh lime juice – 8 tsps / of 2-3 limes, plus more to taste if required
Vodka – 1 tbsp
Pinch of salt Method:

  • Peel the mangoes and cut the juicy flesh from the stones. Cut the flesh into chunks and put them in a blender, along with the sugar, water, lime juice, vodka and the pinch of salt. Squeeze any remaining juice out of the mango and add it to the blender.
  • Puree the mixture until smooth. Pass through a strainer.
  • Add the ginger & chopped basil.
  • Taste the mixture and add more lime juice, as required.
  • Put the sorbet into a freezer-proof container and pop into the freezer. Whisk to break down crystals every hour…(or if you are a lucky ice-cream maker owner, let the maker do the work!!). Leave to set overnight.
  • Scoop out & serve with cut mangoes & fresh basil if you like.

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p align=”center”>REFRESH YOUR SENSES!!

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ROASTING APRICOTS FOR A SORBET…

“I doubt whether the world holds for anyone a more soul-stirring surprise than the first adventure with ice cream. “
Heywood Broun

Here’s a short & sweet post…great roasted flavours, that I made ages ago. Picasa has been misbehaving & lots of my files seem to have become inaccessible with a .ini file type. Naughty & bad Picasa! I can see the pictures in the folder, but when I try to open the folder, it says nothing to view. I have a few pictures of this beautiful roasted apricot sorbet which I had elsewhere, so I’d better get it on my blog before I lose these precious few pictures too!

A sorbet is ideally made in a sorbetiere, but quite good results can be obtained without a machine if you are prepared to spend some time whisking the mixture during freezing. This is the only way to break down ice crystals & produce a fairly smooth result – the more you whisk the smoother the sorbet will be. Here’s to elbow grease!! Generally speaking, you will get a better result by hand with a fruit puree than with a fruit juice. Thus spake the Le Cordon Blue’s ‘Cook’s Bible’…& I followed like a lamb, with my elbow grease!!
This is the only picture I have…& it was melting very fast at temperatures above 42 degrees!! This was originally headed for Mike @ Mikes Table for his event, but never made it in time. It had to see light of day eventually, so here it is!! This was my first attempt at a sorbet… & it was SO GOOD!! I eyeballed the amounts; shall try & put them into measures!
Roasted Apricot Sorbet
Ingredients:
Roasted apricot puree – 500ml
Sugar – 2/3 cup
Water – 1/2 cup
Juice of 1 lime
Almond Essence – 1 tsp
Pinch of salt

Method:

  • Cut & stone the apricots. Lay them on a foil lined baking sheet, cut side up. Sprinkle some brown sugar over the apricots & bake at 180 degrees for about 15 minutes until nice & brownish orange, & gooey. Let them cool on the sheet, then scrape them with their juices & puree with an immersion blender.
  • Add the the rest of the ingredients + a pinch of salt & run the blender again. Add 1 tbsp of vodka if you like.
  • Freeze until semi-frozen, about 2 hours.
  • Whisk every 1-2 hours until frozen with a balloon whisk. I then left it overnight.
  • Served mine with some apricot kernels made into a praline with sugar. The pictures of course abandoned me!!
  • Enjoy!!
Roast ’em apricots & enjoy this sorbet!!

SCREAMING FOR PEACH MANGO ICE-CREAM…

“An apple is an excellent thing — until you have tried a peach.”
George du Maurier

Here’s an ice-cream that left us screaming for more…literally!! Helped the daughter make this a couple of weeks ago coz she wanted to make peach ‘something’…peach anything actually !! Peaches have flooded our market this year & tempt me endlessly. Quite insanely, I can hear them calling to me from their shelves in the local bazaar. All summer fruits are far too irresistible, so I always come back home with bagfuls – plums, apricots, peaches, mango, cherries…! The heat notwithstanding, I can spend happy hours browsing through racks / baskets of these sweet nothings, picking out perfect, unblemished fruit.

Peaches galore…

To please the daughter, I went & got some yum looking juicy peaches & thought we’d make peach ice-cream in the same way that I make my creamy mango ice-cream. Somewhere along the way, I thought it lacked a certain intensity in flavour, probably because the peaches weren’t fully ripe & juicy. So, we quickly pureed some mangoes & threw them in too for good measure. Ooooooooooh la la…what a wonderful creation was born. Peach Mango Ice-cream…just right for Mike’s event You Scream, I Scream, We All Scream for Frozen Desserts! Mike @ Mike’s table is big fan of ice cream. In his words “I was happily the odd one out there making ice creams in the dead of winter. But now with the heat of summer finally bearing down on many of us, there won’t be quite so many raised eye brows over ice cream. So I’m calling on you, fellow food bloggers, to put your creativity towards cooling off with something sweet this summer.” Make sure you check out the frozen treasure trove at his site…it’s COOL!! Watermelon sorbets, mint julep, apricot ripple

Topped with apricots in syrup…sitting pretty on a beautiful runner that Arundati from Escapades sent to me as a gift; there was loads of exciting stuff in the bag!!! Thank you dear girl!!

This recipe made a handsome amount & the daughter proudly served it over meringue, with apricots in syrup, a drizzle of cream & thickened apricot/mint syrup when my BIL/SIL were visiting for dinner. They loved it too…& BIL went in for 3rds too! YUM!!

Ingredients:
Fresh cream – 500ml
Condensed milk – 1 can (14oz)
Mangoes – 2-3 / pureed (I used kesari)
Peaches – 7-8 (700gms), blanched, peeled,pitted, stewed & pureed

Method:

  • Beat the cream & condensed milk well. Add the mango puree & peach puree. (Taste & adjust sugar if required).
  • Put into a plastic bowl with a tight fitting lid & put into the freezer.
  • Whisk the ice-cream every hour to break the crystals that form from the edge inwards, at least 5-6 times (whinge-whinge), & then leave to set for 6-8 hours or overnight.
  • It’s absolutely delicious on its own … serves 8-10.
  • We also served scoops over almond meringues, topped with apricots chilled in syrup, a drizzle of unsweetened cream & thickened apricot/mint syrup….& of course, a sprig of mint! Very refreshing & satisfying!!

Let’s scream for ice-cream!!!

Found about this neat event at Ivy’s; it’s called ‘Original Recipes’ @ Culinarty with Lore. She says, “Concoctions born out of despair when trying to fix something we thought to be ruined, others that come up as a way of playing in the kitchen or just ideas that you put into practice hoping to make your kids or better half eat a bit more of this or a bit more of that…they all bring us great satisfaction when a success!”…It’s never easy to put thoughts into words, & she did it brilliantly!! This recipe is one of my favourite concoctions, & is en route to Lores’.

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IN THE PLUM OF THINGS…A sweet tale of sauce & ice-cream

“A sauce…..adds something, really two things: a taste as well as the opportunity to think about how the thing was made.”
Raymond Sokolov

Spicy Sweet Plum Sauce

Plums ‘n’ Cherries…the fruit of summer!

Plum, Cherry & Black-cherry Conserve Ice-cream

Fresh fruit in food is my kind of thing. Summer brings with it delightful juicy fruit from the hills of Jammu & Kashmir, (Gurgaon & Delhi lie in the plains of North India where the weather these days is HOT, HOT, HOT), & one just cant seem to get enough of these delicious fruit. Have to limit the amount of sweet in everyday food, but the temptation is far too great. Bought a small lot of juicy tart plums the other day. We ate a few & the rest were in for a sauce!

Put them on to simmer in a pan, & kept tossing coins…sweet sauce, sour sauce, sweet sauce or sour sauce. Reached a point of decision making, & went for sweet! Made this from the top of my head…kept throwing in things & tasting…ended up with a nice, full dessert plum sauce. Reduce the sugar, throw in a splash of vinegar, adjust the salt & you’re set with a savoury plum sauce, good as a dipping sauce! YUM!!

More than the sauce, which was finger-licking good, with an ever-so-slight salty after-taste, it’s the colour that won me over! Rich & luscious. Kept looking at it for ages…amazing PLUM colour!

What I did…

I simmered the plums with sugar till they got nice & soft. Then mashed them in the pan with the back of the spoon & pushed everything through a strainer to get a nice thick sauce. Then back into the pan it went…a cinnamon stick, ginger powder, cinnamon powder, dash of rock salt, some more sugar…& it was ready to roll!

Made some ‘Plum, Cherry & Black-cherry Conserve Ice-cream’ with with the sauce…was yum though a tad sweet for me & DH. I had a jar of organic black-cherry conserve that I had to use somewhere. The kids just couldn’t get enough of it. The ice-cream recipe is the same as my Mango ice-cream…skip the mangoes & pistachios, add some plum sauce & pitted black cherries; blend well. Then continue whipping ever hour, finally swirl some black cherry conserve through it & leave to set overnight. Next time will increase the cream by a cup.

Serve with fresh plums, cherries & a drizzle of sauce if you like!

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CREAMY HOME-MADE MANGO ICE-CREAM…ON A CALCIUM HIGH!

“Condensed milk is wonderful. I don’t see how they can get a cow to sit down on those little cans.”
Fred Allen
On a calcium high…Goodness that’s fruity & cool!
This creamy, delicious mango ice-cream’s en route for something I support whole-heartedly & have always believed in…Beautiful Bones: An Osteoporosis Food Event, hosted by one of my favourite bloggers Susan @ Food Blogga. Susan is funny, her posts are evocative, beautifully presented, & come with a fair share of humour, meaning… & much more. Thanks to her, ‘Dermadoc‘ is gaining notoriety as an avid foodie critic too!! Ha Ha…sorry Susan, was hilarious when he dropped by my place a while ago, & then I saw him at Nicismes’ recently too!
I have made this ice-cream twice already to celebrate mango mania in the merry month of May.
Once here…
…&, on popular demand, here again!
It has been my endeavour to ensure both my kids have always been ‘high on calcium’. Thankfully, it’s become a habit after all these years; the 2 glasses of milk & 2 bowls of home-made yogurt daily are inbuilt into their everyday routine ! I sometimes have to refuse the 3rd bowl of yogurt…such is the love of yogurt! These are simple life-style changes that can be incorporated in everyday meals as an investment in the future! They have now come to love grilled cottage-cheese, the panna cotta (yogurt one too), cottage-cheese cheese cake, fresh broccoli, oranges…all wonderful sources of calcium. I too have 3 glasses (yes 3!!) of milk a day (not a tea person), in addition to yogurt etc. Personally, for me, a glass of chilled milk is a great way to fix hunger pangs…glug it down!!

According to the National Osteoporosis Foundation (NOF) osteoporosis is “a disease in which bones become fragile and more likely to break.” May is National Osteoporosis Awareness Month. It is never too early or too late to start your prevention program. Osteoporosis is largely preventable for most people. Prevention of this disease is very important because, while there are treatments for osteoporosis, there is currently no cure.

Four Steps to
Prevent Osteoporosis
By about age 20, the average woman has acquired 98 percent of her skeletal mass. Building strong bones during childhood and adolescence can be the best defense against developing osteoporosis later. A healthy lifestyle can be critically important for keeping bones strong. No one step alone is enough to prevent osteoporosis but all four may.
  1. A balanced diet rich in calcium and vitamin D;
  2. A healthy lifestyle with no smoking or excessive alcohol intake;
  3. Bone density testing and medication when appropriate.

An easy and economical way to boost the calcium content of many meals is to add nonfat powdered dry milk to puddings, homemade cookies, breads or muffins, soups, gravy, casseroles and even a glass of milk. A single tablespoon of nonfat powdered dry milk adds 52 mg of calcium, and 2 to 4 tablespoons can be added to most recipes.
You may add:
3 tablespoons to each cup of milk in puddings, cocoa or custard
4 tablespoons to each cup of hot cereal before cooking
2 tablespoons sifted into each cup of flour in cakes, cookies or breads

Enough said… so now onto the ice-cream…the inspiration for which came first from Arundati’s @ Escapades where she had posted an eggless Star Anise Ice-cream using condensed milk. That stuck in my mind! I was also inspired by the Floral Mango Ice-cream that Mike @ Mike’s Table had posted…the colours & combination were explosive, but for the eggs. I am quite a non-eggy person, so I put my own ideas & measures together & made this. Lovely & creamy ice-cream…& maybe would do even better in an ice-cream machine (whinge, whinge)…I used my arm!!

Ingredients:

Fresh cream – 500ml
Condensed milk – 1 can (14oz)
Mangoes – 2-3 / pureed
Pistachio nuts – a handful / optional

Method:

  • Beat the cream & condensed milk well. Add the mango puree & roughly chopped nuts & whisk again.
  • Put into a plastic bowl with a tight fitting lid & put into the freezer.
  • Whisk the ice-cream every hour to break the crystals that form from the edge inwards, at least 5-6 times (whinge-whinge), & then leave to set for 6-8 hours or overnight.
  • Top with slivered pistachios & sprigs of mint! It’s absolutely delicious.

DH commented…”Better than Ben & Jerry’s”!! YAY!

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