Author: Gary @ BigSpud

A bit of a geek who loves food.

Categories
food ice cream wine

red wine ice cream with dark chocolate sauce and cherries

My brother in law came round, with a rather triffic New Zealand Pinot Noir. There was a bit left in the bottle so what should I do with it rather than drink it? I thought about red wine ice cream.

It’s a bit off the wall but we’re not a million miles from a red berry or grape ice cream are we? I’m no stranger to experimenting with ice cream. I played with what was left in the bottle, then popped out to get some more to continue the testing! And after a bit of tweaking, the addition of cherries and a dark chocolate sauce helps nudge your palate in the right direction, accentuating the sweetness and the bitterness to help you on your way.

What wine varieties would work well in ice cream?

  1. Port: sweeter varieties like Ruby or Tawny Port can add a rich and fruity flavour.
  2. Cabernet Sauvignon: This full-bodied red wine with blackcurrant, blackberry, and hints of oak can bring depth and complexity to ice cream.
  3. Merlot: With its softer tannins and flavours of ripe red berries, plum, and chocolate, Merlot can lend a smooth and sweet character to ice cream.
  4. Zinfandel: Known for its bold and jammy fruit flavours, Zinfandel can add a vibrant and fruity punch.
  5. Malbec: This medium to full-bodied red wine offers flavours of black cherry, plum, and hints of spice.

The Marlborough variety that I’m using offers a vibrant and aromatic style. The region is usually known for sauvignon blanc but this pinot is just how I like it: fruity, not heavy with a really clean taste.

With rich, fruity flavours we’re not a million miles away from a black forest gateau? Suddenly the cherries make sense.

Here’s some of my other ice cream recipes:

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red wine ice cream

Course Dessert
Keyword booze, cherries, custard, pudding
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Freezing time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 40 minutes
Servings 500 ml

Equipment

  • Ice cream machine

Ingredients

For the ice cream:

  • 400 ml red wine
  • 250 ml double cream
  • 75 ml whole milk
  • 4 egg yolks
  • 100 g sugar
  • 8-10 frozen cherries fresh will work but add them just before serving instead

For the chocolate sauce:

  • 50 g dark chocolate
  • 20 g butter
  • 100 ml double cream
  • 1 tablespoon sugar

Instructions

  • Put the red wine in a wide saucepan and put on a high heat. Boil until it has reduced by half - this can take 20-40 mins depending on the conductivity of your pan and water content of your wine. Once reduced pour into a jug or bowl to cool.
  • While it cools, put your cream and milk into another saucepan and bring to a simmer. While you wait beat the egg yolks and sugar together until light and foamy, about 3-4 minutes.
  • Add the wine reduction to the cream and then very gradually drizzle this into the egg yolks, beating all the time. This will help prevent the eggs cooking and scrambling. Return to a low heat and add a pinch of salt. Continue cooking until the mixture coats the back of a spoon, and leaves a trail when you draw a finger across - this will be about 80°C. Pour off to another container.
  • If you have an ice cream machine, churn until just set - a gelato kinda texture (I mean, you do what you want but I prefer the silky smoothness with the wine) and add the frozen cherries when prompted to mix in by your machine. If you don't have one pop the container in the freezer and churn up with a fork every 30 minutes until set, adding the cherries.
  • When ready to serve make the chocolate sauce. Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan and heat gently, stirring occasionally. Once melted together serve with the ice cream.

Notes

This pairs really well with a dense, rich chocolate cake or even as an affogato with a sweetened espresso.
Categories
food

what’s new?

I’ve been busy lately so here’s a quick round-up of some my favourite food things I’ve been enjoying.

Testing the cheapest blender on the market

I’ve been using this dirt cheap blender for a while now, so I thought I’d record my thoughts on what you get for your money. Watch below.

Exclusively show

I haven’t attended a proper food event since before the pandemic and I have to say I miss catching up with other food people. Exclusively 2023 was a trade show and my head was spinning from looking at all the different brands and products on show. Two trends stood out to me: everyone was keen to promote their green credentials, and every single brand seemed to be flogging a water bottle. Highlights for me included Denby’s beautiful crockery:

Henckels latest knife set:

and Vego cookware helmed by the charming Ankur.

BigFoodieGeek

I love finding a new YouTuber to watch, and Matt’s videos are a trove of fun, good recipes and silliness. Go check out his channel.

Bacon & egg ice cream

I was amazed with this Heston recipe. Part breakfast, part dessert, this wacky ice cream recipe is everything brilliant about my favourite chef. Click the pic to read:

Gordon Ramsay’s Future Food Star

Yes, it’s Apprentice with food. I mean, barely any changes to the format. But there is actual food and food business at the heart of all the challenges. Now if they can just lose all the silly jumping off cliffs team building rubbish it’ll be even better, but Gordon loves that stuff. Series 2 has finished now so have a binge on iPlayer.

Beef dripping sauce

I love a steak dinner. And I quite like the chain Miller & Carter – and the beef dripping sauce they do is knockout, so I had to have a go at making it myself. I’m really chuffed with the result, give it a go and let me know what you think.

Categories
beef red wine vinegar wine

beef dripping sauce miller and carter style

I love a good steak. I’ve been spoiled by great beef around the world and though my favourite steak house Chop Bloc in Chelmsford is no more, I’m quite partial to Miller & Carter. It’s a chain of about 100 steakhouses across the UK focusing on premium beef. I’m going to take you through my recipe for Miller and Carter beef dripping sauce but before that, a little history…

Miller & Carter was founded by William and Frederick Miller in 2003. The brothers initially opened their first restaurant in Birmingham, United Kingdom, with a vision to create a premium steakhouse experience. Over time, the restaurant gained popularity and expanded, leading to additional locations across the United Kingdom.

The restaurant chain is currently owned by Mitchells & Butlers, one of the largest operators of restaurants and pubs in the UK. Mitchells & Butlers acquired Miller & Carter in 2011, adding it to their portfolio of well-known dining and hospitality brands like Harvester and Toby Carvery.

You can expect a wide selection of steaks, including classic cuts like ribeye, sirloin, and fillet, as well as specialty cuts such as Chateaubriand and T-bone. In addition to their steaks, Miller & Carter offer seafood dishes, salads, and soups. Their menu also features a variety of sides, including fries and vegetables. And of course, sauces.

I’m aware this all sounds very #sponsored but I assure you it isn’t. Just a very consistent meal out that we enjoy as a family. The signature is a ‘steak experience’, where you choose a cut of steak, wedge salad with choice of dressing, fries, onion loaf and your choice of sauce on the side.

How the restaurant serve the ‘steak experience’ including the beef dripping sauce on the side

I almost always have the ‘beef dripping sauce’ – a very savoury gravy with a lip-smacking quality that leaves you with beefy goodness that you keep tasting later. I just had to have a go at recreating it at home. And after a number of attempts I’m pleased to say I think I’ve cracked it. Check out this pour!

And the Miller and Carter Twitter account have given it the seal of approval!

It is not a diet food. It needs a lot of beef dripping (very easily available at supermarkets, look for it with the other butters and fats in the chiller) and a good slug of booze. I’ve also chosen to thicken it with xanthan gum, which far from being an alien life form is actually present in lots of foods probably already in your cupboard. It’s less sciencey than it sounds, being derived from glucose fed to bacteria. Sounds yummy, doesn’t it. But it’s available in loads of high street shops like Holland & Barrett. Watch this great video on xanthan gum by the excellent Polar Ice Creamery for more info. If you can’t get it or don’t fancy it, you can thicken your sauce in the traditional ways like cornflour slurry or monte butter. Either way – try this sauce next time you have beef. It’s lick-your-plate-clean good.

Pairs well with top rump roast beef!

Looking to recreate the Miller & Carter experience? Try my Miller and Carter onion loaf recipe to complement it! Or the bordelaise sauce.

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beef dripping sauce miller & carter style

A simple sauce that just needs a little time to deliver loads of flavours.
Course sauce
Cuisine British
Keyword copycat recipe
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 40 minutes
Servings 2 people
Calories 225kcal

Ingredients

  • 50 g beef dripping
  • 2 shallots
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • ½ star anise
  • 100 g fatty stewing steak like skirt, flank, chuck etc
  • 80 g red wine
  • 20 g port
  • 500 g beef stock
  • ½ teaspoon sugar
  • red wine vinegar
  • ¼ teaspoon xanthan gum see notes

Instructions

  • Get a wide sauce pan over a medium heat.
  • Peel and finely dice the shallots. Peel and mince the garlic. Slice the beef into thin slices. Add about a third of the beef dripping to the pan and once melted, add the shallots, garlic, star anise and beef and stir fry for 4 - 6 minutes. Cook until the beef has started to brown and everything smells great.
  • Turn the heat up. Discard the star anise. Add the red wine and port and move everything around to get the great crusty bits off the bottom of the pan. Once the wine has bubbled away to about a third of it's volume, add in the beef stock and remaining beef dripping. Bring to a furious boil.
  • Let this all simmer away until it's about half of what you started with. This will take 20 - 30 minutes. Strain off all the solids (see note) and return the sauce to the pan. Turn the heat down low and adjust seasoning: it might need salt, pepper and a pinch of sugar, and add a couple of drops (I do mean a couple of drops) of red wine vinegar to taste to help balance the richness.
  • Once the flavour is right, whisk in the xanthan gum. You can serve immediately, or it refrigerates or freezes well.

Video

Notes

Xanthan gum is not an essential thickener, but doesn't have a floury taste and dissolves easily. It's available from larger supermarkets and health food stores like Holland & Barrett. If you can't find it use a teaspoon of cornflour mixed with a splash of water which will lighten the colour slightly.
The discarded beef and diced onion make a great last minute addition to a stir fry, or tossed with lamb's lettuce for a quick salad.
Categories
bacon egg food ice cream milk

heston blumenthal’s egg and bacon ice cream

Heston Blumenthal was born in West London in 1966. His childhood fed many of his culinary fantasies he was to later draw upon and revisit: from fish and chips at Norman’s Plaice, to ice cream at the Regent Snack Bar. Breakfast and ice cream recur throughout his career, and the confluence of those is one I’m going to look at and cook today: egg and bacon ice cream.

This recipe, like so many of Heston’s, was born out of obsession and one of the first foods he investigated in depth at The Fat Duck restaurant. He wanted to find the perfect creamy mixture, with bold flavours, and yet not tasting too eggy. Not every ice cream recipe needs eggs but egg is an emulsifier that suspends butterfat particles and creates richer, creamier ice cream that stores really well. Searching for the perfect ice cream he began to experiment with all the variables, tweaking egg volume, freezing time, sugar content. After pushing received wisdom that custard bases should be cooked no higher than 85°c, his pastry chef Jocky Petrie commented that the overheated result “looked just like scrambled egg”. This eureka moment sent Heston off in a breakfast direction, remembering how much egg and bacon was a special treat growing up. After some refinement the dish first appeared on the menu at the Fat Duck restaurant in 2000.

The original plating in 2000

It might surprise you that this recipe uses milk powder. Heston has long favoured ice cream recipes with a low sugar content. Not for dietary reasons, but to create a denser texture and heightened flavours. Because of reduced fat and sugar, this recipe is high in egg yolks. The skimmed milk powder stops the ice cream from crystallising to create richness yet light and clean.

There are two published versions of the recipe: the uber-recipe from The Fat Duck Cookbook is an unsurprisingly complex and multi-layered affair, with tea jellies and tomato compotes. But there’s also the comparatively laid back version in Heston at Home, which is what I’ve emulated here: with the ice cream served with an egg-soaked bread and candied bacon. Much more approachable and likely more crowd pleasing.

The original recipe requires dry ice. I wasn’t willing to stretch to this – I can’t find it for under £37 – but instead used my ice cream maker for the final step. It may not be truly authentic but at least it’s Heston’s own endorsed model?

The result is a surprising and playful dessert that combines sweet, creamy ice cream with the savoury and smoky flavours of bacon. The Egg and Bacon Ice Cream reflects Blumenthal’s signature style of molecular gastronomy, where he combines unexpected ingredients and techniques to create unconventional but delicious dishes.

It is terrific. Really, super tasty. If you like dishes that combine sweet and salty flavours this is the one for you. The ice cream has a sweet but smoky flavour with a slightly ‘chunky’ texture and is a real winner. But the pain perdu / french toast / eggy bread is stunning. With a glass-like finish and sweet, chewy middle it’s sensational and worth having with other desserts.

Here’s a variation on the recipe served in egg shells.

And here’s Aldo’s version from BigFatUndertaking.

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egg and bacon ice cream

Heston Blumenthal's ice cream inspired dessert is french toast with a twist of sweet / savoury ice cream.
Course Dessert
Cuisine British
Keyword savoury, sweet
Servings 2 people
Calories 609kcal

Equipment

  • Ice cream machine

Ingredients

For the ice cream base:

  • 66 g sweet-cured smoked back bacon
  • 166 g full-cream milk
  • 5 g semi-skimmed milk powder
  • 4 large egg yolks
  • 20 g caster sugar

For the pain perdu:

  • clarified butter
  • 2 slices brioche stale (refrigerate overnight in a container to speed this up)
  • 100 g milk
  • 1 egg
  • 10 g golden caster sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

For the caramelised bacon:

  • 2 slices smoked bacon
  • 1 tablespoon maple syrup
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon sugar

Instructions

For the ice cream base and caramelised bacon:

  • To start the ice-cream base, preheat the grill to high. Lay the bacon slices on a baking tray lined with baking paper and place under the grill for 5-7 minutes or until crisp.
  • At the same time mix the syrup, salt and sugar together and then brush on two more bacon slices and grill with the other bacon. When this is cooked refrigerate until needed.
  • When the initial bacon is cooked, drain on kitchen paper and cut it into strips. Place in a bowl, pour over the milk then refrigerate to infuse overnight.
  • The next day, put the milk and bacon into a saucepan and add the milk powder. Place over a medium-low heat and bring to a gentle simmer. Remove from the heat and strain off the bacon.
  • In the meantime, blitz the egg yolks and sugar together using a hand blender. Combine the egg mixture with the warm milk and return the pan to the heat. Warm the liquid until it just reaches 90ºC.
  • Once this temperature has been reached, remove the pan from the heat and pass the ice-cream base through a fine sieve into a clean container over iced water, pushing the custard through with the back of a spoon. Transfer to an ice cream machine and churn until done. Freeze until needed.

For the pain perdu:

  • Mix the egg, milk, vanilla and sugar together. Dunk the bread in to soak for 20 minutes. After this time remove the bread to a rack to drain for a couple of minutes.
  • Melt a tablespoon of clarified butter in a non-stick frying pan over a medium heat. Add the bread and fry on all sides, remove and place on paper towel to absorb any excess fat.
  • Wipe the pan out then place it over a medium-high heat. Add enough sugar to cover the bottom of the pan and allow to melt.
  • Once the sugar has completely melted and caramelised, add the bread and cover every side. Once coated on all sides, remove the bread from the pan, place on a silicone mat and allow to cool.
  • To serve, scoop the ice cream into a serving bowl (I used an egg cup). Place a slice of crystallised bacon on top and serve with pain perdu on the side.

Video

Notes

If you don't have an ice cream machine, you probably don't have dry ice either. This can be also made by placing into a freezer, and breaking up every 30 minutes but the results won't be a smooth.
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