The start of July signaled the tipping point into what I consider DC’s fourth season: steam room. In a matter of hours, it seems, the weather turned from “pleasant” to all-day-every-day hot & humid.

I loathe and love this season. Loathe: constant sweatiness and unruly hair. Love: abundant daylight; sunrise runs in Rock Creek Park; summer fruit. Despite the stickiness, the balance, for me, tips more towards love. It’s simple, really: I love summer because it is an unabashed call to unabashed, public pleasure. Other seasons have their joys, but they are somewhat more private ones. You’re more likely to experience them with a small group of people—a fall bonfire with friends, say, or a family holiday gathering. But summer is all out. It’s water slides on the front lawn, concerts in the park, eating watermelon slices on a picnic with friends. It’s a harkening back to the time before you worried about meeting your yearly performance assessment or cared if your bathing suit showed your stomach; a time when you had time to be bored, when you lived in the now. Summer is when you have fun for the sake of having fun. They’re meant to be a release, an escape valve from the grind of the rest of the year. They’re meant to be a corporate enjoyment.

And what food is more enjoyable than ice cream? To misquote the great Ina Garten, “You can be miserable before you have ice cream and you can be miserable after you eat ice cream but you can’t be miserable while you are eating ice cream.” Not even if you’re eating it during a yearly performance assessment, while worried about your stomach pooch, during DC’s fourth season.

Cardamom & Candied Orange Peel Ice Cream

Sources: Adapted from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking: From My Home to Yours

Makes ~2 quarts of ice cream

Active time: ~30 minutes, plus bowl chilling, custard chilling, & churning time

Ingredients:

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 2 cups whole milk
• 6 egg yolks
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1 heaping teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup chopped candied orange peel
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract (I use Singing Dog Vanilla’s Double Fold Vanilla Extract, and it is worth every penny)

Directions:

• The day before you plan to make the ice cream, put the machine bowl in the freezer.
• The next day, pour the cream and milk into a heavy-bottomed pot and bring the mixture to a boil over medium heat. Meanwhile, whisk together the egg yolks, sugar, cardamom, and pinch of salt in a medium bowl.
• When the cream and milk are at a boil, turn off the heat and whisk one-third of the mixture into the egg yolks, whisking vigorously as you do so. Slowly add the rest of the cream and milk to the yolks, whisking all the way.
• Pour the mixture back into your saucepan and heat over medium. Keep stirring, or you could end up with curds in your custard, which no one wants that.
• There are two ways to test whether your custard is done. One is to dip a spoon or spatula into it and then run your finger through the custard; your finger should leave a clear trail with no custard running into the track. The other is to take your custard’s temperature: it should be between 170–180°F.
• Remove the custard from the heat and pour it into a clean bowl. Let it cool for several minutes before stirring in the candied orange peel and vanilla. Press a piece of plastic wrap directly onto the surface of the custard and refrigerate until cold. The custard will be fine in the refrigerator for a day or two, if you want to spread out the work load.
• Once the ice cream bowl and custard are cold, churn the custard per your machine’s directions. My custard took ~20 minutes to reach peak height and frostiness.
• Transfer the ice cream to a lidded plastic container to firm up. Eat when, and with what, you desire—so long as you do it with great pleasure.