March Dinner Party Menu

March Entrance and Exit

Menu for 3/3/2012

Mushroom Crostini

Endive with Red Bell Pepper Salsa

Olives

Boeuf Bourguignon

Buttered Noodles

Green Beans with Walnuts

Mocha Rum Cake

Vanilla Ice Cream

Wine

Beer

Coffee

etc.

So good we nearly fainted

Chocolate Ice Cream To Die For

Last week, I wrote a post about the ice cream maker crapping out at a bad moment and the emergency trip to Williams-Sonoma for a new one.
After a proper time to chill the bowl (much less than the previous bowl, by the way), I poured the custard into the frozen bowl and pressed the "on" switch.  This ice cream maker is about 100 times easier to use the the old one. You pop in the bowl, pop in the top (no weird fitting and twisting and turning and having pieces pop back off again). Pour in the mixture (a nice wide opening, too!) . Let 'er rip.
It's easy to see how the ice cream is doing, i.e., is it ice cream yet?
It was, and quicker than the previous one, too.  Things just got better and better.  I did have to find a container to put it in.  You can't store it in the bowl, and as a veteran saver of "containers," I had an old plastic  half gallon container with a lid from days of yore  that fit the bill.
Froze for 30 hours.  It was so dark and rich looking that well, it screamed for the delicate Orrefors  Illusion crystal dishes. Hand washable, and so fragile that if you look at them cross-eyed, they break.
OMG!  Never tasted anything like this.  Dark and rich and creamy and died-and-gone-to-heaven ice cream.  Worth the custard and the caramel and the hassle of five steps in a half-hour and sweating not to screw up. 
The whole table almost swooned. It was that good.
Tonight, there are two piddly helpings left, and I must remember to photograph.  Gauche to whip out the camera in the middle of a dinner party.  I will definitely be making this again.  Remember, it's in the June issue of Bon Appetit. 
Chocolate Ice Cream
Yowza!