Every once in awhile, the NyonyaCelup gets a lil’ grandiose and thinks that she possesses the cooking & presentation skills of a fine chef.

It also doesn’t help that she stumbles onto blogs such as Mr. & Mrs. Eat A Duck’s — with their mouth-watering food & picture perfect photography — from time to time.

So it was only natural, when I decided to make about a dozen or so panna cottas earlier this week, that I’d look to them for inspiration
& attempt something that required less culinary skill, but equally stunning (visually).

The result were, predictably, disastrous.

What went wrong?
You mean, besides my apparent lack of spatial awareness…
How do I even begin?!

Not content to scoop my ice cream out normally, I decided to give quenelle-ing a try.
Chef Patrick Fahy (then from Blackbird, Chicago) made it look so easy in this video — made possible by Leela of SheSimmers — so I thought to myself: Piece of cake!

It was a misadventure from its inception.
The tubs and tubs and tubs of homemade vanilla ice cream — courtesy of 6 batches of (failed and successful) macarons, 1 batch of meringue cookies, and a pavlova — which had been lying in my fridge, had mysteriously disappeared when I needed them most.
The Baba denies all culpability. 

Left with only RM5 amongst ourselves, we set out to buy the smallest and the cheapest tub of ice cream.

I could blame the fact that it was a cheap tub of ice cream
— and I am more determined than ever to never eat any of that synthetically flavoured *yuck* ever again —
or the fact that Malaysia seems to have turned into a giant oven of late;
but my quenelles just wouldn’t stay in shape.
Not that they were very well formed to begin with. 😦

But on a brighter note, my panna cotta turned out exceptionally well.

As did the raspberry purée.

Regardless of how badly the ensemble turned out, I will be posting the individual recipes for this dessert,
vanilla ice cream included; because nobody should be subjected to the crap that is synthetic vanilla ice cream.
It just tastes so wrong.

Vanilla Ice Cream

I’ve posted this recipe before here;
but it was written at a time before I had easy access to vanilla pods, using synthetic vanilla essence as a substitute.
I was desperate!
I think it’s time we made it with the real thing, don’t you? 😉 

Ingredients

♣ 6 (large) egg yolks
– I usually separate them in the egg shells.
Takes a bit of practice, but I get better results compared to those plastic egg separator thingamajigs.
Use of two separate bowls: one to separate, and the other to store the whites in.
♣ 750 ml of whipping cream
– Geek note → As I have previously mentioned, the complex flavour of vanilla is made out of 200+ aromatic compounds.
These organic compounds extract best in fat / alcohol.
So don’t skimp on the fat content for your cream. 😉
♣ 70 g of vanilla sugar
– Castor sugar that you’ve buried used / new pods in.
In its absence, plain ole’ castor sugar will do, intensity in flavour is almost negligible.
♣ 1 vanilla pod
♣ 2 tbsp natural vanilla extract

Instructions

♦ Pour cream into a bowl.
♦ Split vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape caviar out.
♦ Add both to cream and place in fridge for 1 hour.
Purpose is to allow maximal infusion of the vanilla compounds into the cream.
♦ Once ready, pour eggs, sugar, and vanilla essence into a bowl and mix thoroughly till all the sugar is dissolved.
♦ Add the cream in bit by bit, all the while continuing to mix the mixture (see what I meant by making your job easier).
♦ Once you’ve reached a custard-y consistency, fish vanilla pod out.
♦ Pour mixture into a container and freeze overnight.

Prep time: 1 hr 15 mins
Freeze time: I usually leave it overnight
Makes: 750-800 ml

Vanilla Panna Cotta

Adapted from David Lebovitz, who in turn adapted it from Judy Witts.

Ingredients

♣ 500 ml heavy cream
– In Malaysia, I am aware that this can be difficult.
As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, whipping cream — with its fat content of 33.5-35% — is acceptable,
but I personally use Pritchitt’s Milac Dairy Whipping Cream with 38% fat. 
♣ 40 g vanilla sugar
♣ 1 vanilla pod
♣ 2 tsps powdered gelatin
♣ 45 ml cold water

Instructions

♦ Heat cream and sugar in a heavy saucepan over a low flame till edges bubble. Remove.
♦ Split vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape caviar out.
♦ Add both to cream mixture, cover, & allow to infuse for 30 mins.
♦ Oil your panna cotta moulds with a neutral tasting oil. Yes, olive oil is out. 
If opting to serve from the containers — like I did — skip this step.
♦ Pour cold water into a bowl — bigger the better for a larger surface area — and sprinkle gelatin onto surface.
Stand for 10 mins.
♦ Add to warm cream mixture and stir till all the gelatin is dissolved.
I had to rewarm my cream slightly.
♦  Pour into moulds and refrigerate for 4 hours.

Prep time: 45 mins
Chill time: 4 hours
Makes: 9 100cc dessert cups

Raspberry Purée

Adapted from Wolfgang Puck‘s recipe.

Ingredients

♣ 1 1/2 cup frozen raspberries
– If you can find fresh raspberries in Malaysia, power to you.
♣ juice from 1/2 a lemon
– Heads up, I like mine a lil’ sour.
 ♣ sugar to taste

Instructions

♦ Place raspberries in a (preferably) glass saucepan.
Stainless steel is ok, but I still think it imparts a metallic taste to the final product, IMHO.
♦ Heat over low flame till berries have reduced into a juicy mush.
♦ Add lemon juice.
♦ Stir sugar in and remove from flame.
♦ Once cooled slightly, strain through a medium sieve (I like having some seeds in mine) to remove seeds,
making sure to extract as much of the purée as possible.
♦ Chill for 2 hours.

Prep time: 15 mins
Chill time: 2 hours
Makes: Covers 9 100cc dessert cups generously

Once you’ve got all your individual dishes ready, you can assemble them and serve.
And since I’m an exceptionally bad presenter, I’m sure you’ll do a much better job.

And in case you were wondering…

Ciao!