Sweet Potato Ice Cream

If they can make sweet potatoes into pies, why not ice cream too? A unique blend of cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, brown sugar and sweet potatoes make this one ice cream not to miss!

I'm not much for professing my love of anything. People, places, things.....okay, I do profess my love for food all the time. All. The. Time. But, this post is not going to profess my love for food.....just a food critic's book. It's different than food I swear! ....okay, what I really love is her talking about food all the time.....I give. I only love one thing.

I've been reading Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl. I. Love. It. Mostly for the theatrics of it all. Who doesn't love a food critic who dresses up in ridiculously fun outfits! Telling stories about the way she would get treated in restaurants and the elaborate measure of concealment it would take....including going on a date! While married! She paid for her own food but still! I love it. I'm only half way through, and normally just stick a blip about what I'm reading at the bottom....but this book I have been enjoying too much to keep it on the sidelines.

One thing I've loving is the occasional mention of ice creams served in the restaurants. It makes me happy to hear that these four star place of the 90s in NYC were making some ice creams I've been trying my hands at! Granted the last one they mentioned was one that I failed at need to work on: Lemon Verbena.

But here is one that turned out beautifully! Sweet Potato Ice Cream is one treat not to miss!

Sweet Potato Ice Cream


2 lbs. sweet potatoes
1 cup cream
1/2 cup milk
3/4 s packaged dark brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
pinch salt


Bake the sweet potatoes on 400 for one hour. 


Peel the baked sweet potatoes and puree. Beat in the half-and-half, sugar, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, and salt. Beat together until smooth. 

Transfer the mixture to an ice cream maker. Allow the ice cream to churn until finished and freeze according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Ginger Snap & Ricotta Lemon Cardamom Ice Cream Sandwiches

Spicy gingersnaps make the perfect sandwich cookie for luscious ricotta lemon cardamom ice cream! The perfect gourmet ice cream sandwich!

Butchie and I were totally back on our game! Well, mostly. Let me take a moment to discuss proper high-fiving etiquette.

Perhaps you don't know this, but yes, there is a proper way to high five. If you merely hold up your hand for someone else to hit, this is NOT a high five. That is merely your being hit by another human being. In order for it to qualify as a high five, both hands must be moving towards each other. It is that simple. Butchie has now been well-versed in this etiquette and forced to practice. [FINE I GET IT I HAVE TO MAINTAIN MOMENTUM. --B.]

Why the high-fives? We were on our GAME! A well-oiled machine! We had everything together (including all the ingredients, unlike last week) and had ice cream churned and freezing and gingersnaps made and cleaned up in less than two hours! Okay, well, it sounds kinda weak in writing, but in person it's completely wonderful. [And totally out of character. Don't let these gorgeous photos she puts up every week fool you...we are MESSY. And spill a lot. And sometimes our food looks ugly. Jana, don't delete that last sentence. --B.]

The high-fiving however did turn to hitting when Butchie caught me sneaking cookies. I am NOT sorry. They are good and it was worth it.

We hope you enjoy these lovely ice cream cookies! We love them! [A note on the ice cream: it has a lovely rich texture from the ricotta, but if you are looking for a strong lemon flavor, we recommend substituting a few tablespoons of lemon juice instead of the extract we used here. Lemon extract adds more aroma than taste, which is often our compromise given that J. doesn't like citrus and I adore it. --B.]

Ginger Snap & Ricotta Lemon Cardamom Ice Cream Sandwiches

Gingersnaps

¼ cup unsalted butter

1 2/3 cups sugar

1 ½ eggs **yeah, I mean it too.

½ cup molasses

1 tablespoon white vinegar

3 1/8 cups bread flour

1 tablespoon baking soda

2 teaspoons ground ginger

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground cloves

½ teaspoon ground cardamom

Vanilla sugar or regular sugar

Using the dough hook at low speed, mix the butter and sugar together until well combined. Add in the eggs, molasses, and vinegar.

Sift together the flour, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and cardamom. Add to the butter mixture and mix on low speed just until combined.

Preheat oven to 375 F.

Divide the dough into two eighteen inch long logs and wrap in parchment paper. Refrigerate until firm.

Cut each rope into 30 pieces. Form the pieces into round balls and press the balls in the vanilla sugar (or regular sugar) to cover the tops. Place the cookies sugar-side up on sheet pans lined with baking paper or silpats.

Bake until light brown on top but still soft in the center, approximately 10 minutes.

Ricotta Lemon Cardamom Ice Cream

2 cups cream

1 cup milk

¾ cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. lemon extract

1 tsp. cardamom

12 ounces ricotta

In a stand mixer combine the eggs and sugar. Beat for one minute until light and fluffy.

Gently mix in the cream, milk, lemon extract, cardamom and ricotta.

Transfer the mixture to an ice cream maker. Allow the ice cream to churn until finished and freeze according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

To make the ice cream sandwiches scoop a bit of ice cream onto one gingersnap and sandwich it with another! 

Cardamom Macarons with Lemon Buttercream

Light and crisp, these macarons have the sweet floral accent of cardamom. They pair wonderfully with the lemon-flavored buttercream. As Seen on Food Porn Daily (G Rated) and Photograzing. 

cardamom macarons

Butchie and I decided to take another pass at macarons and try another recipe. We used the basic recipe from when Helen of Tartelette was featured in Desserts Magazine and then added some cardamom.  I’ll admit while baking we were a little put off. They took much much MUCH longer to bake than we had anticipated.

Helen’s recipe said 10-12 minutes, but we baked our s for nearly twice the time and were still unsure if they were really ever fully cooked.  Luckily, the entertainment of the evening was so incredibly overdramatic that it completely took our minds off the amount of time these macarons needed to bake. [Leave Grey’s anatomy for two seasons, and you come back to find that not much has really changed. There are a lot of bad relationship choices, and Seattle Grace is still the only hospital in America in which you are more likely to be shot than cured.  --B]

By the next morning, we’d all but decided to forego the recipe based on the baking time, but then I came home early from work and ate a few of the leftovers. SO much better the next day.  I actually enjoyed them much more than our first attempt at macarons. This might be due to the fact that we were less stressed about the process, or because we had half the number of cooks in the kitchen, but mainly it’s that these macarons really did taste great.  Butchie can’t weigh in….I ate all the macarons and didn’t save any for her. [Jerk. –B. ] I’m not sorry. They were that good.  It is probably one of the best decisions I have made this week.

I really liked adding the cardamom to the macarons. It was a good flavor, especially when accented by the lemon buttercream filling. 

cardamom macarons, almonds,  and national cathedral

Cardamom Macarons

Adapted from Helen’s recipe at Tartelette

100 g egg whites

50 grams granulated sugar

200 grams powdered sugar

110 grams ground almonds (or blanched or whole)
1 teaspoon ground cardamom

In a stand mixer, whip the egg whites into foam, gradually adding the sugar until you have a glossy meringue.

In a food processor pulse the powdered sugar, cardamom and almonds until smooth. If you are using whole almonds this will take about one minute.

Gently fold in part of the almond sugar with one or two strokes, then sprinkle over the rest of the almond sugar and cardamom. Be careful. This process should NOT take more than 50 strokes.

Using a pastry bag pipe out batter into 1 ½ inch diameter circles on to parchment paper lined baking sheets.

Allow to sit for one hour.

Preheat oven to 300 degrees and bake for 10-12 minutes (or 20 if you are us).

Allow the macarons to sit for 10 minutes before removing from the parchment paper. Any amount of time too long will brown the cookies and distract from the beautiful sheen they have.

Remove macarons from oven and transfer parchment to a cooling rack. When cool, slide a metal offset spatula or paring knife underneath the macaron to remove from parchment.

Fill with lemon buttercream.

Lemon Buttercream

1 cup butter, softened
1 tsp lemon flavoring
a pinch of salt
4 cups confectioners’ sugar

Whip (using a paddle attachment)  butter, and flavoring till creamy then whip in powdered sugar in a stand mixer using the paddle attachment.

Enjoy!