Strawberry & Rose Ice-Cream
The strawberries this year are recalcitrant. They have taken one look at the rain and found there no incentive to put on a good showing since Wimbledon will undoubtedly be rained off and so the nation won’t be requiring any strawberries.
As a general rule, the veg patch is usually quite happy about warm rain, growing lush and green and rocketing to jungle-like proportions. But enough is enough and everyone, me included, is in need of some sunshine. The leafy green gang, like spinach, is fine, but anything that fruits – berries, courgettes, beans – needs sun. Without it, they languish and are weak to invaders. And none more so than the strawberries which, stuck in their pinky, half-ripe and damp state, have been beset by tiny black slugs and militant woodlice. As we speak, armies of them are digging neat trenches across the pale flesh of my half-cooked berries. Marauding legions are, this very minute, infiltrating the sodden straw bedding I so hopefully applied, and chomping away at the fruit from underneath.
But all is not lost. Some are surviving the onslaught and a few have even ripened. It is just enough to make some strawberry ice-cream but I have augmented it with a dollop of strawberry jam, a little extra sweetness against the rain.
Strawberry and Rose Ice-Cream
Ingredients
- 250g strawberries
- 600ml double cream
- 397g condensed milk (1 tin)
- 3 tbsp strawberry jam
- 4 drops rose water
- Rose petals, to serve
Instructions
- Hull the strawberries and chop them in half. Put them in a blender and whizz them up to make a puree. Set a sieve over a bowl and tip the puree into the sieve. Press the pulp through the mesh so you are left with a seed-free sauce in the bowl.
- In another bowl, whisk the double cream and condensed milk until they form soft peaks. Stir in the strawberry sauce, jam and rose water. Check the taste and add more rosewater if you need to. The flavours will be deadened when the mixture is frozen but watch out on the rose because too much will make it taste like a granny’s boudoir.
- Spoon everything into a tub and pop it in the freezer to set for at least 6 hours, but ideally overnight. Allow to thaw for a few minutes before serving, then scoop it into bowls and add a few rose petals for added girliness.
