Happy Trails For Us: My Reluctant Blog

Up until yesterday this is what I thought my contribution would be this week:

Somehow the flavor combination sounded odd, and with this week being my return to work after a long and lovely summer, I had not a lot of energy as the weekend approached, and so I spent a lot of time (too much really) thinking about whether I even wanted to make this ice cream. But I had the ingredients, so finally yesterday morning, I started the process.

First came steeping the lavender (from the garden) in the honey:

From this I made a custard - and we all know how I feel about using many bowls, cooking the custard, using all those egg yolks. I am a much bigger fan of uncooked ice mixtures. But I did it, almost cooked it a bit too much, thank goodness for a good strainer.

By now, looking at all the pictures on the ST thread page, I was anxious for this to be ice cream, but it needed an overnight in the refrigerator, and I decided to make that 6-8 hours. Late last evening, after we returned from dinner out, I churned the mixture, but knew that the finished product would need that overnight in order to make a decent scoop. We did a taste taste, and I am glad I made this ice cream - it's delicate, for me it was a hint of lavender, then a pow of honey; David thought the honey came first. We both were reminded of a honey ice cream that David used to order at the Polar Bear ice cream parlor in our Santa Cruz days.

Finally, this morning I was able to scoop, decorate and shoot a picture:

And now onto Peach Ice Cream, my choice for this week, and a favorite summer flavor from summers past.