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‘Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet’ Category

  1. Happy birthday to me – Meringue pie in a cup (sort of)

    July 9, 2012 by Giulietta

     

    A very quick post, with a very clear intention: wish a HAPPY (belated) BIRTHDAY to me (I wish it to myself, 'cause you never know)! Oh, yes, I fall into the birthday's post cliche, too, but I won't keep going (at myself, of course) stating my desperation for the advancing age (but the age advances, though) or describing everything that I prepared for the celebrations in my honour. Well, actually I didn't prepare anything, there was no special celebration, I refused to cook, at least on my birthday (what the heck!).

    But, for my non-birthday (aka birthday celebrated in advance), I prepared this meringue pie in the cup (sort of), which had some success .. why did I prepare meringue pie for my non-birthday, when I don't go crazy for meringue? This remains a mystery to solve. But that's another story, which I think has something to do with mental tares I mentioned in my previous post … look on the bright side, at least I didn't turn on the oven!

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    Category Birthday, Dessert and Sweets, Egg yolks only, Holidays, Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet | Tags: ,,,,,,,,,, | 10 Comments

  2. How to recycle Christmas (before it arrives): nougat semifreddo

    December 14, 2011 by Giulietta

    It is mid-December, already … The most prepared of you have already finished their Christmas presents and will be satisfied, some others will have to think, buy and wrap up gifts (and how come the fundamental gifts are always the last to be crossed off the list?!) and then some other will wait till Christmas Eve to buy the first thing that comes to mind. Well, I usually fall within the first category, 'cause I usually start thinking about Christmas gifts while I'm still wearing flip-flops, and I usually buy every single gift with a disturbing advance .. but this year Christmas will be a little different for me, and this Christmas will include a lot of home-made gifts and a little more calmness .. and it will probably become panic when I'll realize that I forgot the gift for grandma 10 minutes before Christmas dinner.

    But I can't, at least in part, give up my proverbial timing and, although I know that Christmas is yet to come, I'm so ahead of you that today I don't suggest you some home-made and last-minute gift, but a recipe to get rid of nougat leftovers. Today I'm the Grinch, who fights the thought of Christmas, almost as if it was already gone!

    Torrone (nougat) is a very popular sweet in Italy, and we eat it especially during Christmas holidays. There are at least a thousand different kinds of torrone: hard, soft, semi-hard, with hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios, covered in chocolate, covered in glaze, big, small and so on..
    Well, the funny thing is… I don't like nougat! My mom could practically eat a ton of it (so it's not genetic), and instead I don't like it so much, basically 'cause it's too sweet for my tooth.
    But, after Christmas holidays, it's practically impossible living in an Italian house without seeing nougat all around, since it's a very common gift and it's also very used in Christmas goodie baskets.
    So, if you want to use some of those leftovers or if you actually love nougat and you'd like to make a very Christmas sweet, very easy and very sensational, here it is my semifreddo al torrone (nougat semifreddo).

    Today you can find my recipe also here, on Nami's fabulous blog Just One Cookbook (I'm a blogsitter, today), together with a little interview with the undersigned. If you're interested or if you don't know Nami's blog, yet, please pay a visit, and you won't regret it.

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    Category Chocolate, Christmas, Dessert and Sweets, Holidays, Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet | Tags: ,,,,,,,,,, | 30 Comments

  3. If on a summer’s night a birthday, pt. 2 – Pistachio and cream ice-cream cake

    July 11, 2011 by Giulietta

    Here we are at the end of the parties (and I feel a strange relief) and here it is the second long-awaited (really?!) recipe for a fresh dessert, perfect for a summer birthday.

    This was my first experiment with layered ice-cream cake, and it went very well: you can choose the flavors you like and match them as you prefer. I immediately chose pistachio ice cream, my favorite, and then I matched it with a more "neutral" flavor, cream, with a slight lemon flavoring.

    The pictures are ugly enough (don't worry, I know), but I should be satisfied I took some … if the result is not the best, who cares?! The important thing was the taste! In the lower picture of the composition you should be able to see the color contrast light green/light yellow – from outside it was more difficult to see it (they were two pale colors, so there wasn't a striking difference: if you choose chocolate and fiordilatte and you don't see the difference, I would worry). You'll see the contrast even better in the final photo: its quality is slightly higher, but always in the category "not so good".

    I imagine that you are not here to hear me whining about the quality of my pictures, so I give you the recipe right away, before you take the pitchforks.

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    Category Birthday, Cakes and pies, Dessert and Sweets, Holidays, Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet, Ice-cream cakes | Tags: ,,,,,,,, | 28 Comments

  4. If on a summer’s night a birthday, pt. 1 – Home made Nutella Viennetta

    July 8, 2011 by Giulietta

    Yes, yesterday it was my birthday (I'm going towards the 30)! And, while someone claims that the making of his own birthday cake is bad luck (but why?) or simply is not very nice, I have a certain compulsion ("another one?", you'd say) not only in preparing the dessert, but the whole dinner for a party in my honor!

    Am I stupid?! Maybe.

    Do I love cooking too much?! For sure!

    On my birthday, however, traditionally I don't cook, my boyfriend takes me out for dinner (preferably in a surprise restaurant, and this year we ate Piedmontese in a very nice restaurant… awesome) and I buy a nice dessert from my favorite ice-cream maker and/or pastry chef (yesterday I chose two little semifreddo cake, a yogurt-soft fruit one and a three chocolates one), what the heck!

    But, for all other parties (and, believe me, my agenda is really full) I MUST (i's a primordial need) prepare something, the whole dinner or just the dessert. But it's July, so I don't like to stay near the oven (although yesterday it seemed autumn … in hindsight I could have used the oven) … last year I decided to make a tarte tatin and, later, near the oven, I decided that dying would have been a better choice! In short, this year, aided by the loan of an ice cream machine and the consequent desire to experiment, I will present you two cold dessert. Actually, they can't be colder… ICE CREAM!
    PS: the ice cream maker IS NOT ESSENTIAL, though!

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    Category Birthday, Chocolate, Dessert and Sweets, Egg whites only, Holidays, Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet, Ice-cream cakes | Tags: ,,,,,,, | 28 Comments

  5. Welcome to summer: pink grapefruit sorbet (without ice-cream maker)

    May 25, 2011 by Giulietta

    No, I'm not crazy… I know that I jumped nearly a month of our beloved/hated calendar and I know that there are still at least three weeks to the advent of summer! But the temperatures in Turin (the cold and dreary Turin) are now 86° F (30 °C), I think that summer is de facto here with us ..

    And what better way to cool off the heat than a good sorbet made ​​with fresh fruit, sugar and water only?!

    Until now I never made this preparation, 'cause I don't have an ice-cream maker, but then a particularly explanatory episode of Ready, Steady, Cook (about sorbet made ​​with ice-cream maker) and a post dedicated to this amazing heat-breaker played their role, and I told myself: it's time to try it!

    So I took the ingredients recommended by Ready, Steady, Cook, the procedure recommended by Nicola's recipes and I created my own monster (so to speak, because I was absolutely satisfied with the result): a fresh and healthy sorbet, and I chose to make it pink grapefruit-flavored (so, if the sorbet wouldn't be perfect, I could blame this change of ingredient… Am I evil?!)

    Just to make an abstract about ingredients (based on what was said in Ready, Steady, Cook episode) to make a kilo of fruit sorbet you have to keep in mind some percentages (which apply to the fruits containing 8% sugar: in the episode they made the example of strawberries): you should always use 50% fruit (500 g), 28% sugar (but you should subtract the 8% already present, so a total of 240 g) and the difference in water, so 260 grams (a total of 1 kg of ingredients);as a thickener, they used a teaspoon of carob flour.

    Obviously, these percentages don't apply to citrus fruits, which contain less sugar; also, you don't use the pulp of these fruits, but the juice.

    So, after this "introduction to the mathematical of sorbet", follow me for MY sorbet recipe!

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    Category Dessert and Sweets, Fresh fruit, Ice cream semifreddo and sorbet | Tags: ,,,,, | 16 Comments