Lychee

Rating: ****
Nickname: A Remedy of Lychees

This is a flavor that's been on my "to-try" list for a while now, though I can't remember what the original inspiration was. Mountain View Market on Castro St. carries canned lychees, though, so I finally got some of those and made this recipe from ma'ona. It's pretty good, though I think I actually prefer the straight ice cream part, since the fruit is kind of chewy, even when diced up small. Also, once it's fully frozen, the ice cream is kind of flaky, and harder to scoop out. I'm thinking that might be because there's less dairy and so much of the lychee syrup in it. But still, if you like lychees, it's pretty tasty, and that's the main thing.

[Note: I hear "lychee" pronounced different ways, but I like to say "lee-chee," for better punning with "leeches."]

Nutella and Chocolate

Rating: ****

It's been an entire month since I last made ice cream, which is far too long for summertime. And Sunday was even National Ice Cream Day, but I guess I didn't miss that by too much. I made this ice cream last night for Lacey's last California dinner party before she moves away.

For the basic nutella part, I just used this recipe from Carrie's Sweet Life. Then I smashed up a 4 oz. bar of bittersweet chocolate with a hammer and threw it in at the end. Pretty simple, and pretty tasty.

It did come out exceedingly sweet, though, so next time I'd use less sugar. 3/4 of a cup is plenty on its own for a batch of ice cream, then the nutella itself is also very sweet, so together they were a bit much. Luckily, the bittersweet chocolate was a good contrast. I might even put in a bit more of that.

Another nice variation, if you like nuts, might be to add chopped hazelnuts as well as chocolate.