Ice Cream And Halloween

On my ice cream recipes Facebook page I held a poll to find out the most popular dessert for Halloween. It was an interesting exercise but perhaps with an predictable result ...
1st - Pumpkin pie (55% of votes)
2nd - Ice cream (42% of votes)
3rd - Cupcakes

Let's face it, at the end of October, freshly baked, hot pumpkin pie is diffiult to beat! So I was delighted to think that ice cream came a close second.

Put the two together and you get pumpkin ice cream of course. Here is my pumpkin ice cream recipe - which also has maple syrup and nutmeg as ingredients.

If you don't like pumpkin but want an ice cream suitable for spooky Halloween, here's my gothic ice cream recipe. Made with licorice toffee, it is deligthfully sticky, smooth and gothic grey!

Enjoy some Halloween ice cream and have a great time!

Halloween Ice Cream Sandwich

Halloween is always a great excuse for a family get together or night out with friends and it's especially fun for children. Halloween is therefore one of my 'ice cream special days' and it's for such days that I am always keen to try and come up with new, ice cream related ideas.

One such idea came to me a while ago ... a spooky Halloween ice cream sandwich! I was discussing this with some friends recently who run a super little coffee shop close to Hadrian's Wall and, as they specialise in baking unusual homemade cakes and cookies including some fabulous chocolate cookies with spider's web icing, I suggested they try making up an ice cream sandwich using these with mint choc chip ice cream sandwiched between them. Guess what? They did it and yesterday I filmed it in their coffee shop. Here it is, freshly made ... complete with plastic, non-edible spiders! Notice the super, orange Halloween decorations behind - nice touch Emma :-)

Read more about ice cream sandwiches

Read more about the tradition of Halloween

Vanilla Ice Cream - A Recipe For Drew's Asthma

We all talk to people that we've never met either over the phone, by email or Facebook. When that happens to me I will sometimes ask what their favourite ice cream is as it's a great indicator of their personality. More often than not, they not only tell me but they can't wait to share their favourite ice cream memory as well.

Today I had just such an example when I spoke to Drew. Known to his friends as Drew Trumpie Mills, Drew's favourite ice cream is vanilla ice cream and he told me the story of how he came to love it at an early age - in hospital! Drew suffers from asthma and as a young child was in and out of hospital for weeks at a time. His asthma affected his eating and he became underweight so whilst in hospital the nurses gave him 2 foods that were easy for him to eat whilst at the same time affording him some nutritional value:

1. Vanilla ice cream (for the dairy content)
2. Mashed potatoes (for the carbohydrate element)

Drew recalls not only being able to eat these foods but loving the experience of being able to have lots of ice cream ... something he still relishes today.

It just goes to show that you never know who you're going to speak to in a day and what you might learn from asking a simple question. I'm so glad I asked - thanks Drew!