Happy Peach Ice Cream Day!

Peach Ice Cream Day is a pretty specific holiday, but I guess it is a combo of two things at their peak -- peaches are so seasonal and have only a short window of enjoyment each year, and ice cream, while popular year round, certainly shines in the summer when it's hot out. It seems only natural that they be combined into a holiday.

In the past we've posted peach ice cream recipes (or failed to in some cases -- sorry!), but I started wondering where we can get packaged peach ice cream...I started searching some of our favorite brands...here's just a sampling...

• Ben & Jerry's: Nope. This flavor is now in the flavor graveyard. But you can find a recipe for it in Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book (Stay tuned! We'll be having a giveaway this month for a copy of that book!)
• Turkey Hill: Yep, they have a seasonal Peaches 'N Cream which seems to be available June through September!
• Breyer's: Yep. From their site: "Real juicy peach pieces mixed into creamy vanilla."
• Haagen-Daz: No.
• Edy's: Edy's has a slow churned yogurt blend in peach. Does this count for Peach Ice Cream Day? Is it a blend of yogurt and ice cream?
• Ciao Bella: Peaches 'N Cream. Not in cartons. Only in retail locations. Bummer. 
• Friendly's: Nope.
• Perry's: Can't connect to their ste. Bummer.
• Schwan's: Looks like they have a fro yo. Hard to do a search.

Hope this gets you started and gives you a jumping off point for celebrating the holiday!

Happy National Peach Ice Cream Day

Ah Peaches, a fresh taste of summer that is short and sweet so what better way then to celebrate than to make ice cream with them and to declare it a national holiday. Who comes up with these holidays anyways?!

I did try to find out the background of National Peach Ice Cream Day but its all rather elusive so really I have no good answer for you. I did find out about the peach was brought to America in the 16th century (maybe on July 17th?!) by explorers from Spain. Then finally in the 1800s The States started commercially cultivating them into what is today the country's second biggest fruit crop. Never knew we had so many peaches.

So now that this history lesson is done we are happy to share with you a yummy recipe from allrecipes. I am a big fan of this site. I love how its become such a community and I totally rely on reviews for my recipes and for how to make adjustments. Here are a couple I thought would be helpful as you tackle this recipe.

"We have made a similar recipe to this for years and years. It is without a doubt the best ice cream recipe there is..."

"VERY EASY and delicious! i halved the recipe and cut down on the sugar by quite a bit, as suggested by other reviewers. it was the best peach ice cream we've ever eaten!"

"I took a tip from another reviewer and subbed almond extract. I added some freshly ground nutmeg and saved some peach slices to add to the mixture at the very end so that there were some chunks to give it more texture. So good!"


Peach Ice Cream
6 eggs, beaten
3 1/2 cups white sugar
10 fresh peaches, pitted and chopped
4 cups heavy cream
2 cups half-and-half cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon salt

Directions

In large bowl, mix together eggs and sugar until smooth; puree peaches in blender or food processor and stir 5 cups of puree into egg mixture. Stir in cream, half-and-half, vanilla and salt and mix well.

Pour mixture into freezer canister of ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

[Scoopalicious is celebrating National Ice Cream month with a Post-A-Day throughout the month of July!]

National Peach Ice Cream Day

So today is National Peach Ice Cream Day. First of all, who makes up all these holidays? We could blame Hallmark for this one, but I really don't think Hallmark has a Happy Peach Ice Cream Day card...

So anyway, I tried a Peach Pie Ice Cream Recipe that I was going to share with you but I decided against it. Here's why: I've made a lot of ice creams and am getting pretty good at it, not to toot my own horn. But every time I make peach ice cream it's bland and hard and icy. Also, I love ice cream and I love peaches. Perfect marriage, right? Wrong! To me when things are so good on their own, sometimes one just has to leave them as is. But that's just me and my justification of my failed peach ice cream attempts.

But I do have to say, if you have a good peach ice cream recipe and you want to share it, please do send it along and I will try (yet again) and make it. And even if you don't want to share, but you have a good recipe...I'll share my little secret which happened by chance:

I was lazy one day and bought a three pack of ready-made pie crusts. All the packages had two nice crusts and one crumbled one, and I needed the pie crust, so I bought them. Hating the wasted food, I baked the broken crust, crumbled it, froze it, and saved it for my peach ice cream. Even though the peach didn't turn out well I did learn that no matter what, pie crust in ice cream is yummy.

Happy Peach Ice Cream Day! For me, I'll celebrate with a ripe peach at some point, and a bowl of ice cream at another.

Peach photo courtesy of Topfer at stock.xchng.

[Scoopalicious is celebrating National Ice Cream month with a Post-A-Day throughout the month of July!]

Happy National Peach Ice Cream Day!

Happy National Peach Ice Cream Day! To celebrate, I tried something a little different and I infused rosemary into the cream as I was warming it, and made a Rosemary Peach Ice Cream.

This was not as sweet as I usually like, but I loved the mixture of flavors -- it has a very rich taste. As with many of my recent fruit ice creams, one churned and put in the freezer, this was a bit icier and froze harder than I would have preferred. However, once I let it sit and soften for for a bit, I liked the creaminess of the concoction

Unfortunately, I don't have time to post the whole recipe today, but I promise I will post it very soon!

In the meantime, you can take your favorite custard-style peach ice cream recipe, and while cooking the milk, add two sprigs of rosemary while it simmers. Continue following the recipe by adding the whisked eggs, cooking it until the sppon is coated and when it comes time to strain this custard mixture, strain out the rosemary as well.

Promise when I return from lack-of-internet-land, I will post the recipe, but until then, have the most wonderful National Peach Ice Cream Day!

[Scoopalicious is celebrating National Ice Cream month with a Post-A-Day throughout the month of July!]