This week we're taking a closer look at Powell's Pick of the Month Salt and Straw Ice Cream Cookbook by Tyler Malek and JJ Goode.
Remember the mundane days of ice cream? Chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla. Scoop and repeat. Homemade ice cream will never again be boring with the help of the
Salt and Straw Ice Cream Cookbook. All the Salt & Straw ice cream favorites you can possibly try, from the more sedate Stumptown Coffee and Burnside Bourbon to the spectacular Caramel Corn on the Cob and the savory Pear and Blue Cheese. It boggles the mind how these flavors can translate into ice cream, but ask any Portlander — they absolutely do! The recipes are easy to use, with ingredients that are easy to find. Ice cream doesn’t get better than this. —
Corie K-B.
Tyler Malek’s infectious enthusiasm for making ice cream infuses the
Salt and Straw Ice Cream Cookbook with the perfect amounts of zest and sweetness. Great for ice cream amateurs and professionals alike — plus anyone who’s stood in the epic lines at one of Salt & Straw’s locations and thought,
Couldn’t I just eat ice cream at home? — Malek’s cookbook features the company’s best-loved flavors, plus recipes for the extras like marshmallow fluff and gooey chocolate brownies that make Salt & Straw’s ice cream so good.
By his own admission, Malek is kind of an ice cream wunderkind. After convincing his older cousin Kim to let him try his hand at being the company’s Head/Only Ice Cream Maker, he set to work like a mad scientist, filling Kim’s basement with secondhand ice cream makers and ingredients ranging from the obviously delicious (chocolate) to the possibly disgusting (bone marrow). Malek’s willingness to experiment yields surprising, wonderful combinations like Strawberry Honey Balsamic With Black Pepper and Arbequina Olive Oil. It’s also the origin of more unusual flavors like Cauliflower Garam Masala and White Chocolate Rose Pop Rocks. We haven’t had the courage to try the Halloween special Grandma Dracula’s Blood Pudding, but it’s a testament to Malek’s ingenuity and skill that taste-testers and customers deemed it good enough to include in the book.
One of the highlights of
Salt and Straw Ice Cream Cookbook, aside from finally possessing the recipe to Chocolate Gooey Brownie (yes!), is Malek and cowriter JJ Goode’s clear directions. Making an ice cream base is fairly simple, but much of the confectionery involved in creating specialty ice creams takes practice, special equipment, and step-by-step guidance. While some of the recipes are dauntingly long, none are dauntingly complex, due to the authors’ encouragement, sourcing advice, and well-written instructions.
Summer is coming and you’re going to want some cool, sweet treats to share with the people you love (or hoard: it’s your business). Why not trade in your tub of Häagen-Dazs for some homemade Foraged Berry Sherbet?
Salt and Straw Ice Cream Cookbook will show you how fun and rewarding being the boss of your own ice creamery can be.
Check out the rest of our Picks of the Month
here.