Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream -- The Porch, the Mint, and the Long June

I read Paul's books in the evening. The shipwreck books, of course. The same chapters I have read forty times now. The repetition is the comfort. I am not reading for new information. I am reading because the act of opening Paul's books and turning Paul's pages is a form of sitting in the room with him. He is not in the room. The book was in his hand. The book is in my hand. The hands are connected through the book. Peter called from Chicago. He sounded thinner than last week. He said work was fine. I do not believe him. He said his apartment was fine. I do not believe him either. He asked about the dog. He asked about the lake. He told me he loved me. I told him I loved him too. I told him about the bread I was baking. He said he could almost smell it through the phone. We hung up. I stood at the sink for a long minute. I did not know what else to do. Sophie texted a photo of Mira eating cereal. Mira's face was covered in milk. The photo was lit from the side by morning light and the smile in it was uninhibited and full and I could not stop looking at it. I printed the photo. I taped it to the fridge. I have a system on the fridge now: a column for each grandchild, a column for each great-grandchild, photos rotated weekly. The fridge is the gallery. The gallery is the proof. I cooked Lemonade and pepparkakor this week. Fresh lemonade with mint. Pepparkakor from the freezer, brought back to crisp in a low oven. Porch food. Late June. Damiano. The kitchen back-room I have known for over twenty years. The pot. The ladle. The faces. Gerald. The work continues. The work is the same work it has been since 2005. The continuity is, I think, the gift the Damiano Center gives me as much as the gift I give it. We hold each other up. Erik's house is empty now. The Fifth Street house has been sold (the new owners are a young couple from Hermantown, they are kind, they have promised to take care of it; they will paint the walls and tear up the carpet and the kitchen will become someone else's kitchen and I have made my peace with this, mostly). Erik's own house in Lakeside is being cleared out. I helped on Saturday. I packed Erik's coffee mugs. I held one for a long minute. I put it in the box. It is enough. Paul is not here. Mamma is not here. Pappa is not here. Erik is not here. They are all here in the kitchen, in the smell, in the taste, in the wooden spoon and the bread pans and the marble slab. The dead are not where the body went. The dead are in the kitchen. I have been reading the Bible more lately. Not in any new way. The same passages I have known since confirmation class in 1977. The Sermon on the Mount. The 23rd Psalm. The book of Ruth. Whither thou goest, I will go. The repetition of the verses is its own form of prayer. The verses do not change. I change. The change is held by the unchanged words. It is enough.

The lemonade and pepparkakor were porch food, and the mint was from the garden, and the afternoon was long in the way late June afternoons are long when you are not sure what to do with the quiet. I had mint left over — more than the pitcher needed — and the freezer was already doing its work, and it seemed right to carry the flavor one step further, to make something cold and sweet that could sit on the counter and wait for no one in particular, or for everyone. Mint chocolate chip ice cream is not a Swedish recipe. It does not need to be. It tasted like summer, and summer was what we had.

Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 25 min (churn) | Total Time: 4 hrs (includes freezing) | Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy whipping cream
• 1 cup whole milk
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 1 teaspoon pure peppermint extract
• 2–3 drops green food coloring (optional)
• 3/4 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Instructions

1. Combine the base. In a large bowl, whisk together the heavy cream, whole milk, granulated sugar, and salt until the sugar is fully dissolved, about 2–3 minutes.
2. Flavor the mixture. Stir in the peppermint extract. Add food coloring a drop at a time if you’d like a pale green color; stir to combine evenly.
3. Chill thoroughly. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or up to overnight. A cold base churns into creamier ice cream.
4. Churn. Pour the chilled mixture into the bowl of your ice cream maker and churn according to the manufacturer’s instructions, typically 20–25 minutes, until the consistency of soft-serve.
5. Add the chocolate chips. In the final 5 minutes of churning, pour in the mini chocolate chips and let them incorporate evenly.
6. Freeze until firm. Transfer the ice cream to a freezer-safe container, smooth the top, press a piece of parchment directly onto the surface, and cover tightly. Freeze for at least 2 hours before serving.
7. Serve. Let the container sit at room temperature for 3–5 minutes before scooping. Serve on the porch if you have one.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 290 | Protein: 3g | Fat: 20g | Carbs: 27g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 70mg