Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

中文菜谱： 蓝莓奶酪冰激凌

Houston has been known for its long and hot and humid summer…  Well, let’s look at the bright side.  The ice cream season is really long too! O(∩_∩)O~

I love making ice cream from scratch at home.  Most people might assume it is a long, complicate and labor intensive process.  Guess what?  It is not always true! 

Allow me to introduce this blueberry cheesecake ice cream, which is super easy and simple to make.  it is so good that you won’t miss the store bought version once you have tried it.

I use homemade blueberry jam made with fresh blueberries here.  You can always substitute with the ones sold in grocery stores to save some time. 

When blueberry is in season, I buy pounds of blueberries.  Wash and drain them well.  Add to a large pot, along with brown sugar to taste.  Squeeze in some fresh lemon juice.  Cook over medium heat until it boils.  And then reduce the heat to medium low.  Stir from time to time to prevent burning at the bottom. 

Remove from heat when blueberries are cooked down and thicken.

Ingredients：

1package of cream cheese, 8 oz/ 226g
280 g condensed milk/ 10 oz
1 cup heavy cream
3/4 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
blueberry jam 

Directions：

Freeze ice cream container for at least 24 hours.

Take cream cheese out of fridge and leave it at room temperature for about 40 minutes or until it softens. 

Add cream cheese to a medium bowl.  Beat with electric whisker at low speed while gradually adding sweetened condensed milk. 

Add heavy cream, milk and vanilla.  Whisk until everything is well combined and smooth.

Refrigerate the custard for 2 to 4 hours before adding to ice cream machine.

Churn the custard in ice cream machine for 25 minutes.  It comes out as soft-served ice cream.  

Spoon the cheese ice cream to an ice cream container.  Add a couple ladles of blue berry jam in between and swirl with a spoon.

Cover with lid.  Freeze for another 4 to 6 hours.

It is very cheesy and creamy, sweet but not too sweet.  Blueberry jam adds a very nice touch of flavor to the ice cream.

Every scoop of blueberry cheesecake ice cream has its unique pattern O(∩_∩)O~

Chocolate Marshmallows

中文菜谱： 巧克力棉花糖

When we were living in Michigan, we went camping a lot in the summer time.  And we always built a camp fire by the lake.  It was for fun, but also for cooking and grilling too. O(∩_∩)O~

Camp fires in summer night were really beautiful.  Firewood we bought was mostly pinewood.  It gave out a very pleasant aroma when burning. 

Michigan has some of the purest lakes I have ever seen.  Many lakes in northern Michigan are crystal clear.  We were lucky to have seen some peaceful and sparkling night sky like this. 

We built camp fires in day time too, mostly for cooking and grilling. 

（For one of detailed camping trip journals, go to：Interlochen camping & boating：https://www.yankitchen.com/english-blog/camping5）

I learn from our many camping trips that camp fire is very essential to a successful camping trip.  The fire provides warmth and light during long nights and also good for cooking and grilling in the daytime.  And s’more is the most perfect dessert by the fire.  Any camping trips with camping fire and fire-roasted marshmallows cannot be considered perfect. O(∩_∩)O~

It takes patience and experience to roast the marshmallows.  These cute tiny fluffy candies are very easy to burn.  If not roasted enough, the chocolate in the s’more would not melt. 

So I have been thinking what if I can add chocolate into the marshmallows?  By doing so, the marshmallows and chocolate would be roasted at the same time, so that they should both melt perfectly. 

The marshmallow recipe is adapted from Atlon Brown from Foodnetwork (https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/homemade-marshmallows-recipe-1953933).  I use 2/3 of all ingredients from original recipe, and make a little bit change.

Ingredients：

2 packages of plain gelatin (7g / package)
2/3 cold water
8 oz granulated sugar（about 227g）
2/3 light corn syrup
a pinch salt
2/3 teaspoon coffee rum
1/4 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup corn starch
1 cup 60% cocoa chocolate chips

Directions：

Add 1/3 cup cold water to stand mixer’s mixing bowl.  Sprinkle the gelatin on top.  Let it stand for 5 minutes.

Shift both corn starch and powdered sugar together.

 Grease a glass container on bottom and sides.  And then coat with starch sugar mixture. 

Add the remaining 1/3 cup cold water to a small pot, along with sugar, corn syrup and salt. 

Cook over medium heat.

Cook until the candy thermometer shows syrup reaches 240F/ 115.5C. Remove from heat.  

Turn the stand mixer on low speed.  Gradually add sugar syrup down the side of bowl.  Be sure not to pour the syrup on the moving whisk.  The hot syrup could be very dangerous to anyone standing nearby. 

When all the syrup is added to stand mixer bowl, turn the speed to its highest to whisk for 12 to 15 minutes.  The longer it whisks, the firmer marshmallows would be. 

Add chocolate chips in the last minute.

With a greased spatula, scrape marshmallow mixture to prepared container.  Level the top with spatula and then sprinkle a thin layer of starch sugar mixture.

Let the marshmallow mixture cool for a few hours or overnight before cut it with a sharp knife.

It has been very fun to make marshmallows from scratch.

Roast chocolate over charcoal fire.  Guess what?  It turns out awesome!  Both marshmallow and chocolate chips are roasted and melt perfectly!   

How good does that look? O(∩_∩)O~

Passion Fruit and Lemon Water

中文菜谱： 百香果柠檬蜜饮

Passion fruit has beautiful name in China.  We call it “fruit with a hundred fragrances”.  It is true.  Passion fruit deserves that name.  When you closely smell a passion fruit, you can pick up the scents from pineapple, mango, pomegranate, strawberry, lychee…and dozens of other tropical fruits.

It is indeed an amazing and delicious fruit.  Besides eating it with a spoon, I also love making all kinds of drinks with it.    I posted “Iced Tea with Passion Fruit and Berries ” before.  And we are making passion fruit and lemon water today. 

Ingredients：

2 passion fruits
1/4 lemon, thinly sliced
3 to 5 teaspoons honey （adjust the amount according to passion fruits’ tartness and personal taste）
2 cups of mineral water
ice cubes

Directions：

Cut the passion fruits open in the center.  Scoop out the flesh and add it to two glasses, along with thinly sliced lemon and honey.

Add half mineral water.  Stir with a spoon until honey dissolves.  Add ice cubes and remaining mineral water.

Isn’t it easy and simple? 

You will have 2 wonderful and amazing delicious drinks in less than 2 minutes!

Passion fruits’ taste and flavor are delicate and refreshing, which makes it the perfect drink for summer. 

If you like tea, just replace mineral water with black tea.  It is very tasty too!

Fire Grilled Pork Belly and Beef Short Ribs

中文菜谱：

烧烤牛仔骨与五花肉

Fire grilled is food is one of my biggest additions O(∩_∩)O~   It is also my guilty pleasure as well as comfort food.

On the top of my grilling list are beef short ribs, steaks and pork belly.  They all have something in common.  They are high in fat and loaded with rich meaty flavors.  When grilled with as simple seasonings as sea salt and black pepper, you still get that amazing meaty and a bit of smoky flavors.

For grilled beef short ribs：

1 package of sliced beef short ribs (weighs about 1 and 1/2 lbs)
freshly ground black pepper
sea salt to taste
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped
1/4 teaspoon sugar

For grilled pork belly：

1 package of thick cut pork belly (weighs about 1 lb)
1 to 2 tablespoons rice cooking wine
1 teaspoon oyster sauce
1/4 teaspoon sugar
2 to 3 tablespoons soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced
freshly ground black pepper
sea salt to taste

Directions：

Rinse the short ribs and pork belly under running water.  Pat dry with kitchen paper towel.

Thick cut pork belly with ribs is usually available in Asian grocery stores.

Add beef short ribs and seasonings to a medium bowl.  Mix with hand or a wooden spoon.

Cut pork belly into smaller pieces and mix them with seasonings too.

Preheat the grill to 425F/218C

Add beef short ribs and pork belly

Pork belly is very high in fat and there will be a lot of greasy drippings.  So don’t go away when you are grilling pork belly.  It gets burnt pretty quickly if you don’t keep a close eye on the grill.

Pork belly pieces are sizzling on the grill and color turns gold brown.

Meanwhile, beef short ribs are looking good too

Grab a cold beer, pull up a chair and let’s eat! O(∩_∩)O~

Grilled Beef Tendon

中文菜谱：

烤牛筋串

Beef tendon is a rare ingredient in American grocery market.  But it is quite popular in Asian market for its unique texture.  Beef tendon has very tough tissue.  Maybe that is why it is underappreciated in American market.  After a long simmering/ cooking time, it becomes tender, gelatinous, still a bit chewy, with a mild beefy flavor.  We put it in broths, noodle soups, porridges, stir-fries, even meatballs. 

It is only until very recently that I discovered it tastes excellent even grilled! Wow! I am telling everyone I know that how good it is.  And I am going to show you a great way to grill beef tendon.

Ingredients：

2 large pieces of beef tendon (weighs between 1 1/2 to 2 lbs)
1 to 2 tablespoons rice cooking wine
1 large piece of ginger root, smashed
1 spice & herb bag
water for cleaning and cooking
salt to taste

Ingredients for spice & herb bag：

3 to 4 star anises
1 teaspoon Sichuan pepper corns
1 black cardamom pod, smashed
4 to 5 cloves
3 to 4 bay leaves
1 teaspoon dried ginger
a handful of dried red chili peppers, cut into pieces

Directions：

Add star anises, Sichuan peppercorns, cardamom, dried ginger, cloves, bay leaves, chili peppers to a piece of coffee filter paper.  Wrap and tie it up to be a spice bag.

Rinse the beef tendon.  Trim off any excessive fat if necessary.

Add beef tendon along with water, ginger, rice cooking wine, spice bag and salt to an instant pot pressure cooker.  Cook with high pressure setting for 40 to 50 minutes.  Beef tendon is become tender but still pretty chewy and al-dente which I like very much after 40 minutes’ cooking.  If you prefer softer texture, just cook 5 to 10 minutes longer.

Refrigerate beef tendon until completely chilled.  With a sharp knife, cut into half inch cubes.

Skewed with stainless steel skewers

Preheat the grill to 400F/204C

Brush both the griddle and beef tendon skewers with oil. And then add the skewered beef tendon to grill.

Remember to brush them with oil from time to time.  Otherwise the skewed tendon could be quite sticky to the griddle.

Brush with your favorite BBQ sauce too.

Soon, they would be golden brown.

Sprinkle with a mixture of crushed chili pepper, cumin and sesame seeds

Sprinkle with a little bit more spices before serving. 

Bon appetite! O(∩_∩)O~