I'm lactose intolerant. For the last 16 years, I've been scratching my crazy "New Englander driven to eat ice cream by birthright" itch by sampling tofutti, rice dream, sorbet, italian ice and when I'm feeling bold, just the teeniest, tiniest scoop of ice cream. The pounds I packed on during my freshman year of college from the nightly, comforting uberscoop of sub-par ice cream were quickly shed following the day the lactase (ie the enzyme that breaks lactose down into glucose and galactose) died.
Since then I've become -- or should I say, remained -- a fan of exceptional ice creams. Maybe its because I've only been able to make good, not unbelievable, ice cream. When I worked at the Four Seasons in Atlanta, my first mission was to revise and rework the ice creams into something remarkable. I changed recipes, played with flavor, made inclusions from scratch. My gingerbread ice cream for Christmas was a taste to behold: currants macerated in rum, vanilla-molasses ice cream, and homemade ginger snaps. I made an Earl Grey Tea ice cream that similarly brought me to tears: Earl Grey Tea and Orange Ice cream swirled with the deepest darkest fudge made with Valrhona chocolate.
The most hideous ice cream I made, which haunts me to this day, was executed for New Year's Eve 1998. At the request of my chef I made a white truffle ice cream. He was unwilling to purchase white truffles (at $1000/pound) so white truffle oil had to suffice. White truffle oil is just not the same, has no subtlety, and has off-flavors that cannot not be masked by the ice cream alone (think about it -- fat, a major component in ice cream, is a vehicle for non-water soluble volatile flavors like white truffle). I cooked down port and added that to the ice cream, and did manage to finally mask some of the off-flavors. Because I had overdosed the ice cream in the first round (and tasted it at every step), I ended up with way too much ice cream and threw quite a bit out after New Years Eve. No one wanted white truffle ice cream after that.
And I haven't been able to eat anything with white truffles.
My point about talking about ice cream is that I was obsessed with it, much in the way I was obsessed with everything else I've ever gotten into. I had ice cream science books, talked about opening an ice cream shop, and felt horribly offended when my boss at my part time job opened up an artisan ice cream shop called "What's the Scoop" without telling me upfront, after we had had long conversations about ice cream. All this was well before 1999, when cheese replaced ice cream as my obsession of choice.
Since I'm rather picky about ice cream, I don't eat it often. I have yet to find a shop in Chicago that makes me make audible 'yum' noises when I eat it. There's decent Gelato, but I'm never impressed by places using mixes imported from Italy, no matter how great they taste. I've been able to get some of the hand-packed Capogiro at Libby Bonahoom's place Bouffe in Lincoln Square -- delicious, and pretty fresh immediately after she gets the shipment. The Meyer Lemon and Vodka Sorbet is fantastic, despite the film of lemon oil it leaves on my tongue. I didn't care for the pomegranate, but I did like the tangerine. The Meyer Lemon - Amish Yogurt was pretty good, but had a slightly gummy texture.
Needless to say, I have been craving just-made, fresh from the churn ice cream.
In the last few weeks, food magazines have been on an ice cream bender in preparation for the warm summer months. This month's Food Arts magazine features an article called "The New Ice Age", about pastry chefs open up their own artisan ice cream boutiques and wholesale operations. Farm-fresh organic or all-natural milk and eggs, fruits, herbs and spices make up the ingredient list at these places. They aren't "Super Premium", they don't boast about outrageous butterfat and low overrun. They are good. Artisan. Handcrafted. Fresh. And it shows -- in the price point and in the quality of the product.
Over the weekend I went to Princeton, New Jersey for a three-day long Culinology seminar. In that same issue of Food Arts was a brief mention of The Bent Spoon in Princeton, an ice cream shop that is proud -- no, boastful -- of their New Jersey roots and the New Jersey growers of their ingredients. They sell "I (heart) NJ" shirts, which past customers have worn -and photographed - while on vacation all over the world.
I had to go.
On Friday after class I drove myself straight to downtown Princeton to seek out this mecca for New Jersey-created ice cream. I found a parking spot and walked Palmer Square, a square surrounded on each side by a side street filled with quaint stores, preppy mom clothing shops, chain stores like J Crew and Aerosoles, designer boutiques, restaurants, and the heavenly The Bent Spoon.
My eyes, as usual, were bigger than my stomach. Without really knowing what I wanted, I ordered the largest size. At $4.75 it is a lot less ice cream than you would get if you spent $2.99 or $3.99 on a pint of commercial ice cream at Whole Foods. But it is worth it -- dollar for dollar, The Bent Spoon's ice cream is a better value. You get to choose up to four flavors, which they scoop into quenelles (tapered ovals) and place vertically(!) in black oval plastic cups. The temperature is similar to gelato, so the ice cream is soft, creamy, and without ice crystals.
The flavors are remarkably fresh and mostly seasonal. I tasted rasberry thyme-bomb, which was not overly sweet and had the faintest hint of thyme. The chocolate sorbet is the best I've had, and that includes the first ever chocolate sorbet I tasted at Aubergine, Gordon Ramsay's first restaurant, in London in 1997. Mint Streak was a fresh-tasting white mint ice cream with the most wonderfully thin, crunchy chips of 61% chocolate. I had a peach flavor that I loved, although I can't remember exactly what was in it. At the register the kid who waited on me offered me a frequent scooper card. I politely explained that no, I was visiting from out of town and wouldn't likely be back. That's what I told myself. I wouldn't be back.
Later that evening I went back. I had two new flavors - Sicilian Blood Orange and one that I just can't remember. And the next day I went back. Twice. I tasted a honey ice cream that had a smooth sour note that reminded me of yogurt. I tried Kiwi Lime, which had the best mouthfeel of any of the sorbets I tried. But mostly I had Mint Streak and Chocolate Sorbet, a combination that I find satisfying and comforting. On my last visit, on sunday, I skipped lunch and ordered a medium, which is ordinarily 3 flavors, but had them scoop only the Mint Streak and the Chocolate Sorbet. It was that good. Now if I had only gotten the frequent eater card!
I have not eaten that much ice cream and sorbet in years. It was worth every calorie. I've contemplating mail-ordering some, but I wouldn't want to ruin the memory with ice cream that isn't at the peak of freshness and served at the wrong temperature.
