Ramune Sherbet
This one's not gonna win me any points with the MAHA-grifter crowd.
I had planned on making some corn ice cream this week, but honestly, I’m starting to lose a bit of steam with this whole project, and I just could not get it together to choose a corn ice cream recipe. So I took a suggestion from my daughter and decided to make some Ramune sherbet instead. For those that don’t know, Ramune is a Japanese soda that is popular in the USA…amongst certain demographics at least! 😂
The first thing I should note is that Ramune sherbet has become a bit of niche food trend. Adrienne Borlongan’s Wanderlust Creamery probably deserves credit for starting the trend—they serve it seasonally in their shops, and Borlongan includes a recipe for how to make it in The World of Ice Cream1—but Uji Time in SF’s Japantown also appears to serve it up seasonally.
But I didn’t look to either of them for a recipe. I turned to the most reliable of sources on the interwebs: Reddit.
From a proportion standpoint, the Reddit recipe seemed kinda small, so I upped the ratio to match the trusty Salt & Straw base recipe (1 and 1/3 cups each of cream and Ramune + 1/2 cup of sugar + 2 Tbsps corn syrup + 1/4 tsp xanthan gum) and went from there. Here was the final list of ingredients:
Now hold your horses…we’re gonna talk about that blue dye in just a few moments. First we have to talk about the ingredients in Ramune:
High fructose corn syrup! Sure to horrify the MAHA contingent. But I digress.
Process-wise, I added the sugar and xanthan to a bowl, whisked them together, then added the Ramune and corn syrup, and then finished up by adding the heavy cream. No heating involved in this recipe.
Now comes the part that will really send MAHA-land into a rage; I added three drops of blue food dye to give it the signature color that Wanderlust and Uji Time have in their versions.
Look, I don’t love using food coloring, but using it sparingly doesn’t seem like a risk. That’s probably because it isn’t. So I went ahead and used it, MAHA dye-freak outs be damned2.
Here it is scooped up after hardening overnight:
Great texture, and scooped very easily. The kids enjoyed it. My daughter said it tasted like buttery bubblegum. That seems pretty accurate to me. Ramune does have a bubblegum kind of flavor.3
As for me, I didn’t love it. It was fine, but tasted overly sweet to me. The butteriness from the heavy cream was intriguing, but the bubblegum flavor and sugar level kind of spoiled it a bit. What I’m saying is, I probably wouldn’t make this again. Glad I tried it though!
It’s finally peach season so my plan for next week (as of now) is to make some peach ice cream. Will probably be the first of a few, as I want try making a peach cobbler/cookie, peach melba, maybe peach sorbet. I guess we’ll see what I have the energy for.
See you next week!
The recipe, however, involves using a stand mixer and dry ice to achieve the fizziness of the Ramune. That sounds like fun, but also way too much work to do at home.
Look, I’m not just trying to shit on MAHA people here, as they raise some good points about the unhealthy nature of our food system. I remember when Fast Food Nation was a rightful bestseller and many on the political left organized (and continue to organize!) to take on Big Food and remake the system to be healthier for consumers and fairer to workers. Because it is true that our food system and our food culture are not what they should be. And we should try to do something about that. So when someone like Dr. Marion Nestle feels like we can make common cause with the MAHA crowd on some of these issues, it gives me pause.
But if you’re entire political project involves fighting against unhealthy food additives while at the same time spreading falsehoods about vaccines and fluorination of water, you lose all credibility. All of it. Because whatever positives you might accomplish by banning food dyes and unhealthy chemical additives in breakfast cereals will be undone by the much bigger public health skepticism you’ve unleashed with your lies and ridiculous conspiracy-theorizing. And this is not an instance where you can hide behind the weaselly “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” or, as Vani Hari said in a recent NY Times piece, “I don’t understand why it has to be all or nothing.” The reason you’re confused, Vani, is that no one is arguing that it’s all or nothing: we’re pointing out that it’s one potential step forward coupled with three giant steps backward. Maybe if you stopped chasing personal clout for a moment, you’d see that.
Also, the entire governing approach of the clown show that is RFK Jr. (thus far) appears to be right-wing libertarian slash and burn—which, by the way, is what the corporate food industry wants—not increased health or safety. As Nestle says in that Hari article, “They haven’t done anything except to cut the budget.” And yet we’re supposed to believe they’re going to make America healthier? GTFOH. Just like the fake-ass “populist” Trump, these MAHA people are a bunch of grifters.
Then again, I write an ice cream blog, so maybe I should shut up and stay in my lane. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Borlongan’s recipe actually involves using lemon-lime soda and some bubblegum extract instead of Ramune.
I bet Olive would have liked this flavor! Peach sounds good!!! 😃