The Gourmet Cookbook's Ice Cream #8 {Maple Walnut Ice Cream}

 Who doesn't love a good Maple Walnut fudge or ice cream? Especially once the weather has started to turn a little cool in the mornings and evenings? 

The Gourmet Cookbook says that to get the full impact of the maple flavor, you need to seek out Grade B syrup, which is less refined and far more powerful than the easier-to-find Grade A. It also says DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT USING PANCAKE SYRUP! I found a great bottle of Grade B available online at my market, but then I sent my husband to the store with instructions, and a picture, and explicitly said Grade B, and he still bought Grade A. At least it was a good brand and it did have a very dark color and robust flavor. You will need one whole bottle of syrup, or 8 ounces.

This particular recipe was contributed to Gourmet by Ann Patchett, the novelist! I do enjoy her books, particularly The Dutch House, and I am a lover of all books, so I was happy to see this contribution. It states that "Patchett brought us this old-fashioned dessert from a vacation at the Keeper's House, an inn on Isle au Haut, Maine." That gives me a cozy and rather authentic maple feeling!

The maple syrup gets boiled down and reduced prior to adding the cream, milk and salt. When the maple syrup is boiling down it almost has the aroma of molasses - deep and very concentrated syrupy flavor. Do not worry if this is the case for you, because during my interim of making ice cream; I've noticed that ice cream flavors are very pronounced or strong prior to freezing in an ice cream machine. Once the ice cream freezes the flavors tend to mellow out a bit!

The second step is boiling the concentrated syrup, cream, milk, and salt and then slowly incorporating that mixture into the eggs. I'm not gonna lie here, I was very worried about what my mixture looked like when I added in the boiling liquid to the eggs. It looked a little bit like the eggs were starting to scramble and the texture was completely different than the other ice creams, but never fear because the final texture of this ice cream was so silky smooth and wonderful!

The ice cream base needs to chill for 3 hours and during this time I went ahead and toasted my walnuts. Chop the walnuts if you want to, but we opted for some whole or larger pieces of walnuts. Also the 1/3 cup called for in the recipe would be a little too sparse for us, so I toasted more to add on top!

This ice cream is so smooth and silky and delightful! The maple flavor is total perfection, not too little and not too much. The contrast of the silky smooth ice cream with the crunchy nuts is rather addictive and I found myself wanting to go back for more. I am somewhat biased to these flavors, but I can easily say this will be one of my favorite recipes from my Gourmet Cookbook Ice Cream series. I will definitely be making this again - with Grade B maple syrup that I buy with my own two hands! Ha-ha!

Maple Walnut Ice Cream

Adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook

by Ruth Reichl

Makes 1-/2 Quarts

1 cup Grade B maple syrup 

2 cups heavy cream

1 cup whole milk

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 large eggs

1/3 cup walnuts, toasted and chopped

Boil syrup in a 2 quart heavy saucepan over moderately high heat until reduced to 3/4 cup, 5 to 10 minutes.

Stir cream, milk, and salt into syrup and bring to a boil over moderate heat.

Meanwhile, whisk eggs in a large metal bowl. Add hot cream mixture in a slow stream, whisking constantly, then pour into saucepan and cook over moderately low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until custard is thick enough to coat back of spoon and registers 170F on thermometer, 1 to 2 minutes; do not let boil.

Pour custard through a fine mesh sieve into cleaned metal bowl. Cool to room temperature, stirring occasionally, then refrigerate, covered, until cold, at least 3 hours.

Freeze custard in ice cream maker until soft frozen. With motor running, add nuts, and continue churning ice cream until frozen. Transfer to an airtight container and put in freezer to harden.

 Summer Snacks @ IHCC!