a happy mistake … Bittersweet Chocolate Sour Cream Ice Cream

Last Friday was National Gum Drop Day, another in the long, often times puzzling, list of made up food holidays. I thought I had an idea for this one. I really did. I did not. While working on the Peco Brittle (peanut-coconut brittle) a few weeks back, I remembered something else my friends mother used to make that I thought was delicious: Gumdrop Cake. As I recall, it was a simple chocolate cake baked in a square pan, studded throughout with gumdrops and slicked with a simple chocolate icing. I seem to remember I liked it. I think I was wrong. It is horrid. And it kind of threw me off my game for a few weeks.

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vive la France … Bastille Day Bomb Pops

Bastille Day is this Saturday – but you knew that right?  The French national holiday commemorates the 1790 Fête de la Fédération that was held on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille on July 14^th the year prior.  It’s a day that is celebrated with parades, picnics, fireworks and great shows of nationalism, not unlike our 4^th of July.  Last year at this time, I was deep in the Gascon countryside, celebrating a truly unique US-French Bastille Day BBQ courtesy of my friend Kate and a whole crew of mostly American friends at her lovely home, Camont.  It was a fantastic day.

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