ice ice baby

The newest addition in my tiny, but well equipped, kitchen - an ice cream maker. And it's already a love-love relationship :) The first try was pomegranate flavoured frozen yogurt, which turned out amazingly delicate, then followed by raspberry frozen yogurt with chocolate chips. Then I tasted licorice ice cream at a farm market, just had to try it out. My first attempt was made with egg yokes, whipped cream, caster sugar and tons of licorice powder and lemon zest added as a twist. The taste was spot on, but the texture wasn't quite what I had hoped for - but then today I got it right, I made gelato, the Italian ice cream which is my all time favourite. It was surprisingly easy. I made it with tree different flavours: coffee, vanilla and licorice, and it turned out absolutely fantastic :) I used a recipe from www.iselsker.dk for a basic gelato, and then I added the flavours by using measurements from other types of ice cream, and tasting of cause :)

Gelato - base

2 dl cream (38%)
4 dl milk (1,5 %)
4 egg yolks
100 g caster sugar
a pinch of salt


Whisk the egg yolks and sugar into a light and fluffy egg nog (takes about 2 min.).

Pour milk and cream into a pot and heat up to just before boiling, 85°c (small bubbles will occur along the edge) and put the pot aside.

Add 1/3 of the milk/cream mix to the egg nog while whisking. Pour this mixture back into the pot and heat this up slowly until it thickens (max. 85°c) To prevent lumps in the ice cream, sift the mixture before leaving it to cool down. To draw flavour leave it to cool for at least four hours before using your ice cream maker to make the best gelato.

This is a gelato base, so experiment with your favourite flavours :)

I made these :

Liquorice: 25 g of raw liquorice powder, 25 g of crushed liquorice drops.

Vanilla: (½ a portion of gelato base) 1 vanilla pod - seeds and the empty pod. Its a good idea to put these ingredients in, before the second heating.

Coffee:  (½ a portion of gelato base)10-20 g of instant coffee powder - dissolved in a little warm milk, the amount of coffee depends on the strength of the powder, so try as you go along.

a flower headband

I crocheted this headband for my 'niece' for her 5 year birthday. I never learnt to crochet, but I've decided to let youtube help me, so thanks to all the people uploading videos showing and telling what to do :) I just made a lot of different looking flowers, some from the videos, and some from my own imagination as I got the hang of the techniques. I made a narrow band, with a wider piece where the flowers are attached. It was really easy, it didn't take long, even to a rookie and it brought a lot of smiles and happiness along, she really liked it :)

three coloured scarf

Phew - finally done, started this project just after Christmas, and have been working on it on and off for months. But am really satisfied with it - love the colours and yarn, got two of them from my moms stash, she didn't know what to make of it, so she passed it on to me :) It looks complicated, but is really easy, it only took a long time cos its thin and I had to continuously untangle the yarns, cos they cross while knitting the pattern. I knitted from what my mom told me, but later I found the recipe on www.knittingfool.com under T - tricolor fabric, and it looks as if its the same. Now I just have to find out what to do with it, cos even though I love the colours, I can't wear them myself - wonder who around me deserves a little extra appreciation :)

with flash - colder