Pancake Day Ice Cream

Pancake Day and another great excuse for some special home cooking!

Pancakes are popular with people for 2 different reasons - those with a sweet tooth and those with a savory tooth.

In the USA pancakes are a traditional breakfast menu item with many people opting for pancakes and maple syrup, sometimes with bacon. Delicious!

In the UK pancakes are eaten less often but on Pancake Day many people use them as the base for their main meal serving homemade pancakes with stew (meat, vegetables and gravy) or even curry.  Then for dessert they may have another pancake but a 'lightweight' sweet one using lemon juice and icing sugar as a topping. My friend Barbara Goodman serves "Scottish Pancakes" with a choice of sweet topping at her coffee shop as a special Pancake Day dessert.

In France, pancakes (crêpes to the French) are a common and very popular dessert. This is a French pancake (crêpe) with vanilla ice cream, sweet cream (chantilly) and nougat sauce, served by a great artisan glacier in the Vendée. Great at any time of the year, not just Pancake Day!

Happy ice cream eating on Pancake Day :-)

Valentine Ice Cream Sandwich

This has to be the most romantic ice cream sandwich you will ever see!

My friend Barbara Goodman is a professional cook and bakes all the cakes, cookies and pastries for her family-run coffee shop business. Barbara knows of my love of ice cream making and came up with this little ditty for Valentine's Day - just for me and my ice cream recipes readership.

What makes this Valentine ice cream sandwich special is that it is, in fact, 2 ice cream sandwiches. Why? Well, if you look closely at the message on the pink fondant icing you will see why. After all, Valentine's Day is for couples so no good just having 1 ice cream sandwich!

If you want to make your own version of this fabulous ice cream treat here are the constituent parts:

Homemade all butter shortbread cookies
Fondant icing
Raspberry ripple ice cream

Here is the video of this special ice cream sandwich for Valentine's Day

Ah, the romance of Valentine ice cream .... it knows no bounds :)

Valentine's Day Ice Cream: Alcoholic Sorbet

Valentine's Day is just around the corner and there's no reason why you shouldn't celebrate the romance of the day with ice cream. Of course some people celebrate by getting married in a really romantic setting on Valentine's Day - one reason, apparently, why stately home weddings are becoming more popular!

Getting back to a slightly less expensive way of celebrating Valentine's Day :) let's look at homemade ice cream. Offering some specially made ice cream as a surprise to a loved one on Valentine's Day always goes down well. You could choose to make an alcoholic sorbet as a light dessert after a home-cooked meal or just go for your loved one's favorite ice cream and serve it as a surprise after dinner when you've sat down to listen to music or watch a movie together.

If you don't plan to stay home on Valentine's Day, you can still include ice cream as part of the romance. Just find a great ice cream parlor and order a fabulous ice cream sundae, grab 2 spoons and dig in to share! Romance and ice cream were meant for each other :)

Enjoy your Valentine's ice cream.

Ice Cream Is Good For The Memory

I have read so much about ice cream over the years that it never ceases to amaze me what people come up with on the subject.

The benefits of ice cream? Well, we all know how good it makes you feel when you sink your teeth into a glorious ice cream sundae or vanilla ice cream cone on a warm summer's day :)

Apparently, it doesn't end there! According to a recent report,  milk is now believed to help boost the memory. Logically, therefore, it is claimed, any products rich in milk such as ice cream, can also claim to offer that benefit. Some 972 men and women aged 23 to 98 took part in the research so it's believed to have been a broad spectrum based assessment.

Read more in this ice cream and memory article.