Celebrating National Strawberry Sundae Day with The Naptime Chef!

So I am going to cheat just a little today and in lieu of a sundae, persay, we are going to focus on strawberry ice cream because The Naptime Chef just did a fabulous blog post and webisode for some extremely delicious looking Strawberry Mint Ice Cream and she has been kind enough to let us post her webisode right here! We think you'll find this as a replacement to the sundae quite worth it!

We've been a fan of The Naptime Chef since we discovered and posted about her very own Great Ice Cream Festival last August. Intrigued, we even interviewed her for the post and found out she is a master of all trades in the kitchen, and her skills go well beyond ice cream making. I even found she's only two degrees of separation in the whole Six Degrees of Separation, having had attended a small private girls school in New York with one of my dearest friends.

Anyhow, enough of a preview...let's get to the main feature:



You can also watch this and other Naptime Chef Webisodes at Mevio.

Enjoy!

Thanks, Naptime Chef!

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

Think Cold Thoughts With Fro-Zing!

Weather Underground says is is 101.4° in Waltham right now, and it is all I can do to not have another ice crean cone today. Yes, I already had one at 11:40 today at J.P. Licks in Newton Center as I was heading back from an errand -- 8+ months pregnant and 100+° weather -- I thought it warranted a cone. OK, OK...I'm not going to lie. I don't even need either of those excuses, but it did feel extra validated today!

I guess next best thing would be to at least write a long overdue ice cream review...well, a tart frozen yogurt review...it will give me an excuse to put a couple more spoonfuls of a frozen treat into my mouth and perhaps make me think frozen thoughts! Hurrah!

Back in March (I know, it's been a while, but quite honestly, what could be better than a post about frozen ANYTHING on a 100+° day in July!), Kemps sent both Tina and I two cartons of their latest Fro-Zing! and I have to say, I was quite surprised. I am not usually a fan of tart frozen yogurt, but these new flavors have got me double thinking the whole thing!

The blueberry was quite good. The flavor reminded me of the days as kids when we used to put refrigerated yogurt in the freezer and take it out on a hot day, eagerly scraping away at the block of solid yogurt. The bonus was the air that was whipped in -- the effort of scraping away was gone, and I could enjoy the tangy blueberry taste without all the hard work. I found it to be quite refreshing on this summer day.

The raspberry vanilla was my favorite though. The first thing your senses are struck by is the swirl of pink and white frozen goodness as you open the package. The pink is so bright and inviting that that alone cools you off. However, one bite of this frozen yogurt is what really got me. Yes, I was getting live and active cultures which are supposedly good for me, but there was something more to it. It reminded me of a summertime favorite from growing up in Connecticut where my dad grew rows of raspberries, with Mom and Dad collecting quarts of the fresh red berrries at the peak of the season, cleaning them and lightly sugaring them to draw out the juices and finally, adding them to a cup of vanilla yogurt. To this day, it's still a summertime treat I savor when I go home, the only thing better is the raspberry fresh off the plant, still warm from the noonday sun. But I digress. The flavor of this yogurt was just that: the vanilla yogurt mixed with the sweetened berries -- the tart so welcoming because of the nature of the fruit. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by the refreshing subtle sweetness of the raspberry vanilla and find it almost to be a comfort food when I can't be home visiting Mom and Dad.

My only complaint with these frozen yogurts is they are "drier" than ice cream. Dry might not be the right word, but as ice cream melts to the spoon and curls right out to the shape of the spoon, I find tart frozen yogurt (all of them, not just Kemp's) to kind of break up more and have a less smooth texture, probably due to the absence of as much fat as ice cream has. Late breaking news (10 or so minutes after this post was finished): if you let the frozen yogurt sit out for a bit, you get a still cold and refreshing, but super light and airy almost perfect texture. So basically, my only complaint came out of my impatience.

Though I forsee the raspberry vanilla being my favorite of the Fro-Zings!, looking through their Fro-Zing! flavors, the next on my list to try is the cherry vanilla. Can't wait!

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

Ice Cream in the Sky

SKYplay by Horst J. Bernhart via Drawn!. (Thanks Kevin!) 


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

Churn Up Some Red, White and Blue

Election Day 2004, I headed to the nearest convenience store in the North End and found a carton of fabulous red, white, and blue ice cream. I think it was this no name brand and probably fake fake fake, but I really liked it. I have never found it since.

I guess we are on our own to fulfill our red, white and blue needs this year BUT judging from what I found below, I think this recipe will leave me having had forgotten that carton of fake ice cream. 

A google search brought up this fabulous cake, its only downfall being it's not great for July fourth picnics because it can't just sit out on the picnic table.

The photo at left (taken by Zoe Singer for Epicurious) says it best -- um, yum! Layers of blueberry and strawberry sorbet and lemon ice cream separated by chocolate cookie crumbs (or candied ginger, but not being a ginger fan myself and loving chocolate cookies, I have to ask why would you do the ginger?!), and topped with fresh, local fruit, this cake is not only gorgeous to look at, but looks amazing to eat. 

The recipe was created by Gabrielle Carbone of The Bent Spoon (Artisan Ice Cream and Good Ingredient Bakery) in Princeton, New Jersey. Um, I need to go there!

Head over to Epicurious for a great article about The Bent Spoon, its owners, their love of local (and for that alone we love them!), the recipe for this cake (including separate recipes for each of the ice cream/sorbet flavors), and Carbone's ingredient secrets (with a great little blurb about making creamy ice cream).

I know I can't make this for the Fourth of July picnic I am attending, but I do think I will be trying this one out sometime soon!

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

Amazing Ice Cream at Kimball Farm Westford MA

No better way to start off National Ice Cream month than with having ice cream and lots of it. Just so happens that on this first day of the month I was at a work outing at a place that is famous for its gigantic portions and udderly (excuse the pun) good homemade ice cream, Kimball Farm in Westford Massachusetts. This place is super fun for all ages. It is the quintessential jump in the car with the kids and head on down summer place...bumper boats, mini golf, batting cages, country store, arcade, and last but not least...homemade ice cream. See this picture above...apparently its a typical jam-packed summer night.

So after some mean games of corporate tug o war and then a not too shabby game of golf we regrouped for the highlight of the day, the ice cream. Since this was a private company outing we didn't have the tons of flavors available at their main counter but none the less we had some good ones. My choices were mint oreo (because mint is my favorite and if its there I have to have it), Kahlua Crunch, and Mocha Almond Assault (now after telling you my choices I guess we really did have some good options ).

I obviously had a mound o ice cream but I always have such a hard time just having one flavor. A coworker sits beside me with his favorite, black rasperry and we all went on about how could he just have that and even without sprinkles. How dare he...oh and then he went on about how Black Raspberry is his favorite but an old-timers favorite so we debated that for a bit. It is sort of old school when Ben & Jerry's has all these cool flavors now but its such a great classic. Anyways, back to mine. The Mint Oreo was fantastic. I love Mint ice cream that is white. It says I am not trying too hard and I am going to be good no matter the color. White mint ice cream also says natural to me but I am so sure if they use a flavoring instead but I would have to guess that is the case. So then I move onto the Kahlua Crunch...kahlua ice cream with chocolate covered toffee pieces.....wow! And lastly the Mocha Almond Assault...and that is what it was...super creamy Mocha ice cream with almonds. I think the latter was my favorite. The sweet mocha ice cream with salty almonds was to die for. Definitely a keeper. (this photo below is a typical portion size..ouch!)

So even if Kimball Farm is over an hour away from my home its so worth a family road trip. If you ask anyone from Massachusetts if they've been to this infamous summer spot I have a feeling they can tell you some good memory of it.


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