Taro pops!

Background:
I love taro. It's my favorite bubble tea flavor, it's delicious as fries, chips, in soups, etc. etc. There aren't many foods that can be delicious sweet OR savory, but taro is one of the ultimate.
A while back I made taro "ice cream", perhaps more accurately called taro cream. I bought a few fresh taro roots from the local grocery store, peeled and steamed them, and then mashed it up with some honey. It's a great simple dish, like purple mashed sweet potatoes. Anyway, I had so much of it that I decided to use a portion to make ice cream. Since it already had water (from the steam) and sweetener, I thought it would be okay if I just mixed it with heavy cream and poured it into the ice cream machine. Well, it's got the taro flavor alright, but it tastes like how it sounds.. frozen heavy cream with mashed taro bits mixed in. Not so fun to eat by the spoonful.
Now, fast forward to my present-day popsicle mode, and I figured I could do some experimenting with my taro cream before I toss it. I'm going to guess the proportions of ingredients I used below, so that you don't have to go through the taro-torturing that I did.

Materials:
1 peeled and steamed taro, mashed
1 tbsp honey/sugar, or to taste
1/4 c heavy whipping cream
1/2 c milk


Methods:
Blend and pour!

Result:
Appearance: Pretty white and creamy looking, but there was a weird separation going on at the top of the popsicle; see Flavor below
Texture: Pretty great, and Korean ice pop-like
Flavor: It was pretty spot on in the mix of taro and creaminess. However, for some reason in my version most of the fat seems to have sunk to the bottom, meaning it was at the top of my popsicle. There was a line of separation and the top tasted creamier. Funnily enough, the taro bits that I didn't blend well floated, meaning that they collected at the bottom of the popsicle. Rather counter-intuitive.

Conclusion:
Awesome. Make this. All the time.

Lime popsicles/paletas

Background:
In the search for a lime-only popsicle, I came across this recipe. The ingredient list looked interesting, so I gave it a try, without doing the final step of adding graham crackers crumbs.

Result:
Appearance: Beautiful! Creamy white with specks of lime zest.
Texture: Soft and creamy.
Flavor: Super intense lime flavor, and quite sweet... maybe too sweet.

Conclusion:
While a friend of mine loved it and raved about it, I thought the sweetened condensed milk was pretty overwhelming and could be cut back a good amount. It is great for the texture though, so I'm keeping that in mind as a great ingredient to use when I need a boost of sweet and a softer pop.

Cold brew cafe au lait popsicles, Trial #1

Background:
Inspired by my husband and friends, I decided to try making cold brew coffee. Although I am not a coffee drinker - I'm extremely sensitive to caffeine - coffee ice cream is one of my very favorite things to eat. Because of this, I was curious enough to want to see what the hype was about.
The verdict? It was so delicious (with generous amounts of dairy and sugar of course,) that I thought it would make a great popsicle.

Materials:
- Cold brew coffee (see recipes #1, #2, #3)
- Half and half

Methods:
- I used approximately 1:1 ratio of the ingredients. If you added enough brown sugar or simple syrup to the coffee, no need to add here.

Result:
Appearance: Nice subtle, even coffee color; the cinnamon (from the cold brew recipe, which sank) was sprinkled at the top
Texture: A really nice combination of icey and creamy (similar to Korean ice pops, if you know what I mean)
Flavor: Awesome sophisticated coffee flavor, without losing the fun of being a popsicle.

Conclusion:
This one is definitely a keeper. Even though I will probably be enjoying this as a 'breakfast popsicle' until I make a decaf version, that won't stop me!

Green Tea Popsicles - Trial #1

Materials:
- 2 c fat free half and half
- 4 tbsp simple syrup
- 1 tsp matcha green tea powder

Result:
Appearance: Lovely green color
Texture: Not bad, but want it a little less icey to match the creamy taste.
Flavor: The matcha flavor was awesome; it could be sweeter.

Conclusion:
This recipe was delicious, but not quite perfect. Next time, I'm going to use full-fat half and half and perhaps add a little sweetened condensed milk for texture and flavor.

[Side note:
When taste-testing before freezing, make it sweeter than I would like if I were to sip the liquid.]