Roasted Strawberry Ice-cream

I picked 42 lbs of strawberries at Green Truck Farms earlier this week. Granted 10 lbs went to Chef John MacPhearson and his hyper seasonal and really excellent restaurant Three Blacksmiths, and 4 lbs went to friends. That still leaves me 28 lbs. 10 lbs went to jam for the newly formed Jam Club, 12 lbs went to the freezer, and the rest we are eating fresh, in mousse, or ice-cream.

Lately I have been craving ice-creams that are more gelato-like with lots of fruit flavors. So I have toned down the cream in my go-to-Philadelphia style ice-cream, and roasted the strawberries to bring out more flavors. They are very good strawberries, much better than anything you can buy in the store because they were picked ripe and are being used within a few days. Still, they are the “Chandler” variety, one rated for “good” flavor not for “excellent” flavor, for high yield and for vigor, able to resist rain damages. But flavor wise, they are inferior to an EarliGlow or a Rutger’s Scarlet or a Sweet Charlie — all of which are more fragile and therefore harder to find in commercial operations or pick-your-own. So I roasted the Chandler strawberries which concentrates the flavors. It’s a trick that you can use with many other fruit whose flavor is not quite there. But pay attention: if there no flavor to start, roasting WILL NOT HELP!

The recipe has only 4 ingredients: strawberry, cream, sugar & honey. Make sure they are the best you can afford. Do not bother making it with supermarket strawberries. Seriously. Once you have the strawberries, it’s a very straightforward recipe.

Roasted Strawberry Ice-Cream

• 2 quarts ripe local strawberries (1 kg) +/-
• 1/2 cup sugar (100 g)
• 2 Tablespoons honey (30 ml)
• 1 cup (250 ml) heavy cream

1. Wash, hull strawberries and spread in a non-reactive baking dish. Cook in a 250F (120C) oven for 1.5 to 2 hrs. They will be very soft, dull red and will have given up some juice. Remove from oven and chill.
2. Puree strawberries and juice in blender until very smooth. Keep 2 1/2 cups (600 ml) for the recipe and save the rest for another use. Add sugar & honey to the 2 1/2 cup strawberry puree in blender, and process until sugar is well incorporated. Add cream and blend until just mixed.
3. Process in ice-cream maker.
4. Enjoy

Yields about 1 quart ice-cream