Roasted Strawberry Ice cream

We are still getting the sweetest strawberries here in Santa Cruz. I have been buying them from Ron, my Dutch buddy, at the farmers market for many years. He grows and sells them only at local farmers' markets. Sometimes, I buy too many, and they start looking sad in my fridge. What am I to do? I hate throwing good food away. Several years ago, I bought a great cookbook called Baking At The 20th Century Cafe by Michelle Polzine, who used to own a cafe in San Francisco that made Austrian-Hungarian delicacies. The cafe has since closed, but her book has been one of my favorite cookbooks. She substitutes local ingredients in her baking. I made several of her recipes, and they are all very good—and you can’t tell the difference from the original Austrian recipe. I know because I had both. She was nominated for the James Beard Pastry Chef Award.

In her book, she makes cream puffs filled with strawberry ice cream and chocolate sauce. I made the strawberry ice cream. The roasted strawberries are out of this world. I kept some for my morning yogurt, and just thinking about them makes me hungry.

The amount of sugar you will need depends on the sweetness of the strawberries. Her recipe calls for ⅓ cup, but I reduced mine to 3 TBS of sugar. I cut her recipe in half and ended up with a generous cup of roasted strawberries and 4 cups of ice cream.
My tasters approved of the richly flavored ice cream, even though my 40-year-old ice cream machine is having issues, and I think I need to replace it with a new one. I liked the ice cream best when it was soft after just a few hours in the freezer. However, most of it was eaten when it had been in the freezer for days. I made my own version of a banana split with it for some Swiss friends. I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I did.

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Ingredients for roasted strawberries:
This amount makes a little more than 1 cup.
1 pound strawberries
3 TBS sugar
Preheat oven to 300˚F Fahrenheit  (150˚Celsius)

Directions for the roasted strawberries :
Arrange the strawberries in a single layer in a glass dish or baking dish and sprinkle the sugar over it. Roast the strawberries for about 3 hours, stirring every hour, until the juice has been reduced to a syrup. After the berries have cooled, transfer them with their juices to an airtight container. They will last in the fridge for several days. 

Ingredients for the ice cream:
2 cups strawberries
1 cup heavy cream
4 egg yolks
¼ cup granulated sugar
¾ -1 cup roasted strawberries

Directions for the ice cream:
Wash and hull the strawberries. Puree them in a blender or food processor. You should have about a cup and a half. 
Heat the cream in a heavy saucepan until it begins to bubble at the edges of the pan. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar in a bowl. Gradually whisk some (about ⅓) of the hot mixture into the egg yolk mixture. Be careful, or the mixture will curdle, and you will have to start all over again. Pour the mixture back into the pan with the remaining cream and cook, stirring often, until it registers 170˚F (200 Celsius) on an instant-read thermometer. Pour the mixture through a sieve, stir in the strawberry puree, cover, and refrigerate overnight.  Process the mixture in an ice cream maker. Follow the instructions for your machine. When the ice cream is completely frozen, add the roasted strawberries with some of the syrup and continue churning it for a few minutes. Transfer the ice cream to a container and freeze. 
Guten Appetit!
Recipe from Baking at the 20th Century Cafe 
By Michelle Polzine
Posted by the Sunnycovechef

We are having a  Pinot Noir wine tasting at our house next week. I am thinking of serving the following recipes.  

These salmon miso rillettes make a great snack or appetizer.
Click here for the recipe

Flammkuchen or flatbread makes a great snack with a glass of wine.
​Click here for the recipe

I think that these little cheddar cheese puffs will taste good with a glass of wine.
​Click here for the recipe