ICECREAMS with indigenous flavours

[Shalem]

I've made lots of different types of icecreams at home.

What icecreams with australian native flavours have you eaten, and were they yummy?

did you buy or make these yourself?

have your children tried these icecreams and what did they think?

What shops sell icecreams with indigenous flavours?

[Note: Forum admin - is this question about selling ok to ask in the forum? Another forum I belong to doesn't allow websites and products to be mentioned].

[eataust]

You can mention shops and products - we encourage it, actually, because sourcing bushfoods is often very hard!

I've made wattleseed icecream but found the flavour too rich and sweet for me. Mind you, I did it by infusing the wattleseed with boiling water and then tossing the lot into the custard mix, and I may have overdone the quantities.

Cream whipped with about a tablespoon of wattleseed is delicious, albeit crunchy, and not as rich, so that might be the next trick to try.

Lemon myrtle makes an excellent sorbet but it's a good idea to add the juice of a lemon as well, otherwise you again end up with something that's all rich and sweet, but no other flavour to offset. Lemon myrtle pairs with almost any fruit, where lemons don't, so it's worth adding a tiny bit to (say) watermelon or peach or even raspberry sorbet. If I could get enough native raspberries, I'd mix them and lemon or cinnamon myrtle in an icecream or sorbet ...

[Shalem]

Ive made wattleseed icecream too...recall it was yummy. Rich & sweet, yes, but aren't all icecreams? Next time I'm gonna give it a go using Vic Cherikoff's wattleseed extract because it'll give a beautiful uniform colour & no "grit" texture.

Sorry to say but I didn't like lemon myrtle icecream I made.

Bought Vic Cherikoff's fruit confits. Still getting my way through them all, but the quandong confit is truly yummo. Very rich & delicious so only need small amounts. It's great through vanilla icecream (chopped or whole quandong), also as an icecream garnish. I'm sure his riberry, rosella & rainforest lime confits would all work well too.

I found an icecream shop on the web (www.lacreme.com.au) who sell icecream with quite a few Australian native flavours. They're in Botany NSW so anyone down that way, why don't you head over there and try it out (take the kids too!).

[eataust]

Good gracious - Botany?? My partner hails from that area and his family is still there, so we do get there reasonably often. Time for a little search!!

Thanks for finding that!

[Bluetongue]

Heatwave weather down here, and my mind's firmly in the freezer... thank you for the website info, shalem. That range looks incredible!

[Shalem]

I have yet to try this, the jar of Australian Desert Limes in syrup that I have can be used as is in icecreams, which is probably not a bad idea since the limes in this jar are very tart to me.

www.australiandesertlimes.com.au

[Shalem]

VANILLA ICECREAM topped with Dining Downunder's chopped quandong confit on the left and rainforest lime confit on the right.

(I'll post more icecream photos later)

[Shalem]

There's a couple of ways to make your own icecreams at home. A most conventional way is to make a heated custard mixture over the stovetop, which also involves some beating. Cool it in the fridge, then use an icecream maker to churn or do it manually which takes a few extra steps.

Sometimes when I don't feel like doing it this way, I use a very quick easy method with a blender (or lately my mixer) which I learnt from the manual of my ice cream maker.

The basic mixture is blend up: 1 whole egg, 0.5 cup white sugar, 1 cup full cream milk and 1 cup thickened cream (the one with gelatine in it, not pure cream). Put it in the fridge until it's as cold as possible (metal bowls cool quicker I found), then churn. The ice cream maker I have is a fairly cheap one on the market but I think it does a great job, and the icecream bowl needs to be frozen before it's used to churn the mixture.

I made the following icecream using this quick method (but with my mixer to "blend", but I've done it plenty of times in the past with a blender just fine), and added some food colouring. When using the blender method, you can also add whatever you want. Eg, I used to add a can of mango slices, or can of lychees. So delicious and refreshing.




I felt this particular icecream I made with the quick method was still of a very good quality as it still turned out rich, thick, creamy and delicious.

The stovetop custard method could probably all be done by hand without any appliances involved from start to finish. There are lots of good icecream books in libraries for more info.

[Shalem]

If you look under the two ice cream recipes at Herbies Spices (www.herbies.com.au), it gives an idea of how icecreams can be made by hand from start to finish without any appliances involved.

I have not tried these recipes.

[Shalem]

Dining Downunder rosella confit




desert limes in syrup

[Shalem]

Home made Wattleseed Icecream

I suppose a lighter colour can be achieved by using less roasted & ground wattleseed and omitting the Cherikoff Dining Downunder's Wattleseed Extract.

Uses the custard stovetop method.

(in this hot weather, it was difficult to keep the icecream from melting for the photo!)

Other options for Wattleseed Icecream

- Though I haven't tried this, to avoid making icecream or using a stovetop method, it may be possible to buy vanilla icecream, soften it and mix it through with Cherikoff's (or other) wattleseed extract plus ground wattleseed (which has been softened in boiling water).

- There was a chocolate wattleseed sauce bottle available from my local bushfood store (never tried sauce). This could be used as a topping on vanilla or other icecream.

[Shalem]

Well my wattleseed icecream had a distinctive chocolate and coffee icecream taste.

Came as a surprise as there was no chocolate or coffee used, and it's a long time since I made my last w'seed icecream, so had no recollection of what it would be like (except that I knew that the last one was "nice" but couldn't remember any details).

As was the case with my wattleseed panacotta, could do though with slightly more sugar or sweetness. That's probably just a personal taste thing, but seems a coincidence to me that I've made 2 wattleseed desserts that needed bit of extra sweetening to me.

[eataust]

Wattleseed is a distinct coffee/chocolate/hazelnut flavour. Different aspects are stronger depending on the tree species they come from, and how they've been treated. These are similar to the differences you find in coffee or cocoa beans and is something I'd really like to investigate in more detail!

[Shalem]

Home made FRUIT SPICE ICECREAM

quite creamy

Recipe
Using recipe from Dining Downunder cookbook.

Spice

I used 1.5 teaspoons Fruit Spice (Cherikoff's) as I thought maybe 0.5 teaspoon might be not detected as I like my flavours to stand out.

Used part thickened cream (gelatine type, not pure cream) and part "Dollop" cream which is a very thick pre-whipped cream for scones etc. To make up for not having enough thickcned cream in the house.

Stovetop start to finish

It's the first time making this recipe, and first I've made icecream custard in this manner. Basically you put everything into the saucepan at once and heat it to a certain temp using a candy thermometer.

It's an interesting, non-overpowering spice here, and of spices, I think I've only used Australian native spices in my icecreams so far.

[Shalem]

Home Made RIBERRIES IN SYRUP ICECREAM TOPPING

Desserts Topic more info.

I'm glad I made this because I've discovered I like my riberries "cooked" a bit, especially in this nice syrup, just like I preferred my munthari berries "cooked"!

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On their own, I found this particular riberry not as nice in my damper (Breads topic) as much as I very much enjoyed it in this syrup. Just could be a personal taste thing, and I haven't had too much more experience with these riberries.

(In the damper, it reminded me too much of ginger which I don't like that much on its own. I've read several places that the riberry is more like clove taste, but to me it's very distinctive of ginger.)