I have wonderful memories of summers in Cleveland, Ohio.  As a child (up until I discovered girls, cars, and general mayhem) I spent most of my summer vacation at my Nonna’s house.  It was a wonderful experience, to say the least.  We would toil in her spacious backyard garden during the day, planting and harvesting tomatoes, beans, herbs, and various other vegetables (though most of her garden was tomatoes and basil), and as the late afternoon and early evening approached we would cook dinner with what we had harvested.  As the night grew later and later I would watch my Grandfather nod off in his chair, TV Guide in hand, and listen to the comical musical sounds his nose made as he drew his long and satisfying sleepy breaths of the cool night air.

Ahhh....memories!

My Nonna had a huge backyard that seemed to stretch on forever (everything looks bigger as a child), and nobody ever bothered with putting up fences back then.  I would wander about in her backyard, occasionally making my way over to the next door neighbor’s yard (Mr. Fred, as she called him) and would sneak over to the large and thorny bush way in the back.  The “hurty” bush as I called it.  On this rather evil looking and mangled mess of thorny branches and green leaves grew some of the most wonderful berries I have ever tasted.  They were very tiny, purplish-black in color, and ridiculously sweet and almost floral tasting.  Yes, my dear reader, I am talking about black raspberries...the rarest of the bush berries...or so it would seem.

We are all familiar with blackberries.  They look a bit like raspberries, except they are not hollow.  They are also generally a bit tart, and quite juicy.  While blackberries are delicious and make some absolutely fantastic desserts, they are NOT black raspberries.  The similarity ends with the color, and side by side even that is not the same.

We do, however, seem to confuse these two distinctly different berries enough to make it nearly impossible to acquire black raspberries in the marketplace (at least in Northern California, where I now make my home).  I do not know how many times I have asked for black raspberries and been presented with blackberries instead.  When I try to explain the difference, most people tell me they have never seen what I call a black raspberry.  Indeed, they are a rarity in most parts of the USA.  They are more common (it would appear) in the Northeast Quadrant of the USA than elsewhere.  As a small child, I was obviously very blessed to have a bush to steal from (sorry Mr. Fred), so I do indeed know the difference, and I have been able to obtain true black raspberries commercially over the years in very small quantities.  I can assure you, however, that it has been easier to obtain black (or white) truffles or caviar.

As I perused the stalls at my local farmer’s market one fine Thursday afternoon,  I came across 2 half-pint baskets of fresh black raspberries nestled among the abundant baskets of red and golden raspberries that one of my favorite vendors (the one the always has zucchini blossoms) was selling at the reasonable price of 3 for $5.  I was almost in shock to see them sitting there among the “lesser” berries.

“You have black raspberries!” I exclaimed.

“Yes, we only have a few.” replied the nice vendor lady.

“Are they the same price?” I inquired.

“Yes.” she replied with a smile.

“I’ll take them all.”  I said.  “Will you have more next week?”

“I don’t know.  The bushes do not produce a lot of berries.”  she replied.

I promptly paid for the wonderful tiny berries (black raspberries are much smaller than other raspberries), as well as some red and golden raspberries, and happily headed home.  I had visions of black raspberry ice cream in my head.

I found myself eating the berries one by one as I drove home.  Black raspberries are very sweet, with almost no tartness, and a wonderful fragrance which is almost perfume-like in character.  The tiny berries have lots of tiny seeds in them, and they seem more seedy than other bush berries because they are so small.  I decided that I would strain most of the seeds out of the ice cream mix, leaving some of the berries whole to give the ice cream some character.  Here is how I made it:

Black Raspberry Ice Cream

Yield: Approximately 1 Quart

Note:  Reserving some of the berries for adding to the ice cream base is optional.  If you do not want any seeds in your ice cream cook all the berries into the base and then strain.

1 pint (2 cups)  Black Raspberries

3/4 cup  Sugar

1/4 cup  White Rum

1/2  Vanilla Bean (split and scraped)

Pinch Of Salt

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2 cups  Heavy Cream

2 cups  Half-N-Half

6 each  Egg Yolks

1/2 cup Sugar

1. • Combine the Black Raspberries, 3/4 cup Sugar, Rum, Vanilla Bean, and Salt and let the mixture macerate at room temperature over night.  The Rum will extract maximum flavor from the Berries and the Vanilla.
   

2. • Strain the liquid out the next day and set the Berries aside.
   

3. • Reduce the liquid by boiling until you have a syrup which is about half the volume you began with.
   

4. • Combine the Berries and the syrup and let this rest overnight.
   

5. • Reserve about 1/4 of the berries and take the rest of the mixture and combine it in a saucepan with the Cream and Half-N-Half.
   

6. • Beat the Egg Yolks and the 1/2 cup of Sugar until well blended.
   

7. • Bring the Cream mixture to a boil (stirring to prevent scorching) and pour half of it into the Yolk mixture and whisk in quickly (this is to temper the Yolks).
   

8. • Put the remaining Cream mixture back on the stove and pour the tempered Yolk mixture into the pan and cook it until it thickens slightly.  Do not let this boil or it will curdle.  I cook mine until it just begins to look like it is thickening and then turn the heat off and let it finish cooking with retained heat.
   

9. • Pour this into another bowl and set it in a larger bowl with ice in it.  Stir it over the ice until it is cool.
   

10. • Strain the mixture into a container (pressing hard on the seeds to get all the pulp) and stir in the reserved Berries.  Let this chill for at least 4 hours, or overnight.
    

11. • Churn in your ice cream maker and then store in a freezer until ready to eat.
    

This is an intensely flavored ice cream with an incredibly vibrant purple color.  It is absolutely delicious as is, or served with some chocolate sauce on it, or with a scoop of chocolate ice cream in the same bowl.

I took some of this and sandwiched it in between some homemade biscotti to make a delicious ice cream sandwich.  It was quite tasty, I must say!

Mr. Fred has since passed away (my Mother told me), and so has Nonna.  The black raspberry bush is also long gone.  The memories, however, still remain strong in my mind.  On those very rare occasions that I can find black raspberries at the local market, I buy all I can and fondly remember those wonderful summers back home. 

Sigh...

Enjoy in good health!

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