November 10, 2009

Fall Back Position

Daylight Savings time is wreaking havoc around here. While I get decent light in my house, there are only a few areas that work for food photography. I spent most of last winter repeating "I need a light box" over and over but of course then we sprung forward and I forgot all about it. Now that we've fallen back again, and I'm working 2 jobs, daytime photo ops have grown scarce Luckily this weekend I had a free afternoon to sneak in a November TWD, Cran-Apple Crisp.
I've never met a fruit crisp or crumble I didn't like and this one was no exception. This recipe is short on work (and dirty dishes), big on deliciousness and halved perfectly to yield 4 small servings in my ramekins. I omitted the dried fruit, reduced the sugar and substituted whole wheat flour for AP because I would be topping them with a scoop of David Lebovitz's outrageously good Cinnamon Ice Cream.

Cran-Apple Crisp is so good it's a serious contender for Thanksgiving. Or Veteran's Day, Sunday night dessert, perhaps tomorrow's breakfast...don't judge.

Cinnamon Ice Cream
adapted from The Perfect Scoop
1 cup 2% or low fat milk
3/4 cup sugar
pinch of salt
3 cinnamon sticks, broken into pieces
2 cups heavy cream
5 large egg yolks

Warm milk, sugar, cinnamon sticks and salt in a medium saucepan then remove from heat, cover and steep one hour.
Pour cream into a large bowl and set aside. Warm up milk again then strain out cinnamon sticks. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs together and slowly pour warm milk into eggs whisking constantly, then pour the warmed yolks back into the saucepan. Stir constantly with a spatula over medium heat until it is thickened and coats the back of the spatula. Strain the custard into the bowl of cream and stir until cool over an ice bath. Refrigerate.
When custard is thoroughly chilled, freeze it in your ice cream maker.

8 comments:

Amanda said...

I've been saving my photos for the next day, dang daylight savings! Your crisp looks great! I'll be making this next week, i made the cookies this week and they were awesome

chocolatechic said...

I am so with you.

This morning I was googling 'homemade light box'.


Your crisp looks wonderful.

Anonymous said...

Your crisp looks wonderful. And i love DL's cinnamon ice cream.

Pamela said...

Cinnamon ice cream sounds like a wonderful addition to this recipe. Looks good!

Anonymous said...

I used vanilla, but the cinnamon ice cream sounds fabulous for this delicious crisp.

Paula said...

I used Greek yogurt instead of ice cream. Thinkin I should put some cinnamon extract in my yogurt after reading your post.

I sympathize with the daylight dilemma. I bought some special lights myself last week that work pretty good.

Jacque said...

LOL, I had this for breakfast so no way I'm judging.

Your crisps look fantastic!

TeaLady said...

Yep!! Need a lite box very badly. Hard to make pics after about 4.

But your pic looks fine and the crisp looks delicious.