Childhood memories: a Kreem-b-tween
The concept of the Kreem-b-tween was a triumph for Peters Ice Cream. You know the company — it went by the swinging slogan ‘The Health Food of a Nation’. The health freaks of the nineties might dispute that ice cream is a health food, stuffed, as it should be, with eggs, sugar, milk and cream! I love it with a passion.
The Kreem-b-tween worked because it combined the simplicity of the best vanilla ice cream with the crunch of delicate biscuits. As a commercial product it was superbly conceived. You could eat it on the run, and it tasted better than most mass-produced ice creams. I thought that if it worked so well with the inadequacies of commercially made ice cream, and often stale biscuits, what if it was made it with perfect ice cream and crunchy, flavoursome, yet delicate biscuits? It worked beautifully. It tastes great, looks great; on its own, or lying in a fruity sauce, with lots of fruit splashed around. You could make it with any ice cream flavour, but to me, ice cream made with vanilla beans is the best. Vanilla ice cream enhances just about any dessert, the only possible exception being chocolate cake.
With that, the rich chocolate needs a fruity sorbet.
THE ICE CREAM
2 cups milk
2 cups cream
1 vanilla bean
150g sugar
4 egg yolks
THE WAFERS
110g butter
130g sugar
2–3 egg whites
zest of 1 lemon
130–140g plain flour, sifted
1
Make the ice cream and spoon it into a square mould. You must have a churn to make this ice cream. It must be perfeet, yet much firmer than the usual serving consistency. A square bread tin is ideal. The tin should be tall enough to make two Kreem-b-tweens when a slice is cut in half. In case you’ve forgotten, each Kreem-b-tween will be about 10cm x 5cm x 2cm.
2
You will need a good solid baking tray and a food processor. Heat the oven to 200°C. Cut out some cardboard templates in the shape of rectangles — about 5 cm x 10 cm is a good shape. The butter should be quite soft. In the blender, cream the butter, sugar, lemon zest and egg whites until smooth. Add the flour gradually. The mix will finish like softened butter.
3
Using a spatula or wide knife, wipe the mix on to a baking tray. The mix should be no thicker than the hard cover of a book. Bake briefly — no more than a few minutes — until golden colour.
4
This paste can be moulded to just about any shape you like while it is still warm. You can cut it into squares and slip over a tea-cup — and you’ve got a pastry cup. Use it any way you like. For our purposes cut out rectangles — using the template on the baking tray — and put the completed biscuits in a stack. Allow to cool. The biscuits will still be malleable. As they cool, they will become firm and crisp, yet delicate. They will keep very well in an airtight jar.
5
Prepare the ice cream. Ten minutes before unmoulding, put a cold tray in the freezer. Unmould the ice cream onto the tray. This is best done by dipping the base of the tray into warm water. Put the ice cream back into the freezer, until it is very firm.
6
Slice the ice cream with a warm knife into slices about 2 cm thick. The ice cream should be sliced about half an hour before it is served. Don’t do it much earlier as it could gather some ice from the freezer. Unlike most ice cream, this dish is best if served quite firm. Not so hard that you need a laser to cut through it, but solid enough to hold its form in the biscuits, and solid enough so you will need to bite it first, then let it fade away.
7
Put the ice cream onto a wafer and put another wafer on top. Sprinkle the top of the top wafer with icing sugar. Sit one ‘Kreem-b-tween’ on a fruity sauce (a puree of mangoes with orange juice and a sprinkling of passionfruit is terrific), and place another — at right angles — on top. Eat it with your fingers and you will feel like a kid again!
WINE: With the fruity sauce for the Kreem-b-tweens I’d go for a botrytis style of white wine. In Australia, these are generally produced from Rhine riesling or semillon. They are expensive because they are very costly to make.
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