Yield: 1 cup
Provided by: SmallRecipe.com
Categories: Dessert
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Yield: 4
Ingredients:
| 1 cup sugar |
| ½ cup water |
| ¼ cup heavy cream |
| Pinch of salt |
| ¼ ounce dried candy cap mushrooms |
| ¼ cup bourbon or whiskey |
Steps:
- Soak the mushrooms in the water for 30 minutes to reconstitute. Agitate the mushrooms to remove any debris, then remove the mushrooms, strain the liquid through a chinois or fine cheesecloth and recombine the two.
- Combine the mushrooms and their liquid, the salt and sugar in a small sauce pot and bring the mixture to a simmer. Cook the mixture until the color changes to light amber, then remove from the heat, add the brandy and ignite, then allow the flames to die off.
- Remove the pan from the heat, then add the cream and whisk to incorporate.
- If the sauce seems to thin, reduce a bit more, whisking occasionally until thickened to your liking. If it’s too thick, add a tablespoon of water at a time to loosen it. The sauce will keep for months in the fridge, but if it’s around for that long there’s something wrong with you.
“It’s actually really good!”
This phrase is heard over and over again in the shop. In fact, we’ve overheard it so much through the years, we’ve even caught ourselves saying it unwillingly. We kinda hate it, because it goes with the presumption that you’ve already discussed that “it”—whether it’s an ice cream flavor or party or whatever—is not going to be good.
The flavor that sparks the most customers to utter “It’s actually really good!” is Candy Cap, a flavor made with…delicious little mushrooms.
First some background: Porcini mushroom ice cream is one of the only flavor failures Jake will readily admit. It tasted OK, but it was just too earthy, and sadly, there was not a market for dirt ice cream. At least not yet.
But right when we were ready to write off mushroom ice cream, we stumbled upon a wonderful species called candy cap mushrooms.
A local mushroom vendor, Far West Fungi, approached us about doing a mushroom flavor. At first we were pretty skeptical, and at second, we were still skeptical. But when they finally coaxed us to visit their shop at the Ferry Building, they opened a jar of dried candy caps. They smelled like the best maple syrup ever. We were sold.
We soon learned that nothing else on earth tastes like candy cap mushrooms. They carry the earthy taste associated with mushrooms, but unlike in the failed porcini experiment, candy caps deliver their own dimension of sweetness to the ice cream. Guests have said it tastes like waffles, pancakes, cinnamon buns, celery root, etc.
Way more than just a novelty flavor, it’s become one of our most popular flavors—it even got us on the television screen once or twice.
Provided by: SmallRecipe.com
Yield: Makes 1 quart
Ingredients:
| 2 cups heavy cream |
| 1 cup whole milk |
| 2 tsp salt |
| 1 tbsp dried candy cap mushrooms, ground to a coarse powder in a spice grinder (Chopping the dried mushrooms in a coffee grinder also works well and your next pot of coffee will be very special.) |
| 3 egg yolks |
| 1 cup sugar |
Steps:
- In a large, heavy-bottomed, nonreactive saucepan over medium heat, combine the cream, milk, and salt and cook, stirring occasionally, until hot but not boiling. Add the ground candy caps. Remove from the heat and let steep for at least 1 hour or up to 2 hours.
- When you feel like your mushrooms are in a good place, return the pan to medium heat and bring the mixture back to hot.
- Fill a large bowl or pan with ice and water. Place a large, clean bowl in the ice bath and fit the bowl with a fine-mesh strainer.
- Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until well blended.
- Remove the cream mixture from the heat. Slowly pour about half of the hot cream mixture into the yolk mixture, whisking constantly. Transfer the yolk mixture back to the saucepan with the remaining cream mixture and return it to medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly with a rubber spatula and being sure to scrape the bottom of the saucepan so it doesn’t scorch, until the liquid begins to steam and you can feel the spatula scrape against the bottom of the pan, 2 to 3 minutes.
- Remove the custard from the heat and immediately pour it through the strainer into the clean bowl you set up in the ice bath. Let cool, stirring occasionally.
- When the custard has totally cooled, cover the bowl tightly and chill in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour or preferably overnight. When you are ready to freeze the custard, transfer it to an ice cream maker and spin according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Eat immediately, or transfer to an airtight container, cover, and freeze for up to 1 week.