Peach and Honey Milkshake
The first in a series of milkshake posts. Because when you break your jaw, everyone loves wishing you well by granting permission to consume milkshakes in mass quantity, and after three weeks of explaining how important it is for me to eat real food, it’s time to admit it. The milkshakes help get you through this.
This summer I’ve been working to overcome a lifelong bias against fruit flavored ice cream. Making several varieties at home with very fresh, local fruit has exposed the issue: I don’t like commercial fruit ice creams because they are bad. They are bad because a very long time passes between the moment there was a real piece of fruit and the moment ice cream flavored with that fruit gets eaten. In many cases, I suspect no real fruit was ever involved in the making of the ice cream.
These peaches came from a farm in New Jersey by way of the Union Square Greemarket, where the peachy aroma from their farmer’s stand was so strong that we turned on our heels to go back and buy some. They deserved a project.
In my research, I discovered rifts running through the peach ice cream community. There is no consensus on when to add vanilla, nor on whether or not peaches should be peeled in preparation. Want my completely arbitrary opinion? The vanilla is there for its flavor; waiting until the end to add it makes no sense. Also, peach skins have flavor. Peeling peaches is a pain. You’re going to have to blend this to total smoothness, anyway. Leave ‘em on.
Update: A reader (who happens to be a concerned family member) has raised a good point: if you are not using organic peaches, you should most certainly remove the skins. Even well washed “conventional” fruit skins can bring with them all kinds of pesticides and chemicals you don’t want in your ice cream or your body.
Start with:
- 3 peaches, pitted and sliced
- juice of 1/2 a lemon
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup sugar (I use evaporated cane juice)
and macerate the peaches in a big bowl by tossing them with the lemon juice, vanilla, and 1/2 cup of sugar. Cover and refrigerate for about two hours. Check on it and stir every so often.
Now, there is a somewhat laborious way to do the rest, and then there is my way. Because it needs to be super smooth in the end, there isn’t much point in doing what many recipes advise (reserve the liquid, then divide the macerated peaches into two bowls, peeling and mashing one bowl of peaches and hanging on to the other to put in at the very end).
My way: with an immersion blender or hand mixer, blend the following on low until the sugar is dissolved:
- 1 cup organic 2 % milk
- 2 cups organic half and half
- 1/2 cup sugar
Then mix in all but about 1/4 cup of the peaches, including the liquid, until the skins are well blended in. Pour the mixture into your ice cream maker and freeze following the machine’s instructions. You probably have enough to make two batches (I did), which you’ll be grateful for. About five minutes before it’s done, mix in that last 1/4 cup of peaches. I saved this bit of texture because I’m sharing my ice cream with others, but you are entitled to keep it all to yourself, in which case, blend it all before freezing.
Finally, if you can keep yourself from sticking a straw directly into the ice cream maker (I couldn’t), make a milkshake by blending:
- 1 cup organic 2% milk
- a few scoops peach ice cream
- a good squeeze of honey (about a teaspoon)
- a dash of cinnamon
Summer through a straw.
One more thought from my fresh ingredients soapbox. You can be forgiven for using frozen peach slices to make this, especially if they are out of season or if it will just make your life easier to do so (say, if your jaw happens to be broken). In fact, peaches freeze pretty well, so if you have the freezer space, it’s not a bad idea to hoard them at their prime so you can relive a taste of summer in the depths of winter.
However:
Do NOT, under any circumstances, make this with peaches that were put in a can or jar with syrup by a large, multinational corporation. Doing so is a waste of your time, money, milk, sugar, and cream. You might as well just go to the store and buy peach ice cream.
