{"id":2148,"date":"2012-02-17T10:02:45","date_gmt":"2012-02-17T16:02:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/?p=2148"},"modified":"2012-02-18T10:02:57","modified_gmt":"2012-02-18T16:02:57","slug":"meryl-ly-we-roll-along-lavender-ice-cream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/?p=2148","title":{"rendered":"Meryl-ly We Roll Along: Lavender Ice Cream"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0;float:none\"><iframe src=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fthesoupblog.com%2F%3Fp%3D2148&amp;layout=button_count&amp;show_faces=true&amp;action=like&amp;font=arial&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;width=450&amp;height=30\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" allowTransparency=\"true\" style=\"border:none; overflow:hidden; width: 450px; height: 30px;\"><\/iframe><\/div><div id=\"attachment_2152\" style=\"width: 370px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/?attachment_id=2152\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-2152\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2152\" class=\"size-full wp-image-2152\" title=\"Lavender Meryl2\" src=\"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Lavender-Meryl2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"360\" height=\"496\" srcset=\"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Lavender-Meryl2.jpg 360w, https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Lavender-Meryl2-72x100.jpg 72w, https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Lavender-Meryl2-217x300.jpg 217w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 360px) 100vw, 360px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-2152\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Throwing Flowers at the Stage<\/p><\/div>\n<p>You might say that this week\u2019s ice cream is very exotic or very French and you\u2019d be right. But the best way to describe it is very Meryl Streep.<\/p>\n<p>I don\u2019t know precisely how long I\u2019ve been following Streep\u2019s career, but I do remember watching her in a TV version of Wendy Wasserstein\u2019s first play \u201cUncommon Women and Others\u201d back when I was in grade school. I also remember reading about her exploits at the Yale Drama School in an issue of Newsweek that was either laying around my parents house or in a doctor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n<p>I can\u2019t say I ever fell in love with her or anything. (I\u2019m not really into blondes.) Besides you never really feel like you\u2019re really seeing her anyway, you\u2019re seeing the character she\u2019s playing.\u00a0 But I\u2019ve never seen a movie of hers that she didn\u2019t make better. And she\u2019s been in a lot of movies.<\/p>\n<p>Recently there\u2019s been \u201cJulie and Julia\u201d where she was an amazing Julia Child. And \u201cThe Devil Wore Prada\u201d where she played an Anna Wintour-esque fashion editor. Then there was \u201cThe Hours,\u201d \u201cAdaptation,\u201d \u201cMusic of the Heart,\u201d \u201cOne True Thing,\u201d \u201cDancing at Lughnasa,\u201d \u201cDefending Your Life,\u201d \u201cIronweed,\u201d \u201cHeartburn,\u201d \u201cOut of Africa,\u201d \u201cSophie\u2019s Choice,\u201d \u201cThe French Lieutenant\u2019s Woman,\u201d \u201cKramer vs. Kramer\u201d \u2026 It just goes on and on. And those are just the one\u2019s I\u2019ve seen, and just the films on top of that.<\/p>\n<p>Once I was listening to a reading of <em>The Velveteen Rabbit<\/em> with my kids, and there she was again. How does she keep doing it?<\/p>\n<p>The answer, clearly, is ice cream.<\/p>\n<p>How do I know?<\/p>\n<p>I just do.<\/p>\n<p>A few months ago, my wife and I were watching a DVD in which Streep plays a Santa Barbara baker or some other successful foodie entangled in an affair with her ex-husband. The relevant scene in this case was one in which Streep\u2019s character soothes her aching heart by making lavender ice cream. (Sounds interesting, right?) There were other more interesting and sensuous and sensual scenes, including one involving making chocolate croissants but I\u2019ll save that for the year I blog about pastries.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway the movie was \u201cIt\u2019s Complicated\u201d (I was going to say I forgot the name, but with the ubiquity of Smartphone\u2019s, that doesn\u2019t cut it anymore.) and it got the idea of lavender ice cream stuck in my head.<\/p>\n<p>My experience with lavender as an herb only goes as far as <em>herbes de Provence<\/em>, the French herb blend which includes thyme, basil, fennel, etc., etc. and lavender. I had used it in a menu I worked up for my colleagues at the <em>LA Times <\/em>once where I rubbed the herbs onto filets of sole and baked them off. The food was good and earned me both praise and a few bucks when it ran.<\/p>\n<p>But ice cream?<\/p>\n<p>I had to try.<\/p>\n<p>I found dried lavender blossoms at Whole Foods and then infused their flavor into a cup and a half of cream. The flavor was very strong, which I suppose has to do with using dried herbs instead of fresh. My wife and daughter both liked it a lot. It was smooth and rich and very potent. They described it alternately as eating a bouquet of flowers and perfume.<\/p>\n<p>Not exactly appealing images.<\/p>\n<p>Still, it was easily the most adventurous recipe I\u2019ve made to date, a real leap into the unknown.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps Meryl would be proud.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Lavender Ice Cream<br \/>\n<\/strong>(about 1\u00bd quarts)<br \/>\n1 \u00bd cup milk<br \/>\n\u00be cup sugar<br \/>\n2 T flour<br \/>\nA few grains salt<br \/>\n2 eggs or 3 yolks (pasteurized, if possible, see note)<br \/>\n1 \u00bd cup cream<br \/>\n3 T dried lavender blossoms<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Heat milk to 180-190\u00baF with sugar, flour and salt, stirring until thick, cover for 10 minutes.<\/li>\n<li>Beat eggs and add \u00bd cup of mixture while beating, then add eggs to mixture<br \/>\n<strong>HEALTH NOTE:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Since you\u2019re dealing with eggs here, you need to take care when cooking the custard. Too much cooking and the custard gets lumpy, too little and you risk salmonella.\u00a0 Another alternative is to use pasteurized eggs.<\/li>\n<li>Heat the mixture for one minute over medium heat, then cool with plastic wrap or wax paper pressed onto the top of the mixture to keep it from developing a skin. Cool for several hours or overnight.<\/li>\n<li>At the same time, combine the cream with the lavender blossoms in a saucepan and bring to a simmer. Once the cream begins to bubble, cover the pot, remove it from the heat and chill in the refrigerator.<\/li>\n<li>The next day, strain the cream to remove the blossoms and combine it with the custard mixture.<\/li>\n<li>Freeze in an ice cream freezer for about 35 minutes.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<ol>\n<li>Put the now frozen ice cream into the freezer for a couple of hours to give it a chance to firm up.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><strong> NOTE: \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>When freezing ice cream, you need to use an ice cream freezer to ensure that a certain amount of air is mixed into the frozen cream. This gives it a lighter, less icy consistency. When freezing sorbet, you may also freeze it in a popsicle mold, a bowl or on a sheet pan. Be sure to stir the mixture occasionally to limit the size of the ice particles. Larger chunks of ice make for granita, miniscule chunks make for a nice smooth sorbet (an ice cream freezer is ideal).<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo Credit: <\/em>\u201cLavender Streep\u201d used without permission and I will take it down immediately when Ms. Streep asks me, but I\u2019m hoping she won\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What are your favorite Meryl Streep movies, or do you have some other movie star obsession? George Clooney perhaps? Kevin Spacey? Kathy Bates? It may not have anything to do with ice cream, but the way this crazy world turns, it just might. Let me know in a comment.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You might say that this week\u2019s ice cream is very exotic or very French and you\u2019d be right. But the best way to describe it is very Meryl Streep. I don\u2019t know precisely how long I\u2019ve been following Streep\u2019s career, but I do remember watching her in a TV version of Wendy Wasserstein\u2019s first play [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,134,160],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dairy","category-ice-cream","category-lavender"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2148"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2158,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2148\/revisions\/2158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesoupblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}