Closet cleaning

I was in a big snit last week trying to find something I'd stashed away in a "safe" place and then forgot where that place was.  How can this be, in such a small house? To give you an idea of just how small, I can vacuum the entire upstairs without even unplugging the machine.  Still, things go missing all the time.

Well, despite the lack of real, useful closets, there are nooks and crannies and other odd places to stash things in an old house.  Over the years all the excess stuff has filtered down to the basement, so it tuned into quite a search. Anyway, a long story short, this set off a cleaning jag and I filled four big bags for the Goodwill.  Does a person really need thirty vases? And so on. Of course I still didn't find the little thing I was looking for in the first place...

When I told John, he said, "since we're getting rid of stuff we don't use anymore, who not dump the electric ice cream maker you bought me back in the 1990's?"  That was a heavy hint to bring the thing upstairs after a decade of gathering dust, and finally make him some real homemade ice cream. After all, it's summer-- and one of the nicest ones ever in Seattle.

Being a helpful person, he quickly printed out a New York Times recipe:

Strawberry Ice Cream

1 1/4 cup strawberries, mashed
2 cups heavy cream (!)
1/3 cup sugar
pinch salt
2 tbs. vodka (I don't know why)

The instructions were simple because this recipe doesn't include eggs that have to be carefully cooked. You just bring the cream, salt and sugar to a simmer, stirring until the sugar dissolves.  Then add the vodka and chill thoroughly.  When cold, pour the mixture into the machine and add the berries, then churn according to "manufacturer's directions."  Which by some miracle, I didn't put away in a "safe" place never to be found again. 

Yum. In about 20 minutes it looked like this and tasted like Dairy Queen on steroids. This isn't some no-guilt sorbet.  But that little recipe turned into a surprising volume of ice cream, and I've been doling it out for dessert out all week.