roast and toast

by Linda Hopkins

Happy Memorial Day! I hope you and your loved ones are spending a relaxing and reflective weekend together.

Aw, finally! The day has arrived, I am posting the last recipe from my Friday the 13th Dinner Party. I’m just happy I was able to squeak it in before the first of June! The lucky element in this final recipe is the coconut.

The tradition/superstition is that eating any round fruit on New Year’s brings luck and good fortune. In the Philippines, 13 is considered a lucky number so the custom calls for eating 13 round fruits. Whereas, in Europe and the States, we eat 12, which represents the months in a year. In both cases, their coin-like shape and their sweetness are what bring luck.

This is similar to the earlier mentioned belief that when you eat 12 grapes at midnight of New Year, it will bring you wealth and more luck for the next 12 months of the coming year.

A few pointers before we get to the recipe:

To hull the strawberries, you can use a paring knife, a strawberry huller (similar to little tweezers), or a straw. I’m all about the straw method. It’s quick and fun.

I bought the mold for the ice pops HERE on Amazon.

The sticks tend to float up when the molds are filled. I fixed that by placing the empty box the mold came in on top while the pops were in the freezer. Problem solved.

To store the frozen pops; lay down or stand up in a tight-sealing container with pieces of parchment paper in-between each pop.

Roasted Strawberry & Toasted Coconut Cream Pops

1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut
1 pound fresh strawberries, hulled
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 tablespoons sugar, divided
Juice of 1 lime, divided
15-ounce can of whole-fat or nonfat coconut milk, well shaken
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Place a rack in the upper third of the oven, and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spread the coconut onto a rimmed baking sheet and toast in the oven until golden brown. Keep a close eye on it. It goes from perfectly fine to burnt before you know it!

Also, it tends to cook faster in the corners and around the outside rim of the pan, stir that back into the center and return to the oven until evenly toasted.

Remove the toasted coconut from the oven and immediately transfer it to a plate to cool. Wipe down the baking sheet and line with parchment or a Silpat mat.

Place strawberries on the prepared baking sheet, and drizzle with olive oil. Place in the oven to roast until fragrant and soft, about 18 to 20 minutes.

Remove the strawberries from the oven.

Pour the roasted strawberries and any liquids that accumulated on the baking sheet into the bowl of a food processor.

Add 2 tablespoons of sugar and the juice of half of the lime. Blend until smooth.

In a medium bowl whisk together coconut milk, the remaining lime juice, the remaining 2 tablespoons of sugar, and vanilla.

(By the way, if you’re wondering why there are two cans of coconut milk pictured above when the recipe only calls for 1 can … I doubled the recipe)

Stir all but 2 tablespoons of the toasted coconut into the milk mixture, and set aside the 2 tablespoons for garnish.

Dollop a spoonful of the strawberry puree into the bottom of each ice pop mold.

Start with just 10 molds in case you do not have enough to fill 12 molds. Whisk the coconut milk mixture and add to the ice pop molds, filling each 2/3 high.