Bye bye July
Raspberry kinda Ripple Ice Cream Sandwich
Hello from NL 58. This is Bake Sense, the somewhat ordered record of ramblings that concern the world of baking. Here, we champion flavour and wholesome ingredients and keep an open and curious mind that questions where those ingredients come from and how we can make the most of them.
I have been thinking about how to improve consistency in writing and posting newsletters here. When I first began Bake Sense, I had the luxury of setting aside time to write and publish on a weekly basis. Since the start of the year, that luxury has been a struggle to hold on to, but not one I am willing to give up.
If you’ve been a reader or paid for a subscription from the start, thank, you for your continued support and patience while newsletters have been less regular than when you signed up. I am thinking about how to adapt and create a new writing routine that will deliver more consistency than it has lately. One idea I am floating is to publish just one newsletter per month for the rest of this year, a regularity that I think is more achievable, one that will continue to feature recipes from the bakery or my home kitchen; it might be a simple but versatile component or a more involved baking project, plus ideas that I never had the chance to execute and notes for the month ahead, a journal of sorts. I’m already looking forward to approaching August with this format in mind.
In the meantime, I’m here to round off July with one more recipe to put those parfait tips from the previous newsletter into practice. The month has been a great one for berries, and for the first time in a few years, the raspberry haul in these parts was generous enough to allow plenty of play with cakes and jam and volunteered themselves as prime for this nostalgia tainted parfait.
Raspberry Ripple & Coconut Ice Cream Sandwich
All three components can be used in a myriad of other applications and need not specifically be assembled in sandwich format but the combination of raspberry and coconut reminds me of summer holidays, from the Raspberry Ruffles you could get at the Pick and Mix in Woolworths to the Screwballs from the ice cream van. The milky parfait against the sweet swirl and soft cake are little reminiscent of an arctic roll in all the best ways.
The coconut dacquoise is an egg white heavy recipe, a great way to utilise all those taking up room in the freezer and uses both dessicated and flaked coconut for the ultimate chewy, macaroony textute. Toasting the coconut before incorporating into the meringue base lends so much flavour and is a step not the be missed.
A fruit swirl that freezes sans ice crystals requires you to lower the freezing point of the fruit by reducing the water content and increasing the sugar content. In my search to find the texture I was looking for, I turned to this article by Stella Parks. It’s packed full of tips, tricks and science to give you the best chance of success. I followed the recipe for the most part, choosing to add red wine and balsamic vinegar
Ingredients
Makes 14 ice cream sandwiches.
For the Raspberry Sauce
(adapted from Stella Parks)
225g raspberries
15g lemon juice
15g red wine vinegar
170g caster sugar
1g fine sea salt
10g balsamic vinegar
I followed the method outlined by Stella here, I cooked the sauce to 106 degrees C and added the balsamic vinegar at the end to round out the fruity flavour and temper sweetness.
For the Parfait
Yields 1, 9 x 12 inch tin.
100g egg yolk
52ml water
125g caster sugar
40g soft light brown sugar
5g sea salt
755g double cream
Half quantity of raspberry sauce above, plus a little extra for assembly
Prepare the tray by lining it with greaseproof paper.
Place the yolks in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment.
Add the sugars to a small saucepan along with the water.
Measure the double cream into a large bowl (preferably stainless steel) and grab a large balloon whisk.
Whisk the cream until it is just thick enough to form trails in the bowl, we’re aiming for something not quite soft peak just yet but close. Place the bowl in the fridge where it will contiune to thicken slightly as it sits.
Meanwhile whisk the egg yolks on high speed, they will steadily increase in volume to approximately four times their original size.
At the same time, heat the saucepan and stir to encourage the sugar to dissolve; once dissolved, increase the heat and allow the syrup to thicken, use a thermometer and heat the syrup until it reaches 115-116 degrees C.
When it reaches the desired temperature, remove from the heat and turn the mixer down to medium, carefully pour the hot syrup down the side of the bowl into the mixer, be careful to avoid the whisk.
Once it is all added, increase the mixing speed to high and allow to whisk for 8-10 minutes.
Remove the cream from the fridge and check how thick it is, continue to whip by hand until soft but still flowing peaks form. Over whipping the cream can make it difficult to incorporate into the egg foam and ideally you want the cream to be only slightly thicker than the egg foam.
After 8-10 minutes, the bowl of the mixer should feel cool, and the foam should be much lighter in colour and four times the original volume.
Transfer the egg foam to a large clean bowl and pour half of the cream on top, using a silicone spatula, fold the cream into the foam until incorporated.
Add the remaining cream and switch to a large metal spoon to quickly but carefully fold the cream in. Rotate the bowl the opposite way to the direction of folding and use horseshoe shaped movements until the mixture is homogeneous.
Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and swirl through the raspberry sauce. Fear of overswirling caused me to servely underswirl, so my advice would be to swirl with more abandon than you might think.