In the Kitchen: Tomato-Parmesan Scones

Dear Constant Reader,

On Saturday I threw a little tea party at The Manor. It had been a while since my last one, but I hadn’t been feeling up to an elaborate to-do. I hadn’t been in a good place recently and I was badly missing my friends. So, I sent an invitation to a “low-key tea party”, promising only tea, scones and jam, and maybe cake.

And then something exciting happened (more on that later) which got me feeling motivated again. While I still didn’t make any tea sandwiches, I ended up baking two kinds of scones and two types of cake. And, it being October, I had a spooky theme going with the cakes and serving ware. I served…

Coffin brownies filled with Nutella and raspberries, served on a spirit board tray. I used the recipe for Supernatural Brownies from the NY Times and they were, in fact, scary good!

Spice cake tombstones, served on a skull cake stand.

Scones with currants and dried sour cherries (from our tree) from my favorite scone recipe. The heap of scones obscures the charming Victorian skeleton decoration on the bowl.

And these scones were accompanied by sour cherry jam and blood orange marmalade (both homemade) and butter. Please note the skull spoons and skeleton knife (the blade says “poison”).

Also, I made these savory scones as an experiment and I was very happy with the results. The recipe comes from Tea Fit for a Queen: Recipes & Drinks for Afternoon Tea and I’ve converted it from metric. I think the recipe could easily be doubled (and you want to).

Sun-Dried Tomato and Parmesan Scones
8 oz. self-rising flour (or about 1 1/4 cup flour, heaping 1 3/4 teaspoon baking powder, 3/4 teaspoon salt)
1 3/4 oz. unsalted butter (3 Tablespoons plus a little)
1 1/2 oz. grated Parmesan
3-4 sprigs fresh thyme
1 1/2 oz. chopped sun-dried tomatoes
1/2 cup milk

Preheat oven to 425F. Line a baking sheet with parchment (I use a Silpat).

Sift flour into a large bowl. Rub the butter into the flour until it looks like breadcrumbs. Stir in the Parmesan, thyme leaves, and sun-dried tomatoes.

Pour in the milk. Gently stir until the dough just comes together. Knead lightly until the dough is smooth.

Pat dough into a round about an inch thick. Cut out scones. I got about 16 2″ round scones, but you could make them bigger. Bake about 10-15 minutes until barely browned.

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page. Or you can just tip me if you liked this.

Published in: on 21 October 2019 at 3:02 pm  Comments (2)  
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Review: In the Kitchen: The Necronomnomnom

Dear Constant Reader,

If you follow me on Instagram, you’ve seen some photos lately of dishes with rather odd names and a sinister tome in the background. What is up with that? I’ve been cooking from…

The Necronomnomnom
It’s a cookbook, but a truly special one. It’s full of rituals and rites, illustrated with arcane sketches and notes, which must be interpreted to achieve tasty results. As you might have guessed from the title, it’s a Lovecraft-themed cookbook. There are fifty recipes, including cocktails, appetizers, entrees, side dishes, desserts, and even recipes for children (that is, for children to eat, not how to cook them). As the names evoke eldritch horrors, so do the presentations, with odd colors, additional tentacles, or inscribed runes (all edible, of course).

The recipes have terribly wonderful Lovecraft pun names, like The Sandwich Horror or The Custard from Out of Space. But in order to cook them, you have to puzzle through the ingredient lists and instructions, which are written in archaic and mystical fashion — even poetry. The degree of obscurity varies from recipe to recipe, from relatively straightforward in terms of ingredient names and measurements to rather baffling at first glance.

Here, for example are the ingredients for Deep Fried Deep One, the first dish I cooked.

What is the Herb of Mysterious Purpose? The Bay of Elders? It helps to be an experienced cook, because once you figure out what the dish is, things start to fall in place. I was often chuckling at the cleverness of the authors or feeling smug that I puzzled things out.

And the instructions for The Oats of Dagon.

I’ll admit, this was a challenging one! I’m not even sure how many times I read and misinterpreted the instructions before I finally got it.

The illustrations are very detailed and in perfect keeping with the theme. Be sure to read all the scribbled little notes — there’s a story running through the book. Here’s a little taste of the artwork:

I managed to get my hands on a first, or Grimoire, edition, which is only the mystic rituals. There’s really nothing to break the illusion that this is a mysterious spell book and the cover is pretty horrifying. There was also a super-special edition with a three-dimensional flayed skin* cover, for that extra touch of realism.

Don’t worry if the thought of figuring out the ingredients and instructions fills you with fear. The “Bookstore Edition“, which comes out in just a few days, has all the rituals and illustrations, but also practical additions like a table of contents, index, and… all the recipes in clear language in an appendix in the back. I’ve had a lot of fun figuring out the recipes, but I know that’s not for everyone.

I’ve been really happy with most of the results! I’ve also had fun bringing out The Manor’s spookiest china and arranging the tentacles just right for a good photo. Here’s some New England Damned Chowder:

For more delicious photos of my endeavors so far and some commentary on the recipes, I’ve created a photo gallery just for my Patrons.

Highly recommended for creative cooks, lovers of puzzles, and weird fiction fans.

*Or maybe cast latex…

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page. Or you can just tip me if you liked this.

Published in: on 25 September 2019 at 3:19 pm  Leave a Comment  
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In the Kitchen: Queen Drop Biscuits

Dear Constant Reader,

I am extremely enamoured of the Victorian cooking web series at English Heritage and recently I tried one of their recipes. The results were interesting!

The recipe for Queen Drop Biscuits is from the personal receipt book of Mrs Avis Crocombe, the cook at Audley End House in the early 1880s. They’re a buttery cookie, packed with currents and a delightful almond flavor.

1/2 lb of butter beet to a cream, 1/2 lb of sugar, 4 eggs 1/2 lb of currents 3/4 of a lb of flour a few drops of almond flavour drop them on paper

It’s pretty straight forward as historic recipes go, with measurements for almost all of the ingredients. You need butter, sugar, flour, eggs, currants, and almond extract.

The method is super simple. Cream the butter and sugar. Add the flour, then the eggs (Victorian eggs were smaller than ours, so probably only 2), then some almond extract and the currants. Drop by tablespoons onto parchment-lined baking sheets at bake at 350F for 10-15 minutes, until lightly browned on the bottom.

The first time I baked them, I made a rookie mistake. I only used one stick of butter (1/2 cup) instead of two (1/2 pound). The biscuits were more like small cakes than cookies, but so delicious! I brought them backstage at one of our shows and everyone loved them. So, either way, you win. I think I actually like the less butter version better.


Queen Drop Biscuits
8 ounces (2 sticks) butter, softened
8 ounces sugar
2 eggs
8 ounces currants
12 ounces flour
2 teaspoons almond extract

Cream the butter and sugar. Mix in the flour. Beat in eggs one at a time. Add almond extract. Mix in currants.

Drop by tablespoonful onto parchment-lined baking sheets at bake at 350F for 10-15 minutes, until lightly browned on the bottom.

Makes about 2 baker’s dozens.

Note: If you go the less butter way, use 3 eggs.

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page. Or you can just tip me if you liked this.

Published in: on 29 August 2019 at 9:16 am  Leave a Comment  
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In the Kitchen: Cherry Halo Pie

Dear Constant Reader,

It’s sour cherry season at The Manor! Well, it was sour cherry season — we finished picking the other day. As I write this, I’m listening to the birds chirping as they eat the last of the fruit still lingering on the tree. I’ve still got pounds and pounds of cherries to use, and I’ve been working away in the kitchen like mad for the past two weeks.

I had the troupe and apprentices over to teach them how to make old-school G-strings (instructions are in Miss Mina Murray’s Little Book of Burlesque Costuming!) and served them this cherry pie, from the 1953 cookbook 250 Superb Pies and Pastries.

It’s very simple to make and the presentation is lovely. Bonus: you don’t have to deal with a top crust.

You will need:
Sugar, cornstarch, tapioca, salt, cherries, butter, heavy cream, and vanilla.

First, make a pie crust for a 9″ pan. The recipe I used is below, but you could use your favorite recipe or even buy a crust. I promise I won’t judge.

Mix up the sugar, salt, cornstarch, tapioca, and pitted cherries and pour into the prepared crust. Dot with butter. Bake at a high temperature for a short time then reduce the heat to moderate and bake until done.

Let the pie cool and the filling thicken.

Whip heavy cream to soft peaks, add sugar and vanilla and beat until stiff. Spread around the pie, leaving the center open, so it looks like a halo.

Judging from the amount left over (none!), this one was a winner.

Cherry Halo Pie
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 Tablespoon cornstarch
2 Tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 quart cherries, pitted
1 Tablespoon butter, cut into small pieces
1 recipe Plain Pastry
1 recipe Whipped Cream Topping

Mix sugar, salt, cornstarch, tapioca, and cherries together. Line 9″ pie pan with pastry, add cherry mixture. Dot cherries with butter.

Bake at 450F for 10 minutes; reduce temperature to 350F and bake 25 minutes longer.

Let cool. Spread 1 recipe Whipped Cream Topping around pie, leaving the cherries in center uncovered.

Plain Pastry
2 cups sifted flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup shortening
4 to 6 Tablespoons ice water

Sift flour and salt together and cut in shortening. Add water a little at a time until mixture will hold together.

Divide dough into 2 parts. Roll one out on a floured board. Line the piepan with it.

This makes two crusts. Since the pie only needs one, you can freeze the other piece of dough until you need it.

Whipped Cream Topping
1 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Whip cream until it make soft peaks. Add sugar and vanilla and beat until cream holds stiff peaks. If you have the time, chill your beaters and bowl before whipping the cream and always make sure your cream is cold. It will whip much faster if everything is cold.

Enjoy!

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page. Or you can just tip me if you liked this.

Published in: on 16 July 2019 at 2:02 pm  Leave a Comment  
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In the Kitchen: White Bean Dip

Dear Constant Reader,

As the weather gets warmer, I’m thinking about picnics and backyard parties and this dish is perfect! It’s easy, so delicious, and even vegan and gluten-free. I also love it because I almost always have all the ingredients in my pantry, so it’s easy to whip up on a moment’s notice.

You need…

A can of cannellini beans, lemon juice, white wine vinegar, garlic, fresh thyme, olive oil, and salt & pepper.

Drain and rinse the beans. Smash the garlic with the side of a knife.

Toss the garlic into the food processor with the lemon juice and vinegar and roughly chop.

Add the beans, thyme, salt and pepper and begin to process into a thick paste.

While the processor is going, drizzle in the olive oil. Add a little water, if necessary, to bring it to your preferred dip consistency.

Let it rest at least 15 minutes before serving, or even better, overnight (in the fridge).

Serve with chips (I like pita) or crudites.

I made some the other day because I have SO MANY baby carrots in the fridge (I think there are like six pounds — most of which I was gifted with. Got any good carrot recipes?), and they go awfully well with this dip. Also, I was celebrating that I had thyme in my herb garden again (my previous plant died over the winter). You could use dried thyme, but it’s not as good.

I’ve also made this recipe with garlic scapes and it’s so good. If you’re lucky enough to acquire some, chop the scapes coarsely and use in place of garlic cloves.


Here’s the recipe!

White Bean Dip
1 15-oz can of cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
2 cloves garlic, smashed (or 1/3 cup chopped garlic scapes)
2 Tablespoons lemon juice
1 Tablespoon white wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt
A few grinds of black pepper
1 Tablespoon fresh thyme (or 1 teaspoon dried)
1/4 cup olive oil
1-3 Tablespoons water, as needed

Toss the garlic into the food processor with the lemon juice and vinegar and roughly chop.

Add the beans, thyme, salt and pepper and begin to process into a thick paste.

While the processor is going, drizzle in the olive oil. If the dip is too thick, add water to the right consistency.

Let the dip rest at least 15 minutes before serving, or even better, overnight.

Serve with chips or crudites.

Published in: on 22 May 2019 at 11:40 am  Leave a Comment  
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Friday Tip

Dear Constant Reader,

Happy Friday! It sure is cold out there! I mean, Boston is nowhere near as bad as the Midwest, but it’s still No Fun At All. Here’s a tip to help you get through the day.

Eat a good breakfast.

Your mother was right! Don’t skip breakfast, especially when you’ve got a busy schedule. My favorite breakfast food is delicious, filling, good hot or good, has room for creativity, and is super easy to make — overnight oats.

At its simplest, overnight oats are just equal parts old-fashioned rolled oats and liquid. Don’t use instant oats because you’ll end up with mush. Don’t use steel-cut oats because they won’t soften enough. For the liquid you can can use milk (of any sort), fruit juice, or just plain water.

Put your oats and liquid in a container with whatever toppings and seasonings you like, cover, and stash in the fridge overnight. In the morning, eat. It’s that simple.

In the evening, I pour a half cup of oats and a half cup of liquid in a Pyrex container (as seen to the right), then add my toppings. I pop the lid on, stick it in the fridge, and ignore it until morning. I prefer my oats warm, so I microwave them for a minute or so (hence the glass container). But you can grab them right out of fridge and dig in.

Topping the oats is where thing get fun. You can add fresh or dried fruit, nuts, seeds, spices, fresh greens or herbs. I know oatmeal often has sweet toppings, but give savory oats a try.

A few suggestions:
Mina’s standard
Oats and water, pinch of salt. Toss some frozen mixed berries on top. In the morning the berries are thawed and when I nuke the oats, they turn into fruit compote. Sometimes I add a dash of natural cocoa powder for a hint of chocolate. It’s not sweetened, so only use it along with fruit, unless you like a bitter-tasting breakfast (just ask me know I know…)

Autumnal oats
Use apple cider for the liquid and add chopped apples, toasted walnuts, and dried cranberries. Sprinkle with a little cinnamon.

Savory sesame oats
Make the oats with water and add a splash of soy sauce and a dash of sesame oil. Top with sesame seeds and chopped scallions.

Almond Joy oats
This one is basically dessert.
Make the oats with milk. For true decadence, use chocolate almond milk (personally I think it’s a bit much). Top with toasted shredded coconut, toasted slivered almonds, and a few dark chocolate chips. If you warm this one, the chips get all melty and ooze through each bite.

M2Like this tip? There are lots more in Miss Mina Murray’s Little Book of Better Burlesque.

These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page.

Published in: on 1 February 2019 at 2:53 pm  Leave a Comment  
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In the Kitchen: Christmas Pudding, part 3

Dear Constant Reader,

Earlier in the year I showed you how to make and steam a Christmas pudding. Now that your pudding is good and aged, it’s almost time to serve it!

Take your finely-aged pudding out of its aging container and unwrap it from the cloth. Get your pudding basin and butter it well, then slip your naked pudding into it. Wet the pudding cloth, wring it out, and tie over the top of the basin with your pudding string just like you did before. Steam the pudding for an hour or two until it’s heated through. You really can’t overcook it; just make sure the water never boils away.

Traditionally Christmas pudding is served with hard sauce. It’s not called “hard” because it has booze in it (although it does), but because it can’t be poured. You’ll have to scoop it onto your warm slice of pudding where it will melt into a puddle of deliciousness.

To make hard sauce, you need:

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1 cup superfine sugar
2 Tablespoons booze

Superfine sugar, also called bar sugar and caster sugar (in the UK), can be a little hard to find. If you can’t scare up any, use confectioner’s sugar (I don’t care for it because it’s got cornstarch added) or grind up granulated sugar in the food processor. Straight granulated sugar will make your hard sauce gritty.

For the booze, use whatever you’ve been aging your pudding with. In my case, that’s rum. Usually dark rum, but my pudding drank it all.

Cream together the butter and sugar, then beat in the booze. It’s that easy! Keep the hard sauce in the fridge until you’re ready to serve.

Now to serve the pudding aflame!

Place the pudding on a serving platter, preferable one with a bit of a lip. Gently warm 1/2 cup of booze in a sauce pan. Turn out the lights in the dining room and place the pudding platter on the table. Get your camera ready. Pour the warm booze over the pudding and light the vapors with a long match. Voila!

When the flames go out, slice and serve with a generous spoonful of hard sauce.

Here’s last year’s pudding and the proud cook.

If you make Christmas pudding, I want to hear about it!

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page.

Published in: on 19 December 2018 at 2:34 pm  Leave a Comment  
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In the Kitchen: Cherry Bounce

Dear Constant Reader,

It seems you all like my cooking posts best (at least according to my site stats), so I’ll endeavor to give you more!

This latest recipe is very vintage — it dates back to at least the 18th century! As you, dear Reader, know well, early summer brings cherries to The Manor and a desperate attempt to use them and preserve them. This year I was determined to try Cherry Bounce, a cordial popular in colonial days. It was said to be a favorite of George Washington.

Cherry bounce is made with cherries (or any stone fruit, though you’d have to change the name…), sugar, and liquor. Washington liked his with brandy, but you can also use rum or whiskey or vodka. Each adds its own characteristics to the bounce. Sometimes the fruit is used whole, sometimes it’s pressed for its juice. You can also add spices or even fresh herbs. For a lower proof, add some water. I’ve seen so many variations.

We used a very simple recipe that’s much like my Christmas fan dance: Sugar Rum Cherry. I wanted to use rum, as it’s very New England and also my favorite spirit. I decided not to add any spices as I feared the results might taste like cough syrup (based on an unfortunate experiment with raspberry cordial once).

Take a big glass jar with a lid. Add a pound of sugar and then a little rum to dissolve. Add a pound of cherries and mash them a bit. Pour a quart of rum over it all. Let it sit in a sunny place for a week, then store in a dark place for at least a month. Strain the liquid and pour into bottles.

We made two versions, each with 2 pounds of sugar, 2 pounds of cherries, and a 1.75 L bottle of rum. The first was a white rum and we put the cherries in whole and then bashed them around with a spoon after the rum was added. The second was gold rum and we bashed the cherries into the sugar with a potato masher before adding the rum.

We let the jars of bounce sit for a week in the pantry and I would stir them every day to make sure the sugar stayed in solution and further bruise the cherries. Then we stashed them in a cabinet for about 2 months. I strained out the cherries and poured the bounce back into the jars. The white rum bounce is pretty clear, but the gold, where the cherries were crushed, has a lot of sediment. I need to find some attractive bottles to decant the bounce into. When I bottle it, I’ll strain it too (coffee filters work well for that).

So, how does it taste? Very good. It’s intensely cherry. I think the white is actually more cherry-flavored than the gold. The gold has more of a boozy taste. And they’re both quite strong. It’s a nice dessert tipple to be drunk out of wee glasses. I’m sure some creative sort could come up with a cocktail that uses cherry bounce.

I was going to toss the cherries, assuming they had given up all their cherry goodness and no longer tasted like anything. However, upon sampling, they still taste like cherries and very much like rum. I pulled out all the whole ones and froze them. They’ll be great over ice cream. Maybe I’ll even flame them like cherries jubilee.

Martha Washington’s original recipe, if you want give it a try:
Extract the juice of 20 pounds well ripend Morrella cherrys. Add to this 10 quarts of old french brandy and sweeten it with White sugar to your taste. To 5 gallons of this mixture add one ounce of spice such as cinnamon, cloves and nutmegs of each an Equal quantity slightly bruis’d and a pint and half of cherry kirnels that have been gently broken in a mortar. After the liquor has fermented let it stand close-stoped for a month or six weeks then bottle it, remembering to put a lump of Loaf Sugar into each bottle.

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page.

Published in: on 9 October 2018 at 11:02 am  Comments (1)  
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In the Kitchen: Bedroll Special (1952)

Dear Constant Reader,

In my collection of mid-century cookbooks, I’m most fond of a series by Robert H. Loeb Jr. I’ve already shared a recipe from Wolf in Chef’s Clothing, his cookbook for men. Now here’s one from Date Bait: The Younger Set’s Picture Cook Book (1952)

Despite the name, it’s mostly recipes to impress your friends and your parents. There’s a lot of reliance on packaged foods (this is the 1950s after all!), especially cake mixes. The first chapter is snacks to keep in your icebox for the hungry midnight raider. I made Bedroll Special, a pinwheel sandwich.

You need bacon, eggs, mayonnaise, butter, olives, and a loaf of unsliced bread.

Start by hard boiling the eggs and cooking the bacon. Chop the eggs fine and crumble the bacon. Mix with mayonnaise.

Then comes the tricky part. Cut off all the crusts, except the bottom one, from the bread. Then cut two thin slices lengthwise from the top. The only unsliced loaf I found at my nearby supermarket was Italian bread which turned out to be too irregularly shaped and squishy to make thin, even slices. I got rather raggedy results, which I ran over with a rolling pin to make flatter and more even. If I do anything like this again, I’ll get an unsliced sandwich loaf from our local Irish bakery.

Spread each slice with softened butter, then spread with the mayo mixture. Get close to the edge. At this point in the recipe you were supposed to go over it with a rolling pin, but I didn’t want to get goop all over mine and the slice was already pretty flat.

Place olives in a row along one short end and then roll the bread up. Wrap each roll in a piece of wax paper and twist the ends to make a little sandwich bonbon. Stash in the fridge for at least 2 hours.

Before serving, take the rolls out of the fridge and unwrap them. Slice cross-wise into rounds (a serrated knife works well for this). You can cut the ends off first if they’re not so tidy. Pile the rounds onto a serving platter. The cookbook had a little banner that said “You’re For Me”, which you could cut out, glue to a toothpick, and plant in the middle of the stack of sandwiches before replacing them in the fridge for your midnight snacker to find.

Instead of a lovely platter, I put them in a tupperware so they wouldn’t dry out and to make them easier to transport to rehearsal. My presentation is often less than elegant.

They’re pretty good. My taste testers were quite positive. The filling is completely unseasoned, so the salty, briny, and smoky flavors from the olives and bacon were necessary.

Bedroll Special
2 eggs
2 slices bacon
3 Tablespoons mayonnaise
Stuffed olives
Softened butter
1 loaf unsliced bread

Hard boiling the eggs. Let cool. Cook the bacon until crisp and drain. Crumble bacon into a bowl and mix in mayonnaise. Chop eggs fine and add to mixture.

Cut off all the crusts, except the bottom one, from the bread. Then cut two slices 1/8″ thick lengthwise from loaf.

Spread each slice with softened butter, then spread with the mayo mixture. Get close to the edge. Roll bread with a rolling pin to flatten.

Place olives in a row along one short end and then roll the bread up. Wrap each roll in a piece of wax paper and twist the ends securely. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Before serving, take the rolls out of the fridge and slice (a serrated knife works best) cross-wise into rounds. Pile the rounds onto a serving platter. If not serving right away, keep under a damp tea towel to keep the bread from drying out.

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page.

Published in: on 11 September 2018 at 11:50 am  Comments (2)  
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In the Kitchen: Mocha Marlow (1953)

Dear Constant Reader,

It’s been rather hot so far this summer. A perfect time for icy-cold treats! The other day I made some delicious mocha marlow. “Marlow?” you ask, “What’s marlow?” Like its equally obscure cousin mallobet, it’s a frozen dessert made with a marshmallow base. I’ve definitely dated this style of dessert back to the 1920s (Clara Bow contributed a recipe for Vanilla Marlow to a 1929 movie star cookbook), but it may go further back to the earlier days of ice boxes. These desserts were still being made into the midcentury, but seem to have then died out completely.

Both marlows and mallobets are made with melted marshmallows. Marlows get their fluffiness from whipped cream, while mallobets (marshmallow-sherbet) contain stiffly beaten egg whites. You don’t need an ice cream maker for these concoctions, which was part of the appeal, I think.

I made this marlow on a terribly hot day and I must confess that cooking everything over boiling water was torture, but the end result was worth it.


Start by cutting 16 marshmallows into quarters. It’s easiest to use kitchen shears or a knife dipped in hot water. Don’t substitute mini-marshmallows because you’ll end up with the wrong ratio of cornstarch (which coats the outside of the marshmallows) to marshmallow.

Set a saucepan over boiling water and melt the chocolate. Then fold in the marshmallows and a cup of strong coffee and a pinch of salt. I don’t drink coffee so I never have any just hanging about. I made instant espresso instead. Keep folding the mixture.

When the marshmallows are about half melted, take them off the heat and keep stirring until they completely melt. Make sure everything is well combined and let it cool. I stuck the pan into a bowl of ice water to help it cool down faster on such a hot day.

Then whip cream until it’s stiff and fold into the cooled mocha mixture and add toasted nuts. I think toasting nuts before using them is always a good idea; they just taste better. The first time I made this I used slivered almonds since that’s what I had on hand, but hazelnuts add a lovely Nutella flavor. If you’re one of those people who doesn’t like bits of stuff in their ice cream, you can certainly leave the nuts out.

Spoon the mixture into a container — I recommend a metal loaf pan — cover it, and stick it in the freezer. When it’s about half frozen (use your best judgement), give it a stir.

It will take a couple of hours to firm up enough to serve.

Mina’s Mocha Marlow

1 oz. unsweetened chocolate
16 marshmallows, quartered
1 cup strong coffee
pinch salt
1 cup heavy cream
1/3 cup chopped toasted nuts

Melt chocolate over boiling water. Add marshmallows, coffee, and salt. Fold mixture continuously over and over until marshmallows are half melted. Remove from heat and continue folding until mixture is smooth. Cool. Whip cream. Add whipped cream and nuts to mocha mixture. Pour into metal loaf pan, cover, and freeze until firm, stirring at least once.

M2These writings and other creative projects are supported by my Patrons. Thank you so much! To become a Patron, go to my Patreon page.

Published in: on 16 July 2018 at 2:34 pm  Comments (1)  
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