This is a recipe review, which means this is a recipe that I did not personally come up with, but that I tried out and am giving my opinion on how the recipe turned out. For legal reasons I cannot post these recipes, but I can tell you where you can get them yourself.
Recently, I did a post on the King of Spices - the Peppercorn. One of my goals has been to come up with something on the website for each different type. While reading through the book "Making Artisan Gelato" by Torrance Kopfer, I found a recipe for Pink Peppercorn gelato. I never dreamed of using them to make a dessert. If you have read my post on the peppercorn, you would know that the pink peppercorn is first off not a true peppercorn and secondly, it is a berry. So even thought it smells like a peppercorn when you crack it, the taste is more berry like. It reminds of lingonberries (which you can get at IKEA stores), but without the tartness.
So I got all my ingredients together, and made the gelato. You can get the full recipe in the Making Artisan Gelato book, which is available on Amazon or check your local library. Here are my notes describing my experience with this recipe.
1. Make sure you crush your peppercorns good. I found that the flavor when it was ready to go in the fridge wasn't strong enough. You want almost too strong of a flavor before churning it. I allowed some peppercorns to remain in the mixture until I was ready to churn, and then I strain them all out.
2. My mixture was off-white when it was ready to go into the fridge. So I decided to add just a bit of red food coloring to make the color a little pink. It doesn't affect the flavor, but I think if something looks better to our eyes, we can trick our tongues into thinking it tastes better.
3. I used a Cuisinart ice cream maker for this gelato.
4. I ate mine fresh out of the machine when it was done. I think if you are going to make gelato at home, then it's at it's best right out of the machine. When I make ice cream, I put that in the freezer to harden for a couple hours. If you don't know the difference between ice cream and gelato, check out the earlier post explaining it. My leftovers ended up in the freezer.
5. I didn't use any vanilla extract as I was all out. Also, I think in some ice cream/gelato flavors that I have made the vanilla overpowered the flavor it was suppose to be.
Overall, I think this is a good recipe. The flavor was good and unique. I am sure your guests would be intrigued to try this. The recipe was easy to follow, especially for someone who has been making ice cream for a while now.
Recipe Grade: B+
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