Stardew Valley #39: Ice Cream

Ingredients: Milk, Sugar

Item Description: It's hard to find someone who doesn't like this.

Got some serious ambitions for this one. I have an ice cream maker, you see. And they want 3 different scoops, I want to try and make 3 different scoops.

Let's start with the most... normal one? Ive got some leftover strawberry essence, raspberry syrup, and then some double cream and sugar. 

In it all goes, the syrup will be slightly sweet already but i think this one will still need extra sugar.

It's also only gently pink, so ive got a little extra food colouring to top that up.

I thought it might need some extra heating to dissolve the sugar or something, but I dunno if that was really necessary. Well its done now.

Once its cooled it goes in the ice cream maker to churn. Gotta be quick!

That actually looks like its churned and cooled quite well. Now to pop it in the freezer and hope it doesnt go rock hard.

Next one! the ice cream maker needs cleaning, drying and re-freezing between rounds so im just doing one of these a day. This ideas a funky one, i thought itd be fun to make an avocado and lime flavour.

Im just shoving it all together in a blender, hey look the avocado has made a big air pocket! Not for long. The avocado will make up for some of the creamyness I guess, so we should need less cream..?

Another secret weapon! To enhance the green-ness im adding a touch of spirulina powder! Earthy! Im also going to try not cooking this one, surely the blender has mixed the sugar in enough?

This ones gone really well! it looks good to go already.. and tasting a little bit... it tastes so good! Hope it freezes ok.

And the last ones a white ice cream. But im too weird for vanilla, you can get that anywhere... i want to try making yogurt and honey ice cream.

At least this ones straightforward! Yogurt. honey. mix it up.

Well this ones not looking churned like the others. But it's not cream. Frogurt is still a thing so surely... itll just... work out...?

Alright moment of truth! Or rather, we'll make this work some way or another. The cream ones are a little stiff, and the yogurt one looks positively unscoopable. I'll leave them out for a few minutes and then we'll just hack our way through.

****

It was extremely annoying to get these 3 dry bitch scoops to stay stacked on a cheapass kiddy cone and balance them with 1 hand while unlocking my phone and taking a photo with the other. I'm annoyed, but at least I have ice cream. I wish I had a better sense of like, what temp to keep my freezer at, how to balance proportions with new flavours, good scoop technique, etc etc. I'd rather just buy ice cream if im gonna have to fit it in a cone instead of just eat it out of a tub same day. But damn look at it... now that its all done, it looks kinda good right?

Flavour wise its good! The pink and green are so creamy and fruity, and the white is quite sour, which complements the fruits very nicely. I think my favourite is the avocado lime. It's buttery, refreshing and adventurous. 

Next time... i should make this in summer and not the middle of winter. ._.

Stardew Valley #38: Rice Pudding

Ingredients: Milk, Sugar, Rice

Item Description: It's creamy, sweet, and fun to eat.

I think I tried rice pudding once as a kid, I didn't like it. But that was a long long time ago. Since then i've become a big fan of the worlds staplest grain. Donburi, pilaf, paella, risotto, egg fried rice, rice crackers, mochi... LOVE the stuff! Can't get enough! Is there anything rice can't do? Let's find out.

We got the real deal proper stuff: some british short grain pudding rice, sugar, and then a bay leaf and nutmeg for a subtle flavour.

Now we're cooking it all in milk instead of water! A good bit more milk than how much water i'd normally add, as its supposed to come out all soft and mushy.

Then its gotta check for... lemme ask the internet... TWO HOURS!? Wow. This is a perfect job for my steamer though. We can stir it halfway through since it only goes up to an hour.

2 hours later, stirred it up to check, and that looks right to me? It looks great, all saturated and creamy. Puddingy.

**

It's creamy, sweet, and not much of a treat. I tipped back out about 2/3 of what i portioned for the photo (back into the bowl for leftovers not in the bin!) because i just wanted a light dessert. After just a couple mouthfuls I already feel kind of nauseous. Was my dinner bigger than i realised? Did I do something wrong? (feel free to let me know!) Or is there just something about this combination of overcooked milk and mushy rice... ? Maybe kid me was right... maybe rice pudding... against all odds..  just kind of sucks.

Stardew Valley #37: Eggplant Parmesan

Ingredients: Eggplant, Tomato

Item Description: Tangy, cheesy, and wonderful.

Eggplant! Tomato! I think we need more than that actually. I've never made parmesan anything before so I looked it up. Seems like you need flour, egg and breadcrumbs to crumb it up, a tomato based sauce and some kind of cheese combination. Yknow, hence, parmesan.

Chopped the eggplant into nice burger-sized discs. PS its called an aubergine here in the uk. One recipe reccommended to salt it and then let it air dry for a while, but too late I want to make dinner soon so im gonna just pop it in the oven while it preheats for a bit.

Next we coat it in flour. Sorry i took this photo sideways so it looks all weird I don't know why I did that.

Then we dip it in egg and coat it in crumbs! I dont think ill get much to stick to the skin of the eggplant. I don't think that will matter though.

Now we need to fry these up crisp i guess!? Bit of olive oil drizzled on it to help. I've got some flavoured olive oil but do what you want.

Now we can prepare the cheese! I've chosen mozzarella and "parmesan" ok its grana padano, SORRY ITS LIKE £2 CHEAPER AND I LITERALLY DONT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE THEY TASTE THE SAME

Cooked enough!? I decided to transfer these to a casserole dish, which I could have used this whole time but I didn't think very hard. A casserole dish will be better for when we GET SLOPPY

Alright first we have mozzarella slices and then im gonna season it with garlic powder and oregano.

Then tomato sauce. I actually bought a second tomato based pasta sauce in case I was too low on passata, but I think I had plenty so ive just used that, a splash of balsamic vinegar, and PLENTY of grated PARMESAN-LIKE ITALIAN HARD CHEESE. Then we shove it back in the oven and bake it for 15-20mins until the cheese is... well you know..

Ohhhh yeah thats the look. Shes got the look.

*****

Hard to go wrong with a massive pile of cheese and tomato sauce! The mozzarella was soooooo insanely stringy like a cartoon pizza. The flavours were great. I kinda don't really see the point in breading the eggplant though...? Maybe i didn't dry the vegetables enough but the wetness of both the eggplant and the tomato sauce made the breadcrumb coating decidedly un-crispy so you'd barely notice it was there. I feel like we could have just skipped that part and literally just sauced up some vegetables.

It's like a chicago pizza pie crossed with a moussaka.

Stardew Valley #36: Red Plate

Ingredients: Red Cabbage, Radish

Item Description: Full of antioxidants.

Got (hopefully enough) leftover shredded red cabbage in my freezer, plenty of radishes, and a few other things! I thought some pomegranate seeds would add a burst of sweetness with each bite and they're also very red and antioxidant rich.

To differentiate this from all the coleslaws I thought it'd be nice to do something hot and make a sautee'd cabbage dish. I'm also cooking it with butter, I really like how that goes with cruciferous vegetables.

We'll dump in the cabbage and leave that to cook from frozen for a bit, while thats cooking I chop some radishes, eh just as many as I feel like..

Now to add some seasoning! I just picked some herbs based entirely on vibes, so we're adding parsley, sage, thyme, salt, pepper, and a splash of cider vinegar to add some crisp fruity and sour flavour!

In they all go, fry fry fry

At the very tippy end we can dump in pomegranate, maybe it can get a bit seared but we don't really wanna cook it i guess.

****

Really nice! A very sweet and sour salad, but light enough that the herbs really make a difference. Heavily red-themed but still a pleasantly balanced flavour. Would be a great side dish for a roast dinner.

Stardew Valley #35: Tortilla

Ingredients: Corn

Item Description: Can be used as a vessel for food or eaten by itself.

So when they say you need corn for this recipe, what you really need is a big bag of masa harina. And like, i probably could order some from a specialty store...? Or I could just find some corn tortillas in the big tesco which I did.

 

This wont be completely cooking-free, as a good tortilla should really be toasted a lil' bit 

**

Hmm I mean its edible on its own, but its very plain if you ask me. I guess a homemade one might have been better to eat on its own.. BUT IT SAYS I CAN USE IT AS A VESSEL FOR FOOD IN THE DESCRIPTION

SO I actually had it with some leftover homemade doner kebab instead. Better!

Stardew Valley #34: Maki Roll

Ingredients: Any Fish, Seaweed, Rice

Item Description: Fish and rice wrapped in seaweed.

Right off the back of the sashimi recipe, lets get these rolled while the fish is still fresh. I've got some steamed and cooled sushi rice, and i'm gonna season it with a little bit of salt, sugar, rice vinegar and sake. 

then just fluff that up, mixing it a bit.

For the filling we're slicing up half an avocado, the rest of the raw salmon, and some cucumber into matchsticks.

And of course the seaweed! And a handy little bamboo roller that supposedly helps you roll it tightly.

You put the rice on first, and the topping in the middle, I think leaving a bit of a gap for the seaweed to overlap... I dunno I don't make these often enough to have a good feel for it.

One big log. Cutting it can be a bit of a challenge, depending on how sharp your knife is. Making sure the seaweed is damp enough to stick to the rice really helps, and then try to glide the blade diagonally so you are slicing and not crushing, that's my tip I guess. Let's see how well it works out for me.

****

Fresh and delicious! But, having these right after the previous recipe (same meal btw) I feel like the sashimi was just a bit better. I think I could have seasoned the rice a bit more, used a bit more sugar and vinegar, since with the soy sauce it was a little bitter. Very nice and I love sushi, but let's leave it room for improvement.