Vanilla Bean-Roasted Figs with Wildflower Honey-Vanilla Ice Cream

Am I a complete and total loser because I sang "now brrrrrring us some figgy pudding" in full operatic voice with rolling "r"s AND a British accent when I started making this? Wait. Don't answer that. [Because I did. I know. I need help.]

I also needed help because there was **GASP** an error in The French Laundry Cookbook. I KNOW. Inconceivable. The recipe for "Honey-Vanilla Ice Cream"? Had no vanilla in it. Had I made it as-directed in the book, I would've gotten honey-flavored white ice cream. Which might have been okay, but I love me some vanilla, so I had to figure out during which step to add it. Before I share with you my totes awsesome kitchen wizardy skillz on how to include the vanilla for all you hep cats out there who plan to try this dish in the future, let me show you the mise en place for the ice cream portion of our program:


Did you count the egg yolks? Oh yes, there are 10 of them. In addition to whole milk and CREAM, so you know this is gonna be rich and wonderful. I've become quite the ice cream addict these days, thanks to a relatively new book I've come to adore:


It's David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop, which has what I believe to be the definitive chocolate ice cream recipe. I don't want to get off-track here, but thanks to my worshipping at the altar of The Perfect Scoop all summer, I was able to figure out how best to add the vanilla to Keller's ice cream recipe to make it work.

In a saucepan, I combined the milk, cream, a few tablespoons of sugar, and a vanilla bean (which I split and scraped and included the contents of it in the pan, as well).


I brought it up to a medium heat, turned off the flame, covered the saucepan, and let it steep for 30 minutes. Next, I whisked the egg yolks with the remaining sugar and tempered it with a wee bit of the still-warm vanilla milk/cream mixture:


I poured the tempered egg yolks back into the saucepan and kept it on a low-medium flame and kept stirring until the ice cream turned into a custard-like texture and coated the back of my wooden spoon. I then poured this mixture through a strainer into a bowl that was sitting in a bowl of ice, stirred in the honey (thanks, Tony R. for reminding me to include this step) and let the mixture come to room temperature, stirring it every now and then. Once it had cooled, I put it in the refrigerator overnight to chill completely:


The next day, I put it in the ice-cream maker for 35 minutes, and then put it in a container to keep in the freezer to harden a bit more:


About 30 minutes before my friends were due to come over, I got the figs ready. Have I shown you the figs yet? I don't think I have. Here they are:


As you can see, I used a combination of Black Mission, Brown Turkey and Calimyrna figs for this dish. I split and sliced the remaining three vanilla beans into one-inch pieces and stuffed one into the top of each fig (from where I'd just cut off the stem). I melted some butter and sugar in a medium skillet and placed the figs in there:


They went into a 400-degree oven for ten minutes and I let them cool for about 15-20 minutes before serving.

Plating was easy -- one scoop of ice cream, surrounded by three figs, and a tiny drizzle of the butter/sugar melty goodness:


My tasters had mixed reactions -- mostly because they are not "fig people," which as an oyster-hater, I cannot judge them. I can only wonder what the hell is wrong with someone that they don't like figs! Ha! Of course, I am kidding.

The ice cream was a huge hit -- it was absolutely spectacular. I love vanilla ice cream, but Keller's use of wildflower honey made it so much better than any vanilla ice cream I've ever had. I love love love figs, so I was happy to eat not only my figs but also all the leftover figs (and then roll my ass onto the couch for a nap). This dish was so easy, and I will definitely make vanilla-roasted figs again. I'll also use wildflower honey as a sweetener in other ice creams and frozen yogurts just to see what kind of difference it makes, because this was gooooooood. I always recommend buying the cookbooks I write about because I think it's important to respect copyright, so in addition to buying The French Laundry Cookbook, I wholeheartedly recommend adding The Perfect Scoop to your collection (link to purchase below). You won't be sorry.

Up Next: Salad of Black Mission Figs with Roasted Sweet Peppers and Shaved Fennel

Resources:
The Perfect Scoop, by David Lebovitz
Krups ice cream maker
Organic Valley milk and cream
Eggs from Smith Meadows Farms
McClure's wildflower honey
Figs from Whole Foods
Vanilla beans from TPSS Co-op
365 organic butter

Music to Cook By: Tears for Fears; Raoul and the Kings of Spain. There are very few songs that make me stop whatever it is I'm doing, and one of those songs is from this album. It's called "I Choose You." There's nothing significant about the lyrics (actually, they're kind of depressing), it's just the music, the phrasing, and Roland's voice that stop me in my tracks. This whole album is remarkable and a long-time favorite (even though, technically, it's more of a Roland Orzabal solo album, since Curt was pretty much out of the picture by then). The fact that it's been out for 12 years and I still listen to it about once a month says something, I think.