Saturday, April 2, 2011

Introducing: AMH Cooks !

I'm excited! The votes are in from the poll last month and the winner for the new regular feature here at AMH is for me to share a favorite weekly recipe! YEAH!! I think the hardest part is going to be deciding which one to share each week. LOL. For your convenience, I created another page tab that you can see below the blog title up above, called "AMH Cooks" and on that page I will keep a list of all the recipes shared here. Sort of a virtual cookbook.
I had a hard time deciding what recipe to share first and my OCD wanted to share an appetizer first so that my entries were in order. However, I finally decided on a cream sauce recipe for my brother in law Stephen who specifically requested it last weekend. It is very similar to the Ruth Chris Steakhouse recipe, or so I've been told. I've never personally tried their version so you will have to let me know.
Since Spring is finally here...or at least making an attempted appearance, this is really good to create a warm weather dessert.

(* Please note: I'm licensed in food prep safety so you'll occasionally see me take some steps that you may feel are not necessary for your home or personal use and that's totally ok. I'll make the text color for those steps red so you can feel free to skip them. If you are going to make something for a large group of people though, it might be wise to follow them to prevent the possibility of illness.)

Cream Sauce for Fruit

Ingredients:
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup sugar (divided)
10 egg yolks
1/3 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:
Place cream and 1/2 cup of sugar in a saucepan on the stove. Mix well and heat until it starts to boil. (Be careful not to boil over.)
In a stainless steel bowl, mix egg yolks (You will not need the egg whites for this recipe.), 1/2 cup of sugar and vanilla until well blended and sugar is completely dissolved. Whisk simmering cream into egg mixture.
Transfer mixture to top half of stainless steel double boiler. Cook for 8 - 12 minutes on low to medium heat, (Temperature should reach between 165 -175 degrees F, use a candy thermometer to check. ) until sauce thickens and coats the back of the spatula, stir constantly.
Use the spatula to pull the sauce away from the sides and fold it back into the center of the pan. Remove from heat. Filter through a chinoise ( to remove any small lumps) and into a Tupperware container. Place a Ziploc bag filled with ice cubes into the sauce, and put the container into an ice bath to quickly cool it. When completely cool, remove the container from the ice bath, remove the bag of ice from the container and place the covered container in the refrigerator until time to serve.

To Serve: Pour over a dish of fresh fruit. (Strawberries, Raspberries, Blackberries or even Peaches are EXCELLENT with this!)  Add garnish (mint leaves are nice).

Variation: After the sauce has cooled, you can whip in (Be careful not to exceed ¼ cup) whiskey, brandy or rum to make a more interesting flavor.
Thanks for voting and let me know what you think! :)