I scream, you scream, we all scream for...

Another month has flown by and more variations on an ice cream cake can be found here!  Let's just say my ice cream maker has been getting a work out!

The August 2010 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Elissa of 17 and Baking.  For the first time, The Daring Bakers partnered with Sugar High Fridays for a co-event theme of beurre noisette, or browned butter.  Elissa chose to challenge the Daring Bakers to make a pound cake to be used in either a Baked Alaska or in Ice Cream Petit Fours.  The sources for Elissa's challenge were Gourmet magazine and David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop".

Somehow Jason convinced me to make both...for his office party.  The first is an old American classic: the Baked Alaska.  It looks much harder than it was to actually make.  The base was a browned butter cake that I topped with a coat of peach puree. 

Topping the cake was a peach gelato made with mascarpone that was frozen in a bombe shape. 

 

The cake was then finished off with a piping of meringue that was torched right before serving.

Here it is after using my kitchen torch:

The second dessert was an ice cream petit four that was delicious, but much more complicated to get together.  I used David Lebovitz's recipe for a mint chocolate chip ice cream.  Mmm...we're talking fresh mint infused for 1 hour in the cream and finished off with chocolate stracciatella/chips.  

The ice cream was sandwiched between 2 layers of the browned butter cake.  After cutting the cake into little squares, the entire thing was dipped into ganache and frozen.  I topped each petit four with a candied mint leaf for good looks :)  Unfortunately, they didn't look as pretty as I had hoped, but I think the taste made up for it!

For the recipe, check it out here.