Monday, April 30, 2012

Spiced Caramel Biscuit (Haagen Dazs)


Last week, I was a little bummed out and decided the right course of action was to purchase some ice cream. I decided for the sake of expanding my horizons and for the sake of, well, blogging something besides red velvet cake ice cream, I'd try something totally different.

And let me say, Haagen Dazs will be seeing my business again.

Spiced Caramel Biscuit ice cream might be ringing in near the top of my favorite ice creams list, and I've only had it once (though I made sure to purchase a second carton today). The base ice cream is caramel, and it's a nice, smooth flavor. The carton describes it as velvety, but I hate using that word to describe food. As much as the ice cream itself is delicious, what is stand out is the incorporation of the spiced biscuit.

I was a little hesitant at first because I'm not a huge fan of cookies in my ice cream; however, the biscuit in this one is somewhere between a graham cracker and biscotti in terms of flavor and texture, and it paired really well with the caramel ice cream. The biscuit isn't soggy nor too hard -- it melts in your mouth without a whole lot of effort. Spiced Caramel Biscuit reminded me of tea time in Europe (not that I've ever had tea time in Europe but I've seen it on TV enough to know what that must be like). It's sweet, but it's not too sweet and it made me want a cup of tea when I was finished. There's a bit of a bite to it, as the biscuit itself is somewhat spicy with its cinnamon hues. Yes, I felt fancy using the word hues to describe cinnamon.

This is a limited edition ice cream, and it reminded me a little bit of the limited edition Sticky Toffee Pudding ice cream that came out a few years ago (do you remember that? It was the winning flavor from the Food Network's amazing Scoop! competition. Why don't they bring that show back?). According to Haagen Dazs's website, this one will be available through December.

As much as I like ice cream, I'm not a huge fan of sweet flavors. I prefer more muted tones, and this one hits all the right notes. It's a little pricey at $3.50 or so for the small, 4-serving carton, but this one is worth the extra pennies.

Friday, April 27, 2012

Review: D’Ambrosio Gelato in Seattle, Washington (Guest Post)

Jackie Parker -- librarian, sometimes blogger, and foodie -- has submitted the first SCOOPED guest post, and it's a review of Seattle's D'Ambrosio Gelato.

When I first moved to my neighborhood the only ice cream to be found in this incredibly walkable local was an overpriced frozen yogurt shop that claimed to be green, but served the stuff in styrofoam. Since then, there’s been an explosion in tune with the rumored statistic of Seattle being the second highest ice cream consuming city. This had made me very happy. The newest shop is D’Ambrosio Gelato. I’ve eaten a fair amount of gelato in my life, but D’Ambrosio is easily the creamiest I’ve ever had. Every flavor I’ve tasted has been great. On this outing Kyle and I both got medium dishes. Medium comes with three options; I went with Pistacchio, Hazelnut, and Caramel & Figs. Kyle got Crunchy Biscotti and Lemon Ginger.


The hazelnut and pistachio where good representation of fairly standard flavors; sweet, balanced by nuttiness. The standout was the Caramel & Fig. People, this was caramel gelato swirled with a jammy fig compote - I had what must have been a half a preserved fig in my swirl. It also blended beautifully with the two nutty flavors.

Kyle was pleasantly surprised at how well the biscotti went with the lemon ginger. For the biscotti, don’t think those twice baked cookies you get in coffee shops, think of Biscoff cookies crumbled in a sweet cream gelato. The lemon ginger had a bright pop that faded into the vegetal spiciness of fresh ginger, tempering the sweetness of the biscotti gelato.

The store’s only been open for a couple months, but this was our third time there. It won’t be our last. 


I know where Jackie will be taking me next time I am in Seattle. 

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Peanut Butter Banana Milkshake -- DIY


We couldn't leave our readers drooling right away, so we thought we'd kick this blog off with our first ice cream DIY. Technically, this is a milkshake, but in my mind, milkshakes are in the ice cream family. No need to discriminate.

You can make this with just the ingredients in your kitchen right now. Recipe makes 2 servings.

Ingredients
- 1 ripe banana
- 2 spoonfuls of peanut butter (adjust as you wish - I like 2 heaping spoonfuls)
- 1 cup of milk (I use skim)
- 10 ice cubes
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- dash of salt
- dash of cinnamon

Cut the banana into pieces and put all of the ingredients into a food processor. Blend until smooth.

Aside from bananas and peanut butter being natural pals, the salt in this gives just the right balance to the sweetness. Bonus: this milkshake is probably healthy.

Enjoy!

Recipe adapted from here, where they've gone for a non-dairy approach.

Red Velvet Cake (Blue Bunny)


If you are anything like me, you sometimes make your grocery purchases based on the packaging alone. So when you see the big head of Duff Goldman (of Charm City Cakes fame) you are somewhat turned off. I mean. I don't want the picture of some tv cake star on my ice cream carton.

But I am so glad I decided to swallow my pride in favor of the lush, lush offerings of Red Velvet Cake Ice Cream.

It is the perfect blend of vanilla -- not too strong, not too weak -- with actual bits of red velvet cake. Imagine the beauty of red velvet cake (my favorite!) paired with great ice cream (uhm, also my favorite!) and you have the world's most perfect ice cream. The vanilla quality is of note because it doesn't take a back seat to the cake, and the cake doesn't lose its cakey-ness as a result of being married to the ice cream. These aren't chunks of ice, friends. This is the real deal.

One serving is not enough. This is the kind of ice cream you remove the lid from...and deposit the lid right into the trash can. You won't be needing it. The only requirement for this stuff is a spoon and about half an hour on the couch.

For those who are as turned off by Duff as I am, I suggest bringing along a sharpie, as well, and making a game of mustache-making while you're enjoying the delectable treat inside the carton.

At roughly $4/carton, I promise you will not regret a cent spent on this treat. It's great for your good days, and it's even better on your bad days. My only caution is if you have loved ones expecting a piece of this cake-filled ice cream, you better buy more than one.

Welcome to SCOOPED

The ladies who brought you STACKED are now taking to the web with our second love: ice cream. We're going to tell you about the good, the delicious, and the amazing.

We accept guest posts, we accept ice cream stories, and of course, we accept nothing but beautiful pictures of ice cream. Please feel free to get in touch with us at stacked.books@gmail.com if you'd like to contribute.

At SCOOPED, we take ice cream seriously.