By guest blogger Sharon Halkovics

Ice cream and summer are linked together in my mind much like peanut butter and jelly.  The two words are so naturally paired, you don’t even think twice about stringing them together in the same breath.  Of course, I still eat ice cream in the winter, but I can’t think of anything that can make me as happy as sitting outside on a warm August night with the crickets chirping and an ice cream cone in hand.

I’ve been playing around with my ice cream maker quite a bit the past few weeks.  First, I churned out a batch of raw milk vanilla ice cream, then on to a batch of blueberry cassis, sour cherry, and then….the sublime Nutella gelato.  The main difference between ice cream and gelato is that gelato recipes use more milk and less cream so there’s less fat in gelato.  Gelato is also churned slower so less air gets into the mixture.  In simple terms: gelato = less fat + less air = richer, creamier taste than ice cream.

I stumbled across this gelato recipe online.  Hands-down, this is one of the best ice cream/gelato recipes I have ever tried.  It was simple to make and tasted like an artisan batch churned by a neighborhood gelateria.  Interestingly, I buy the Kroger brand of chocolate-hazelnut spread versus Nutella.  I find the spread to be a bit thinner (which I prefer) and much more hazelnutty in flavor.  To boot, it’s a fraction of the cost and it’s actually made in Italy.  Before summer slips away – give this recipe a try.  I can guarantee…it’ll make you happy.

On a Happy note: CSR staff recently dined at Happy Noodle House in Boulder.  A big thanks to Jen S. and Chef Sam for the delicious meal and great service.  Two thumb’s up…we definitely recommend the place, especially the Thai fish cakes, house made pickles, fried brussel sprouts, and the hot & happy soup!

Nutella Gelato

From Giada DeLaurentiis

Makes about 4 cups

You’ll need:
2 cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
½ cup sugar, plus ¼ cup
4 egg yolks
½ tsp vanilla extract
½ cup chocolate-hazelnut spread (i.e.: Nutella)
½ cup toasted hazelnuts, crushed, for garnish

Directions:
In a saucepan combine the milk, cream, and ½ cup sugar over medium heat. Cook until the sugar dissolves, about 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a medium bowl whip the egg yolks with the remaining sugar using an electric mixer until the eggs have become thick and pale yellow, about 4 minutes. Pour ½ cup of the warm milk and cream mixture into the egg mixture and stir. Add this mixture back into the saucepan. Cook over very low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture becomes thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon, about 7 to 10 minutes.

Place a strainer over a medium bowl and pour the warm custard mixture through the strainer. Stir in the vanilla and hazelnut spread until it dissolves. Chill mixture completely before pouring into an ice cream maker and follow manufacturer’s instructions to freeze. To serve, scoop gelato into serving bowls and top with hazelnuts.

By Juliet Wittman

Last day of class. Chef Michael had asked us to bring in ideas, split into teams of two, and have each team produce a couple of small plates. Then, instead of sitting down to a full meal, we’d sample each offering as it was completed. Somehow by the end of a session of cooking, swapping our own tips and ideas, running to Michael for instruction, referring to hastily-acquired recipes, we’d come up with thirteen dishes. We shared an earthy mole, ratatouille, ravioli made with crimson beet pasta, an Asian-inflected pork-rice combination, a tomato-mozzarella tart, corn souffle with bacon, tamales, curried vegetables in pastry alongside a yogurt-cucumber sauce, and I honestly don’t remember what else—except for three desserts: buttermilk ice cream, a strawberry tart, the fruit beautifully arranged on a bed of creme anglaise, and chocolate souffle with raspberry coulis. As if that wasn’t enough, some students made home-made butter, others produced two fat, beautiful loaves of bread.

This day—one of the most enjoyable I’ve ever spent in a kitchen—encapsulated the skill with which Chef Michael orchestrated the entire five-day course, always providing enough organization to not leave us feeling stranded, but also allowing our passions and predilections full play, so that the result was a harmonious and productive coming together. We had wonderful ingredients—taste those fresh fruits and vegetables and you’d never want to buy cardboard, out-of-season produce again—and two skilled culinary school staffers, Jenny and Pat, were always on hand to answer questions. There was a lot of laughter—very important in a kitchen—and though the atmosphere was unintimidating, you were still encouraged to be meticulous in your cooking.

I learned a lot of useful and specific things in this class, more than I’ve been able to fully assimilate at this point. And also things that are hard to put into words, things having to do with respecting and understanding the food we eat and where it comes from. I know Farm to Fork will come back to me at odd moments in the kitchen. I’ll remember that you have to be gentle with butter and what’s so good about cast-iron skillets. I’ll hear Michael explaining that the problem with Hollandaise sauce is that “it does not want to be in the state that it’s in.” I’ll think of Jenny as I roll out dough, and Pat next time I make a souffle; see Laura shaking salt into ratatouille when I season dinner; remember Barbara every time I make the no-knead bread she introduced us to. Everyone’s throwing around words like locavore, organic, and sustainability these days, but trendiness won’t persuade people to change their habits, and nor will lecturing. The food revolution we need will happen when we rediscover the pleasures of eating real food and sharing our table with others. This class is a wonderful place to begin.

Teen Tech is just past half-way through their week-long class. They are whisking along, learning how to prepare foods from soups, to salad dressings, to grilled meats. Today, the class prepared a delicious Carrot Ginger Soup. It was brilliant orange and smelled perfectly spicy, not to mention the carrots were grown and harvested from a local farm. Also on the menu today was Homemade Ranch Dressing on a Wedge Salad, Oven Roasted Veggies, Whole Roasted Chicken, and Cherry Crisp.

If learning to perfect soulful soups is something you’d like to learn – check out our Stocks & Soups class coming up in a few months. 

It’s been so busy at CSR with all of the contests we’ve been posting that I haven’t posted my weekly roundup in a while. With that in mind, here’s a taste of what’s on my food brain this afternoon: Ice Cream, The English Muffin Man, Blackberry Grunts, and a Cupcake Update. Enjoy your delicious reading.

Top Ten Ice Cream Makers

Cupcake Update

What’s a Blackberry Grunt?

Do You Know the English Muffin Man?

By Juliet Wittman

The end of our fourth day in the kitchen, and—though no one I know would ever believe such a thought could cross my mind—I’m feeling I don’t ever want to think, talk, read about, or shop for food again. Let alone eat. Too much hustling round the kitchen, too much trying to figure out what I’m doing, too many stupid mistakes brought on by fatigue, too many things to taste—each of them wonderful, but cumulatively overwhelming—too much uncertainty about tomorrow, when we’re supposed to go off book, split into small teams, and figure out for ourselves what to cook. With Chef Michael’s help, of course.
I’ve been talking with Laura, another student, about buying a half pig together and splitting it, and I dreamed about that damn pig last night: My part arrived. It hadn’t been eviscerated, but that was okay because it was actually a hard, dark piece of wood, and I left it propped up on a chair in the back room. Walking into the room later, I noticed the thing was moving. Slightly, but unmistakably.
I like eating meat, and I like working with it, but I’ve never managed to come completely to terms with the fact that an animal has to die to provide it. I discussed this with Kimberly—a proud carnivore—as we worked at a saddle of lamb this morning pulling skin and fat away, guiding our knives carefully against bone so as to lose as little meat as possible in separating out the loin meat and releasing the tiny tenderloins. The creature we were dissecting was very young and amazingly small. Michael had talked to us earlier about the kind of fat and scrap worth saving when you’re cutting up an animal—the luscious melt-in-the-mouth and carry-flavor-like-nothing-else-can kind—and the stringy stuff you need to toss.

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By Juliet Wittman

Every six-hour session of our Farm to Fork class is a small journey in itself. Today’s started off with some unwanted drama: a nearby vet had a St Bernard prone on the ground just outside the cooking school’s large front window, and was working on his teeth. An assistant held him down, a woman who seemed to be his owner crouched nearby. I have no idea what the vet was doing, but the dog was panting fiercely and writhing, the procedure went on for a long time, and none of us could figure out why the poor dog hadn’t been anesthetized for it. Chef Michael was trying to explain how to make preserves and keep Hollandaise from separating, but with all of us glancing anxiously toward the dog, and then determinedly back to him, and then back to the window again, it was hard to keep focus. Turns out almost everyone in the room, including Michael, is a dog lover.
The dog was released from his torment, and we got back to the business of cooking. Yesterday’s menu was full of vegetables. Today—hello sugar, butter, and starch.
We made our own English muffins, halved them, added home-made sausage, wilted greens (kale and spinach), a tomato slice, and a poached egg, and topped the whole thing with Hollandaise and a sprinkling of herbs. There were pancakes made with Munson’s corn and served with fruit preserves—raspberry, raspberry peach, and a delectable cherry-apricot. Lest we remain hungry, a couple of students had whipped up a quick milk gravy—what’s breakfast without it?

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By Juliet Wittman

We prepared a very American feast for this second session of Farm to Fork. By 2:30, we were sitting around the table eating sloppy, delicious little potato-bread burgers heaped with barbecued bison, vegetable slaw and pickles—each element tasty on its own, and all of them even better together. There were drunken beans cooked with stout. Also corn salad. We’d begun with plates of fried green tomatoes, a southern staple most of my classmates had tasted but I never had, and ended with carrot cupcakes crowned with swirls of cream-cheese frosting and candied pecans. We’d taken those bison tenderloins through quite a process, scraping off silverskin, rubbing the meat with spices, searing, sauteeing mirepoix, braising in the oven in a deep, whispering sauce, and finishing with bourbon, mustard and molasses. Chef Michael encouraged us to taste step by step and customize the barbecue to our individual tastes. I love this kind of meat preparation, the subtleties and complexities of the flavor, and I loved the simple rounds of bread that began with yesterday’s biga.
The classes are starting to take on a rhythm. At the beginning, Chef Michael talks about the day before, asks if we have questions, dispenses information on the day’s menu and lots of incidental cooking tips. Then there’s a period of pretty intense cooking. We’re supposed to form into teams, but we tend to just seize on whatever task interests us and get going. When you’ve done one thing, you check out everyone else’s work, sniff, taste, ask if anyone needs help. This sounds disorganized, but Michael keeps an eye out, going from person to person, making sure everything gets done. He also answers questions—on the day’s menu or anything else food-related you have on your mind. Like how to deal with the tougher flesh of a free-range chicken, or render the fat from a duck breast.
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By Juliet Wittman – Farm to Fork Student

I knew how to make pastry dough—savory and sweet—before attending the first Farm to Fork class. And I’d cooked with fruit. So I was fairly blasé about the dessert listed in our book: peach and cherry galettes with rosemary cream. What I didn’t know was how bright sour cherries and sweet peaches tasted together, and how delicious when combined with lemon zest and a touch of sugar. As for the crust: it was a revelation—flaky, tender, sprinkled with sugar crystals, it could have served as dessert all on its own. The rosemary cream added a deeper, unexpectedly woodsy note. None of this was accidental: a combination of simplicity and sophistication defines Chef Michael Montgomery’s (the Farm to Fork Chef Instructor) approach to food and teaching.

Then there was the cultured butter. I’d read about cultured butter, but I didn’t really know how it differed from any other butter, and I couldn’t figure out why Chef Michael was so enthusiastic about it. We began the morning by passing two large jars of cream around the table, shaking them until the solids and buttermilk separated, kneading the solids with our hands. The feeling was wonderfully primal, and the taste amazing.
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Satisfy your sweet tooth at CSR’s Bake Sale – Saturday, August 28^th from 12-4pm. If you’ve never attended the Bake Sale before, you’re in for a sweet treat. CSR’s Professional Pastry Arts class will be baking up delicious cakes, pies, croissants, cookies, quiches, and more. New on the menu this year will be a Farm Fresh Peach Pie, Colorado Apple Pie, Old Fashioned Layered Chocolate Cake along with an assortment of gluten free items, cupcakes, and candies. Join us as we transform our kitchen into a bake shop filled with goodies galore.  Pastry Arts students will be baking all day but shop early for the best selection!

Hybrid fruit may soon be taking over farmers’ markets and grocery stores. Check out these nectaplums, they are a cross between a nectarine and a plum. I came across them this morning over at TheKitchn (a lovely site if you’ve been there before).The variety featured here is called a Spice Zee, which is supposed to be rich sweet and round on the palate with just a touch of acidity. What two fruits to you think would be perfect crossed together?