Bailey’s & Dulce de leche Mocha Cookie & Cream Ice Cream

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If you are like me, then the mention of cookies, alcohol, and ice cream in the same breath would make your eyes brighten up and your mouth drool! That is if the long name doesn’t scare you away!

The idea behind this crazy sounding name came the other day while I was thinking of  how to incorporate the cookies left from the time I made the Mocha Chocolate chip cookies.

Now, during the visit to my grandparents’ place, somebody had invited us for dinner and I had the most amazingly creamy strawberry ice cream- which was homemade and completely eggless. The aunty told it was a fairly simple eggless recipe with equal proportions of milk, cream and milk powder and she adds strawberry crusher which lends the sweetness and flavour to the ice cream. But, I wanted to add the cookies, so I thought I would replace the strawberry crusher with crumbled cookies.

The Bailey’s was something I remember from one of David Lebovitz “no ice cream machine” ice cream. Just before leaving US for my India vacation I got my copy of Room for Dessert and I remember seeing David’s chocolate and banana ice cream that requires no ice cream maker.

Now the thing is I think I am allergic to banana. I think  so because everytime I eat a banana I get this horrible-horrible pain in my stomach. This allergy was never there before. I experienced it for the first time when I was at some one’s place and had taken my banana bread for them. I ate it at night. The next day I had severe pain. Since we had eaten out I thought it was a result of that. But it remained for quite a few days, because I was still eating bananas. Anyway, our home stock of bananas finished and so did the pain. Still it did not strike me. After few days again the same thing and the same happened when my in-laws were there. The only food that was common all these times was banana. So well, I guess I am allergic to it, which kind of sucks because I love banana bread!

So with these two recipes and a little help to get it all together from  here I set out to make my jacked up mocha cookies, dulce de leche ice cream!

Dulce de leche (pronounced DOOL-say day LAY-chay) is Spanish for “milk candy”. It tastes quite like caramel but with the additional taste of cooked milk. (Technically, dulce de leche is a type of caramel.) It’s often used in liquid form as a sauce for ice cream, cakes, cookies, just about anything that needs a sweet topping. In solid form, it is most often eaten as a tasty candy.

The ice cream turned out more like mocha cake batter ice cream.-probably because of the soggy cookies that I had used. Anyway, that wasn’t a problem. Only problem that I had was that it was melting too soon. Homemade ice creams are generally more soft than store bought- they have the soft serve consistency. But this one was melting way too fast. It is really hot here but still not so much that a ice cream can’t behave itself for a few minutes. I guess it could be the alcohol level that did not allow the ice cream to freeze too much. The person, whose original recipe I used, does not add alcohol and has a very creamy ice cream thanks to the milk powder in the recipe. And since I added alcohol, as well as the milk powder, it might have changed the science behind freezing the ice cream. I, actually like my ice cream melted. So I wasn’t complaining, but my mom likes her ice cream “ice cream consistency” (which she couldn’t get because the tub had been out for quite a while as I was busy clicking some photographs). She loved the taste though.

The melted ice cream did make a darn good adult cookie and cream shake! But next time I would skip the cognac and see how that works.

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TWO WRONGS DO MAKE A RIGHT- THEY MAKE ONE GREAT DESSERT!

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I was reading an article today that talked about how within just 6 days the Japanese repaired a section of the Great Kanto Highway that had been badly damaged by the earthquake. The article further goes on to state that many workers returned to their jobs only a day after the earthquake and subsequent tsunami and some businesses in the worst-hit regions have already reopened.

My prayers go out for the people of Japan who have suffered such grave loss, and hearing such stories of the Japanese determination just strengthens my belief that if any one nation has the power to rise again after such a tragedy- it is Japan. It emerged triumphant from the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and even now they will rise again. No wonder they are called the land of the rising sun!

Its such a simple lesson that one can take from the Japanese tragedy and the fortitude of the Japanese people- one could either resign and sit after such a disaster and accept it as nature’s will or one can stand up and be determined to get back on his/her feet.

Not that my tragedies in the kitchen are even remotely related to what Japan has gone through and is still going through, but the lesson learnt is to never give up and some wrongs can be made into a right if you have the will and determination along with some creativity.

I have joined the Daring Baker’s gang and February would have been my first DB challenge. But I failed in completing it as my first attempt was a failure and I was busy travelling after that to give it another shot. The challenge was to make Panna cotta and florentine cookies. My first attempt at Panna cotta was a big flop. It would not have been such a flop had I not used silicon muffin moulds for setting the Panna cotta. I am assuming so because the ones I left to set in the ramekins turned out fine. But out of the 13 servings I had, I put only four to set in the ramekins. Since I these were to be served for a party of 8 I knew I had to think of another way to serve them or make a completely different dessert. So instead I set out to make a chocolate Zucchini cake. Now, that is another story!

For the Zucchini cake- my parents bought a new oven and it was the first time I was baking a cake in it. I was scared- I had made buns earlier in it and they browned too quickly from the bottom and not from the top. So I knew the oven did not have even heating and I would have to keep a constant watch. If technical issues were not enough, human error on my part made sure that a disaster was on its way. I decided to use an angel cake pan for the batter. I knew that I would need another pan so I greased a small loaf pan too. But, I don’t know why, when I started pouring the batter I thought I should be good with only the bundt pan. I should have known better to not overfill. There was a voice that did tell me to pour the batter in the other pan as well (and it was right there- all greased up), but I was left with only a ladleful (or so I thought) and thought I should be able to manage with one pan. And in spite of my better judgement I filled it to the top. I knew it then and there I made a mistake.

And then it happened. Like lava the cake batter started overflowing from the pan and touching the sheet pan I had put underneath the rack. And my heart sank. It overflew and dropped on the pan and started burning since the sheet pan was on the lower most shelf and the house smelt of burnt cake, even though on the middle rack the cake was still baking. There was smoke all over and once the batter stopped falling from the pan, I removed the sheet pan and removed the burnt cake batter. The cake, once baked, was in no shape to serve as is, though it tasted really good.

The party was the same night and I had two failed desserts, albeit tasty! I did have the crumbs from the cake and a smooth, partially set panna cotta. I decided to make parfait like desserts with the two disasters. And boy, were they a hit. The creaminess from the panna cotta combined with the moist, chocolatey cake made a perfect dessert! (Of course, individually too they make fabulous eats!)

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