Nectarine and Cardamom Ice Cream

So I'm pretty much making ice cream every weekend now. I'm so glad because I thought my ice cream machine might be one of those appliances that gets lost in the dark depths of the kitchen cupboards, never to be seen again. But no, the results are always so delicious and I guess the hot weather plays its part too.

All the beautiful Summer fruits are in stores now, which gets me so excited! One of my favourites is nectarines. I love peaches, but I squirm just at the thought of that furry skin! The tartness of the nectarines actually make this ice cream taste more like a frozen yoghurt, which was a lovely surprise. I paired it with cardamom and a coconut milk base for a very refreshing frosty dessert.

Ingredients:

1 can light coconut milk
5 nectarines
10 cardamom pods
3 tbs xylitol or vegan friendly sugar

Remove the pip from the nectarines and chop roughly. Extract the seeds from the cardamom pods. I use a pair of scissors to cut the pod length ways and then push the seeds out of each half. Place the coconut milk, cardamom seeds, nectarine flesh and sweetener in a blender and blend til smooth.

Churn for about 20 minutes if you have an ice cream machine. Alternatively, place in a container in the freezer and stir every hour until reaching the desired consistency.

I found that this ice cream froze quite solid (I think it is because it doesn't contain much fat) though it was still okay to scoop because I churned it. As a solution, you could use this recipe in popsicle molds instead.

Enjoy and have fun! xxx

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Creamy Zucchini Pesto Pasta

I have always been a creamy pasta person, which is very dangerous. Thankfully I'm not in the habit of cooking pasta very often, but when I do, I like to make it rich and very garlicky.

Yesterday, I had a kilogram of zucchini that needed to be eaten in a hurry. I decided to create a creamy pesto-ish sauce by roasting the marrows with garlic, and blending them with non-dairy cream and basil. It worked a charm!

I topped the saucy pasta with roast brown mushrooms, fresh baby plum tomatoes and toasted seeds. The tomato gives a nice acidic contrast to the creaminess.

Ingredients:

+- 350g wholewheat pasta
1 whole bulb garlic
1kg zucchini, cleaned
2-3 tbs olive oil
250 ml Orley Whip unsweetened non-dairy cream
8-12 brown mushrooms
20g fresh basil
20-24 baby plum tomatoes
Himalayan salt
Black pepper
2 tbs sunflower seeds
2 tbs pumpkin seeds

Pre-heat your oven (top element only) to 250 degrees C, and start boiling your pasta as per the packaging instructions. Chop the zucchini into 1 inch thick medallions and place evenly on a large oven tray. Chop just the top of the garlic bulb off and place on the tray, along with the brown mushrooms. Drizzle olive oil over all of the vegetables, add a generous sprinkling of salt and pepper and toss with your hands so that everything is coated. Place under the grill for about 10 minutes. When the tops of the zucchini are starting to blacken, turn them over. Also turn the garlic and mushrooms over (the garlic should be open side down). Continue to grill until the other side of the zucchini begins to blacken.

Place the grilled zucchini, basil and cream in a medium bowl. Once the garlic is cool enough to handle, pop each clove out of the skin and into the bowl. Pulse all the ingredients with a stick blender so they are combined, but not completely smooth. You want to retain some texture. The zucchini is naturally sweet, so you may want to add some more salt and pepper to the sauce.

Mix the sauce into the pot of drained pasta. Toast the seeds in a dry pan on high heat until golden. Serve the pasta with sliced fresh tomatoes and top with toasted seeds, two or three mushrooms and a sprig of fresh basil.


Makes four large servings.