mix, mix… stir, stir

No, no, stay with me here. Basil is an amazing chameleon of an herb and has a talent for transioning effortlessly from the savory into the sweet. I discovered this thanks to Kate Zuckerman’s recipe for Basil Ice Cream in her fantastic book The Sweet Life. Occasionally there is one recipe in a book that is so intriguing it alone justifies the purchase. Basil Ice Cream is the reason The Sweet Lifeis part of my cookbook collection. I really couldn’t imagine how it would be and it blew me away! I have served it to numerous people to confirm that it’s not demented taste buds on my part, and they also loved it.

When Caroline at A Consuming Passion selected the Peppermint Cream Puff Ring for this week’s Tuesday’s With Dorie baking assignment, I fully intended to make it peppermint. When the day came to make my puffy delights I was planning to buy some peppermint, in fact it was written on my shopping list, and then I remembered I had a very large quantity of fresh basil sitting in my refrigerator. Change of plans! I revisited the basil ice cream recipe to get an idea of the quantity of basil to use and proceeded to infuse 3/4 of an ounce in the cream for ten minutes. I strained and chilled the cream and proceeded with the rest of the recipe as Dorie suggests up to the point of the garnish. I didn’t have sliced almonds and briefly thought about making a trip to the store, but then I remembered the pine nuts I had in the freezer. I tossed them in some simple syrup and baked them to create a nice candy coating and it makes the perfect garnish for the puffs. The pine nuts also give the eater a hint that there might be something a little different about what they are about to eat.

This is a lovely cream puff recipe. My culinary experience was expanded by the need for creme fraiche, which I made for the first time. It is as simple as mixing 1/2 ounce of sour cream with one cup of heavy cream and letting it stand overnight at about 80-90 degrees F. It was fantastic! One issue with the whipping cream based filling is it has a potential to make the pastry a bit more soggy than a standard pastry cream filling, but the lightness of the whipping cream filling makes these puffs eat like little clouds. I’ll be making these again and even if I have peppermint, I may make a trip to the store to get some basil.

You can find the recipe in Dorie Greenspan’s book, Baking: From My Home to Yours 

Tags: Basil, Tuesdays with Dorie

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