Wine Wednesday + Happy Anniversary!

Evodia Garnacha

“This wine rains kisses in your mouth.” –Insatiable By Gael Greene

The first Wednesday of every month is Wine Wednesday! Spectacular wines under $10.00. Yep. Under $10.00. Sometimes wine is less expensive where I am, but most of the time it’s more expensive. Hopefully that means that I will pick wines that are well below the $10.00 limit for most of you.

I will post wines that I particularly like. I am no specialist by any means, but I do love wine. I know the basics of the different varietals, what regions generally produce, how wines are made, but this space is all about preference. We all like what we like, and you might like what I like too. I will post food pairings and why those pairings are suitable for the specific wine.

Evodia Old Vines Garnacha

Price: $8.99

Variety: Garnacha

Guys! It’s the one year anniversary for the Wine Wednesday series! Cue the glasses of celebration wine! I knew that this one had to be special for the one year mark. So I made…wait for it…red wine ice cream! (Flash back to last year’s first Wine Wednesday post here) Also psst: this is perfect for Valentine’s Day!

My good friends Keelin and Kaitlin have actually requested wine ice cream for the blog. There’s a brand of wine ice cream that boasts a 5% alcohol content which would be pretty amazing for any girls night-in. So I figured I would give it a whirl.

Ice cream is a partially frozen mixture of water, sugar syrup, fat, and air. As the water freezes in the mix, the sugar syrup becomes more and more concentrated which eventually becomes so saturated that it ends the freezing process. Alcohol actually has a big impact on ice cream. It has a really low freezing point which lends a super scoop-able texture to ice cream. Essentially, the alcohol increases the proportion of unfrozen ingredients in the ice cream. The flavor of the alcohol that you mix into the ice cream also becomes more concentrated during the freezing process as ice crystals form—perfect for a wine’s flavor that you love!

PS Remember that Magic Chocolate Shell? The ice cream featured in that recipe uses whiskey!

Wine Wednesday + Wine Ice Cream

For the wine, I chose a varietal that’s bold, and a brand I had tried and loved before. Evodia wine is a Garnacha (Grenache) grape wine that’s peppery and dry with big fruit notes like plum and blackberry. The peppery notes help to cut through the sugar in this recipe, and the fruitiness adds some depth to the ice cream. It’s not aged in oak, which I think is perfect for sweeter applications like this. This wine is perfect for any red wine-lover—if you are not a big fan of red wine, I would choose a lighter style. I would not go with a sweet red for this ice cream. The sugar will make the texture even softer, and the flavor will get too sickeningly sweet. Save the sweet red for drinking.

So help me celebrate Wine Wednesday’s one year anniversary, and maybe show off your skills for Valentine’s Day! The color would be perfect! I used the red wine in two forms—pure, poured straight from the bottle, and in a syrup swirled into the base. Be careful with the wine you choose; if the alcohol content is too high, the ice cream will be too soft, and it will become a sloppy mess.

**Caution: this ice cream has approximately 3-4% alcohol content depending on the wine, so if you feel uncomfortable serving to those who are underage, take note!

Red Wine Ice Cream

3 large egg yolks

1 cup heavy cream

½ cup milk

¼ cup + ½ cup sugar, separated

½ cup + 1 ½ cup dry red wine, separated

1. Pre-chill a large bowl in the freezer.
2. In a separate heatproof bowl, mix the egg yolks together. Set aside.
3. In a small/medium saucepan, combine the cream, milk, and ¼ cup sugar. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, stirring constantly, to dissolve the sugar—about 4 minutes.
4. Add half of the hot cream mixture to the egg yolks and whisk quickly to combine and prevent cooking of the yolks. Add the egg/cream mixture back to the pan with the remaining cream and stir together.
5. Cook the mixture over medium heat, stirring constantly with a whisk, until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. This should take about 5 or so minutes. Do not let the mixture boil, or it will curdle.
6. Strain the custard into the pre-chilled bowl. Stir in ¼ cup red wine. Cover and refrigerate until cold, at least 1 ½ hours.
7. Meanwhile, prepare the red wine syrup. Mix together the 1 ½ cup dry red wine with ½ cup sugar in a medium saucepan. Heat over medium heat, simmering, until the mixture is syrupy. The volume should be about ⅔- ¾ cup in volume. Remove from heat and let cool. Refrigerate until ready to use.
8. Freeze the ice cream base mixture in an ice cream freezer* according to the manufacturer’s instructions. The mixture will not become that hard, so once the base becomes semi-solid, you’re ready for the next step.
9. Swirl in the red wine syrup quickly, but try to keep it from becoming one color. Cover and freeze until solid.
10. You can eat this ice cream alone, or serve with a slice of chocolate cake—my favorite way to eat this ice cream.

* This ice cream has a low enough freezing point that you may be able to get away with making it a no-churn ice cream. I would vigorously whisk the mixture every hour or so to keep it from getting icy. Once the mix is semi-solid, add the red wine syrup like the instructions here say, and freeze until solid.