Dana bought me the best grad school graduation gift ever- a lemon-yellow Cuisinart ice cream maker (#EarnsCommission)! The Cuisinart and I have made some delicious ice creams together in the past year, and this is the latest one.
We were having a party at work for one of my coworker’s birthdays, it was going to replace our normal Wednesday morning team meeting. Ever since Dana and I have started the blog, I don’t like to buy food to bring places, I prefer to make something fun. I was having a really hard time thinking of what I could bring that was creative, could be prepared the day before, and was breakfast appropriate. Then I remembered my ice cream maker! Everyone loves ice cream, and a fruity ice cream is totally appropriate for breakfast (let’s get real, ice cream is appropriate at all times of the day-there’s always room for ice cream)! My original plan was to make peach or nectarine ice cream, but when I went to Cub to get the fruit, none of the peaches or nectarines were ripe enough, so I switched gears to apricot. This recipe comes from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop, the only difference is that his recipe calls for almond extract, but when I was in Cub, I couldn’t remember if I had almond flavoring, so I gambled on the assumption that I did…and lost. I figured vanilla extract was an as good or better substitute. All my coworkers seemed to like it, so I’d say its a win!
Other than the fact that Cub didn’t have ripe peaches or nectarines (you want really ripe fruit for ice cream!), a benefit of making apricot ice cream in the place of peach is that you don’t have to peel the apricots! Same goes for nectarines, apparently their skin is delicate enough to dissolve in the heating process.
Start by pitting the apricots, just slice them in half and the pit should pop out easily. Then cut each half into fourths.
Put your apricot pieces and a 1/2 cup water into a medium saucepan, cover, and heat over medium heat for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Once the 10 minutes have passed, or the pieces are nice and soft, remove the pan from heat stir in the sugar until dissolved, then cool to room temp.
When the apricot/sugar mixture is cool, either use a blender or food processor to break up the apricot so you have a nice smooth apricot mash. I used my immersion blender and it worked great. If you have a lot of fiber from the apricots, you can push the mash through a strainer to remove it, but this wasn’t a problem for me.
Next stir in the cream, vanilla extract, and lemon juice, and stick it in the fridge until cool. I am never patient enough to wait for the fridge to cool it, so I always stick it in the freezer for about a half hour.
Once the mixture has cooled, pour it into your ice cream maker and let it do its magic. Mine took about 30 minutes to get thick, once you reach your desired consistency (remember it will thicken in the freezer too), scoop it out into a tight-sealing container and put it in the freezer to harden a bit more. Or you could eat it now if you are impatient or like softer ice cream!
That’s all! Ice cream is a really fun activity in the summer, and this apricot flavor is perfect for a refreshing cool treat.
- 1 pound ripe apricots (about 5 apricots)
- 1 cup heavy cream
- ½ cup sugar
- ½ cup water
- 3 drops vanilla extract
- 2-3 drops fresh squeezed lemon juice
- Remove the pits from the apricots and cut each apricot half into fourths
- Heat the apricot pieces and the water over medium heat in a covered sauce pan for about 10 minutes, or until soft, stirring occasionally
- Remove from heat and stir in sugar until dissolved, cool to room temperature
- Stir in cream, vanilla, and lemon juice
- Cool in the fridge
- Pour into your ice cream maker and allow to churn for approximately 30 minutes
- Scoop into a tight-sealing container and allow to continue hardening in the freezer
I love this one…so. would your gramma! She loved all things apricot….and ice cream was always her favorite!