Welcome to the inaugural post of Amber Eats. As I continue on my food Journey, which I will go into on another post, let’s just say I’ve learned a lot about. I’ve learned to play with my food. Who else wants to play with their food? I think everybody does. Some of my post here will be insightful, some of them will be observation/this is what I did, some will include “real” recipes. So as I enjoy this as part of the journey,I invite you along.
Here in Austin, Texas it suddenly got hot, summer has arrived with a Vengeance, and the rest of this week is supposed to be over a hundred. Which brought me to: I have a cantaloupe in my fridge I need to use, and I want something cool. So I came up with cantaloupe ice cream. After researching online what other people are doing I decided to use the K.I.S.S. principle – the only things I put in my ice cream was cantaloupe and canned coconut cream.
Being the old fashioned girl that I am (at least in some things), I have ice cube trays around. I find that ice cube trays* are beneficial in so many ways these days – cooking for just one, I freeze things in serving sizes that are appropriate for me. Once frozen, you have the nicest little cube of food stuff. In this instance: cantaloupe ice cream, In other instances I’ve used it for basil pesto, pizza sauce, freezing one serving of olives. You get the picture? I have also learned that sometimes I want more than ice cube size, in which case I use a silicone muffin cup and fill it to varying levels. Also very easy to pop out, and I am finding as I work with this more that it stores better in my freezer.
Let’s go back to the cantaloupe ice cream though.
- ½ cantaloupe, seeded
- 1 can coconut cream
Put in blender, zap to desired level of chunk. Add extras & mix well. Add more or less coconut milk/ cream to desired thickness. Ditto with cantaloupe. Pour into ice cube trays. Freeze. Pop out of ice cube trays. Eat. Or freeze in airtight container.
Added benefit of ice cube trays – you don’t have go in & stir it. It works perfectly.
So when you hear cantaloupe ice cream and coconut milk, what else do you think of? Those tropical fruits, chunks of those fruits in your ice cream. So depending on what you wanted to do, the possibilities here are endless. What about pina colada ice cream? Just use pineapple, a little coconut, extra chunks of pineapple if you’d like. Maybe a hint of lime? Maybe mixing strawberries with my cantaloupe? I eat pretty holistically, to the extent that I can, and one thing I noticed when I was researching is that everybody was adding sugar to their ice cream. You have this fabulous fruit, why do you need sugar? If I choose to use a sweetener, I tend to go toward agave because of its low glycemic index, but that’s me. What works for you?
Of course you can add other things – spices, herbs.
Are you ready? Go forth and PLAY!
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