Fruit Salad with Lemony Whipped Cream (and a secret to super-stable whipped cream)

My friends from Good Cook challenged me with some lemon keepers.

Actually, there's a post coming about all of their keepers, but right now the challenge was specifically about the lemon keepers. They're big enough to hold a large lemon, but to be honest, I don't need to keep whole lemons in separate containers. They're fine rolling around in the vegetable bin.

But zested lemons are a whole other thing. Once they're zested, they go downhill fast. I usually put them in plastic bags, but I hate the idea of buying plastic bags that just get thrown away. So the lemon keepers make sense for zested  lemons.

And how often do you use a whole lemon? I mean, sure, there are some recipes where I might need a whole lemon, or even a couple lemons. But most of the time I need a few slices. Or half a lemon. And then I'm back to plastic bags again. And lemons getting squished in the vegetable bin.

Or, really, you can use these keepers for anything that fits in there. Because although they resemble lemons, there's no reason they couldn't be used for anything that fits in there. Right? Right.

So I started thinking about what I might use a lemon keeper for. Besides storing my zested lemons. Fruit was on my mind, and I decided that a fruit salad made sense.

Picture these things at a picnic or barbecue where you could have individual fruit salads ready. And covered. To keep the flying critters away.

And what goes good with fruit? How about some whipped cream flavored with lemon? Oh yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

AND, this whipped cream has a secret ingredient that makes it much more stable, so you can make it well ahead of time, and it won't deflate.

AND the secret ingredient doesn't require any special handling. No heating, melting, or sifting. AND it doesn't add any discernible flavor.

Super Stable Lemony Whipped Cream

1/2 teaspoon instant pectin*
2 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon lemon zest

Combine the pectin and sugar in a medium bowl and stir to combine. Add the heavy cream and stir. Let it sit for a minute, then whisk until you have a fluffy whipped cream.

If you like, you can use an electric mixer for whipping the cream but I like whipping cream by hand. I can feel how it's thickening, and I'm much less likely to over-whip and end up with butter.

Mix in the lemon zest during the last second of whipping. Use immediately or transfer to a container and keep chilled until needed.

*You will most likely find this with the canning supplies - it's used for thickening freezer jams that aren't cooked.

And now for some fruit salad - in lemon keepers.

I filled some lemon keepers with fresh fruit including pineapple, nectarine chunks, and lots of strawberries.

The whipped cream fit perfectly into another lemon keeper. Cute, huh? Wouldn't this be great for a picnic?

And then the partly zested lemon fit perfectly into another keeper. No more plastic bags and no more innocent citrus fruits getting squished in the vegetable bin.

What would you use a lemon keeper for?

Besides keeping lemons or fruits in the refrigerator, these would be handy for small servings of snacks you could take with you. The lid twists on, so it's pretty secure. They'd also be good for salt or your all-purpose spice mix that you keep on your counter.

Or ... put a battery-operated tealight in one to use as a decorative light. You're not going to read the newspaper by the light, but it looks pretty.

Good Cook provided the lemon keepers to me along with other keepers as part of the Kitchen Experts program. This post was not required.

Check out my giveaway HERE from Good Cook.

Bread with a Healthy Shake Mix

A while back, I was contacted by a company called Visalus to create a recipe for them. That's still in progress - it will be showing up here in a while.

The company makes nutritional products, typically used by folks who want to lose weight in a healthy way. I figured that instead of using them as meal replacements, I could use some of the products as meal enhancements - adding the extra nutrition to foods we normally eat.

I mean, I'm still in the mode where I'm trying to get my husband to gain some healthy weight.

So, I've been experimenting with the products to see what works and what doesn't. They sent me plenty, so I've got more than enough to work out their recipe and to create a few for my own use.
Of course, I decided to make bread. Because I always decide to make bread.

For this recipe, I used the Visalus Vi-Shape shake mix. When I opened the bag, it had a pleasantly sweet dairy-like scent. Sort of like powdered coffee creamer. Which makes sense, considering it's supposed to be used to make healthy shakes. I figured it would work just fine in bread. So I plunged right ahead.

The resulting bread was a little sweet, but not so much that it was a dessert bread. Just fine for sandwiches.

Bread Machine Loaf with Vi-Shape

1 teaspoon instant yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
2 1/2 cups (11 1/4 ounces) bread flour
1/2 cup Vi-Shape shake mix
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup water

Place all ingredients in your bread machine in the order suggested by the manufacturer. If you have options, set the machine to a light crust, medium-sized loaf.

Press the appropriate buttons (beep beep)

When the bread is done, remove it from the machine and let it cool completely on a rack before slicing.

The Visalus products were provided to me for the purpose of creating a recipe. I was not required to make additional posts.

Cheesecake-inspired ice cream

Here I go again with the ice cream. I originally was thinking about making an ice cream with the flavor of s'mores, but I couldn't figure out exactly how I was going to get the toasted marshmallow flavor.

If I had any marshmallows sitting around, I would have toasted them, then melted them into the milk. But that's not something I have on hand all that often.

But the s'more idea got me thinking about graham crackers, and the more I thought about it, the more I knew I wanted to infuse graham cracker flavor into the ice cream.

And then what?

Cheesecake, of course. I had the graham crackers and dairy, so all I needed to do was figure out what flavors to add to give it a cheesecake flavor.

I think I nailed it.

Since my favorite cheesecake ever had an almond flavor, I decided to add a little almond extract here. It's optional, though.

You can buy creme fraiche, but it's incredibly simple to make your own. Recipe here.

Essence of Cheesecake Ice Cream

1 cup milk
3/4 cup heavy cream
4 graham crackers
1/2 cup sugar
Pinch of salt
1 cup creme fraiche
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon almond extract (optional)

Combine the milk and heavy cream in a small bowl. Add the graham crackers. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for an hour or two. Or longer, if you have other things to do.

Strain the mixture through a fine strainer into a bowl. Discard the graham cracker sludge.

Add the sugar and salt to the milk/cream mixture and stir to dissolve the sugar and salt. Add the cream fraiche and stir or whisk until combined. Add the vanilla, lemon juice, and the almond extract, if you're using it.

Refrigerate the mixture until it's well-chilled. Since most of the ingredients were cold to begin with, it shouldn't take long - an hour should do.

Churn in your ice cream maker according to manufacturer's directions.

When it's done churning, transfer to a storage container and freeze until firm.