The Dabble

-food with a side of life-

Dreaming, PTSD and Vanilla Ice Cream

Today didn’t start very well. I had a dream about my old workplace and woke up with Greg at 4AM. I saw him off and decided to tell my mind to shut-up about the whole work thing and attempted to fall back asleep on the couch, which eventually happened.

When I woke up, after putting in earplugs because of construction and early morning town workers cleaning the street and watering the flowers, it was almost 10….I couldn’t believe it.

These dreams happen up to a few times a week and they aren’t unusual. It’s not like I’m walking around in a bathing suit, or riding a zebra, trying to make copies and talk to the therapists I worked with (for my clients, not myself) and then they morph into Ewan McGregor and hug me. No, I could definitely have seen whatever happened in the dream in the actual workplace. I refer to them as nightmares much more scary than the dreams where someone is standing over my bed; I would be putting it mildly to say it was a horrible work experience and I often fantasize about telling a good number of people off. I haven’t worked there in over 2 years. I think it’s post traumatic stress disorder honestly. That’s enough about that or I will start thinking about what I would say to “stick it” to at least 3 characters from my past.

I know I said I wasn’t interested in making plain old vanilla but I meant that once the novelty of my ice cream maker wore off (which it has), that I would attempt to perfect and find the best vanilla, chocolate and strawberry recipes. I have found a creamy, easy vanilla recipe. Thanks to thebakingbeauties, I have found my go-to vanilla recipe. I did not have the vanilla bean but I can imagine how wonderful that flavor would be on top of all the goodness it already encompasses. Now if only I had made an entire batch…

Creamy Vanilla Ice Cream
Creamy Vanilla Ice Cream

Vanilla Ice Cream
Makes 1 quart

Ingredients:
¾ cup sugar
1/8 tsp salt
1 ¾ cups whole milk
1 vanilla bean and seeds, split and scraped, optional
2 large eggs, beaten
11/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1 tsp vanilla extract

In a saucepan, combine sugar, salt, vanilla bean seeds, pod, and milk. Cook over medium, stirring occasionally until steaming. Reduce to low. In a bowl, beat eggs and whisk half of the hot mixture into eggs to temper and place back into saucepan. Cook over low-medium until slightly thick, about 3 minutes and remove vanilla bean. Remove from heat and place in freezer to chill. When time to freeze in ice cream maker, add heavy cream and extract. Make as directed. I place it back in the freezer for a bit longer after this and then eat it when I start to think about my dreams-just kidding.