The human ice cream maker Part 1

A write this as I watch James Martin's last Saturday Kitchen.  A claim to fame I have is that I was on this show with my best friend, Sarah Benton many moons ago.  My then boyfriend, now husband, mocked me mercilessly for flirting with James Martin.  My friend and I ate and drunk so much that we rolled out of the studio came home, cooked a massive fry up  (in butter James would have been proud) and promptly carried on drinking.  A super happy day and a super happy memory.  Saturday Kitchen was my pre children hangover cure.  I have cooked so many dishes from the show and tried many of the wines and it always inspired my Saturday food shop.  Sarah is also the person who has and continues to inspire my cooking, not least with the inspiration and support for this wee blog.  So thank you! 

Right, enough gushing and reminiscing, back to the cooking! Although, this recipe is a homage to James Martin and Butter.  A browned butter, rosemary and honey frozen yoghurt. So, this is a catch up recipe and I have informed you I will not be buying a ice cream machine, I will be the said machine.  I think the effects are better in a machine, a smoother finished product but it is not half bad without one.  You may recall I made Nigel's lemon sorbet without one which was a lovely tart treat.

So on to the frozen yo-gurt (said with a full on American tang much to my guests distaste!).  This is a March 5 recipe and on pages 76 - 79 of Nigel's book, A Year of Good Eating, the Kitchen Diaries Vol III.  Picture here:

The recipe starts with a whole pack of butter (I told you James would love this).  Butter with rosemary and the smell is amazing!  I chose unsalted butter as I was not sure if my toddler would eat this but I think salted butter would also work well and take on that current trend of salt and sweet.

 

This is another wonderful simple dish of pulling the ingredients together.  I am not actually looking forward to this as I am not a fan of natural yoghurt.  I think it tastes like gone off milk but there are some big flavours here which I am hoping will overpower the taste of sour milk.

As I am without an ice cream maker, you need to remember to keep stirring, about every half an hour.  I was actually rubbish at remembering so perhaps set an alarm to go off to remind you.  Really give it a good stir round.  Here are a couple of my attempts. Hope you can see the texture in the pic:

The finished results I served in bright summery cups.  With the advent of spring it does feel like summer is around the corner and this is a great summer recipe.  The taste of this dish is delicious.  You get the freshness of the yoghurt but with the richness of the butter, the sweetness of honey and the earthy flavour of the rosemary.  A really grown up frozen yo-gurt indeed, with a wonderful crunch of flaked almonds.  The texture was a little grainy, which I am not sure if was because of the lack of ice cream maker but it certainly did not ruin the dish.  Anyways, the finished product here:

JanieCooksNigel

26/3/16