Southern Peach Ice Cream with Bourbon-Peach Swirl

It’s August. We’re in the middle of a heat wave here in Toronto (which really could be the south, for all intents and purposes) and eating ice cream at the water park every day. So when I stumbled upon this recipe, I couldn’t resist! This is not for the faint of heart. Here it is people. 

Adapted from 10th Kitchen

For sweet tea ice cream

  1. 2 cups heavy cream
  2. 1 ½ cups  whole milk
  3. ¼ cup light corn syrup
  4. 6 tbs Silver Service Peach Passion tea
  5. ½ cup granulated sugar
  6. 2 tablespoons cornstarch

For bourbon-peach swirl

  1. 1 cup peaches, blanched, peeled, pitted and roughly chopped
  2. 1 tablespoon sugar
  3. 1 tablespoon cornstarch
  4. 1 tablespoon bourbon

Instructions

  1. To
    make the ice cream, heat the cream, milk and corn syrup in a large
    saucepan until just simmering. Add loose-leaf tea, lower heat to low and
    simmer, keeping a close watch so it doesn’t boil over, for 10 minutes,
    then remove from heat and allow the tea to steep for 2 hours.
  2. Strain the mixture through a very fine mesh sieve or cheesecloth and try to squeeze as much of the liquid goodness out!
  3. Whisk
    together sugar and cornstarch until combined, then whisk into the
    tea-infused cream mixture.  Reheat and cook over medium heat, stirring
    constantly, until the mixture reaches a gentle boil, then reduce heat to
    low and simmer, stirring constantly, for 30 seconds (mixture will be
    thick and bubbly).
  4. Strain
    mixture through a fine mesh sieve into a large bowl, then cover tightly
    and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, at least a few hours but
    preferably overnight. (Take our advice here.)
  5. To
    make the peach-bourbon swirl, toss together the peaches with cornstarch
    and sugar and cook in a medium saucepan over medium heat until the
    peaches have broken down and the mixture is bubbly, thick and delicious, 5 minutes
    or so.  Cool mixture, stir in the bourbon, and refrigerate until
    thoroughly chilled.
  6. Once both the cream mixture and peach mixture are chilled, process the
    cream mixture in your ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s
    directions.  Purée the peach mixture in a blender or food processor
    until smooth, then drop spoonfuls of both mixtures into a resealable
    container, alternating between them.  Run a butter knife through to
    create a swirl effect, then freeze until firm.  Makes about a quart. Which should last you about a day.

Bourbon black magic

image

Well folks, it’s officially spring…oh wait, unless you live on the east coast and just got a dump of snow! On behalf of West Coast Canada, we’re sorry.

We made this on a Monday night, after a Sunday all-day birthday celebration (for moi) and before leaving our baby with a babysitter (!) – ok, actually 2, we’re nuts – and riding our bikes to Italian birthday dinner date night. It was a delicious weeknight celebratory drink. A way to keep the birthday going…maybe for a few more days.

Here are the basic proportions:

1 part bourbon

3 parts tea

1 tsp sugar
Splash of milk

+ a sprig of mint (mostly for fun, and to pretend/celebrate the coming of spring)

It was lovely sans milk but honestly so deliciously creamy with just a splash. Feel free to play with the ingredients and let us know how it turns out!


Sweet Cinnamon Banana Bread

We made tea-infused banana bread! And it was amazing. I think
you could use any banana bread recipe you love, but we used this one, and
infused the butter with tea. I even (accidentally) spilled some of the tea leaves into the batter
in my tired attempt to squeeze every last drop of butter out of them, and we
have yet to have an overly-crunchy-tea-leaf bite! I also added walnuts and they add a nice texture to it. It’s deliciously cinammon-flavoured, with
the cinnamon oil from the tea most present in the aftertaste, and really
sinking into the bread after a night in the fridge.

My only word of caution: infusing butter with tea does use a
lot of tea leaves (I used ½ cup for this recipe!) so…maybe don’t make this if
you love actually drinking the tea.  Or make it sans tea and brew a cup of Market
Spice Sweet Cinnamon
instead.

Sweet Cinnamon Banana Bread

3 to 4 ripe bananas, smashed

¾ cup melted salted butter + ½ cup Market Spice Sweet
Cinnamon tea (instructions for infusing here)

1 cup light brown sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

3 tablespoons bourbon (or more!)

1 teaspoon baking soda

pinch of salt (oops, I forgot this)

1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional – I left this out but it could
be nice for a layered flavour)

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

1 ½ cups flour

Preheat the oven to 350°F. With a
wooden spoon, mix infused butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing
bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, vanilla and bourbon, then the spice(s). Sprinkle
the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour
mixture into a buttered 4×8 inch loaf pan. Bake for 50 minutes to one hour, or
until a tester comes out clean. Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to
serve.


Bourbon iced tea!
We used smittenkitchen’s recipe and our own cold-brewed Kenyan Estate black tea from justea. Here’s the recipe, in slower motion:

3 oz cold-brewed Mount Kenyan Estate, 2 oz grapefruit juice (Trader-Joe’s), 1 oz bourbon (we tried a few and went with our family favourite, Four Roses), juice of ½ lime, ½ tbs. sugar.
Fill a shaker with ice and shake well. Fill 2 glasses with ice, pour and enjoy! Add sprig of mint if you’d like…we forgot but it was still delish.