Eight recipes from The Atlantic's food blog

My wonderful food-nerd friend Liz sent me this Menu from the Atlantic Monthly's food blog.  After a quick browse, the most promising of the recipes seems to be the creme brulee ice cream with pineapple shortcake.  That said, this dish reminds me of something one would have seen in a fancy New York restaurant in the late 1990s.

The ice cream and topping are so good that you don't even need to agonize over the short cake. I often use pre-made short cakes from the grocery or I bake a sheet cake and cut into three-inch rounds. You can also purchase a pound cake or use a sweet biscuits as a short cake.

Crème Brulee Ice Cream

Makes 1 quart
    • 2 cups sugar
    • 1 pint heavy cream
    • 8 egg yolks
    • 1 ½ cups half and half cream
    • 2 tablespoons vanilla extract (The better quality your vanilla, the better your ice cream.)

Put sugar into heavy skillet and caramelize. Use a heavy duty pot holder to hold the handle of the skillet so you do not burn yourself. Tilt the skillet to evenly brown the sugar. When the sugar is dark brown, but not burned. Immediately add the cream. This will stop the sugar from burning. Cook until all the sugar has dissolved.

Beat the egg yolk with the half & half and vanilla.

Place the egg mixture over a double boiler and begin to heat. Slowly add in the sugar & cream mixture. Stir with a wire whisk.

Cook your custard mixture over medium heat for about 12 minutes until it will coat a wooden spoon.

Pour into another bowl and refrigerate. The custard should be completely cooled before you put it into the ice cream maker.

Follow your ice cream maker's directions and freeze.

Pineapple Topping

    • 1 fresh pineapple
    • ¼ pound butter
    • 2 cup brown sugar
    • 1 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
    • 1 tablespoons fresh orange juice
    • 1 teaspoons orange zest
    • 3 tablespoons dark rum

In large sauté pan, over medium heat, melt butter, then add brown sugar.

Add lemon juice, orange juice, and orange zest (if you don't have a zester you can finely grate the orange peel). Continue to cook until brown sugar has cooked to a syrup.

Peel and core pineapple, then cut length-wise, then in thirds. You want the pieces to be about two inches each. Add pineapple to brown sugar syrup in the pan.

Add the rum and cinnamon. Heat for just about two minutes You want the pineapple to remain firm.

Spoon warm pineapple in rum-flavored syrup over short cake. Then top with crème brulee ice cream.