To describe a food as melt-in-the-mouth is a very good thing. From candy floss and M&M's to chicken parfait and gnocchi, in my experience the conversion in the mouth of something from solid to liquid makes us very happy. And nowhere is this tongue-coating delight felt more keenly than with ice-cream. Whether we are first-teeth-young or no-teeth-old, an ice-cream is a pure, sensory delight.
Even so, there are tough choices to be made, chief among them whether to serve it in a cone or cup. The ability to eat both the ice-cream and its wafer receptacle not only tastes great, it also generates less recycling or washing-up, while the great advantage of the cup is that it eradicates all risk of ice-cream splat trauma. What toppings, fillings and other extras you add to your cone orcup – that's another big decision. For all the enduring popularity of the 99 Flake, the contrast of the hard chocolate stick with the super-smooth ice-cream has never worked for me as well as, say, chopped nuts and swirls of caramel, chocolate or tahini sauce.
The big choice for those who make ice-cream at home, however, is whether to invest in an ice-cream machine. Ice-cream from a machine is the easiest way to ensure your creation gets a "Wow!" from friends, even though you've essentially just made a custard, tipped it into a machine and pressed "On". That's because continuous churning restricts the creation of ice crystals, making the end result smooth and creamy. Even so, machines are not cheap, and it really is very easy to make good ice-cream without one: you just need to check on the custard a few times while it's freezing, and give it a good stir by hand. It may not be quite as smooth as a machine-made version, but that shouldn't be too much of an issue, especially if you eat the ice-cream on the day it's made. Either way, be sure to take the ice-cream out of the freezer 10 or so minutes before you plan to serve it, to give it a chance to soften.
Chocolate, rose and walnut ice-cream
One of the great advantages of making your own ice-cream is the fun you can have experimenting with the ingredients that go into it. For all the beauty of a single-flavour, single scoop, sometimes it's fun to play. Rose is the key to this ice, but try to get hold of good-quality rose water, preferably a fragrant and delicate Lebanese brand, because many more common types tend to tip over into the tastes-like-perfume bracket, which is never a good thing and will dominate the flavour of your ice-cream. Serves eight.
350ml full-fat milk
300ml whipping cream
20g cocoa powder
3 egg yolks
100g caster sugar
100g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids), chopped
1 tsp instant coffee powder
2 tsp rose water
65g toasted walnuts, broken into 1cm pieces
3 digestive biscuits, broken into 1cmpieces
120g rose-flavoured Turkish delight, chopped into 1cm cubes
1 tsp dried rose petals, to garnish
For the chocolate sauce
200ml double cream
100g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids), finely chopped
½ tsp brandy (optional)
Pour the milk and cream into a saucepan and, on a medium heat, cook for six minutes, until it starts to simmer. Pour 80ml of the mix into a small bowl and add the cocoa. Whisk to combine, then return to the pan. Stir, turn the heat to medium-low and cook for six to seven minutes, stirring often, then remove from the heat.
Put the egg yolks and sugar in a bowl and whisk until pale. Pour over 100ml of the warm chocolate cream and continue to mix. Tip the lot back into the pan, add the chocolate and coffee, and stir to melt. Cook gently for six minutes, until the custard thickens, then set aside to cool.
Add the rose water a spoonful at atime, tasting after each addition to make sure the rose flavour doesn't take over. Churn in an ice-cream machine until semi-frozen (or put in a suitable container and freeze, giving it a good stir every half-hour or so), then spoon into a plastic container for which you have a lid, stir in the walnuts and biscuits, cover and freeze for at least an hour.
Make the sauce just before serving. Put the cream in a small saucepan on a medium heat. As soon as it starts to boil, pour it over the chocolate and stir until smooth. Stir in the brandy, if using. Spoon the ice-cream into glasses, cones or cups, dribble some sauce on top, sprinkle with the Turkish delight and rose petals, and serve at once.
Grilled bread pudding with lemon and basil ice-cream
This is two recipes in one, and the combination of the two is a very happy one. Brioche is the best choice for the pudding, and is now sold in many supermarkets. The ice-cream, give or take an adjustment or two, comes from my friend Helen Goh's notebook – she can't for the life of her remember where she got hold of the recipe, so apologies in advance for any inadvertent plagiarism. Serves eight.
For the bread pudding
420ml full-fat milk
170ml double cream
1 medium orange, zest shaved into long strips
2 cinnamon sticks, broken in half
1 vanilla pod, cut in half lengthways and the seeds scraped out
400g brioche loaf, crusts removed, cut into 8 2.5cm-thick slices
75g caster sugar
5 eggs
For the ice-cream
450ml full-fat milk
40g large basil leaves, torn
Shaved rind of 2 small lemons
225g caster sugar
6 egg yolks
2 tbsp lemon juice
225ml whipping cream
To serve
150g fresh raspberries, roughly mashed with 1 tbsp icing sugar
Start with the bread pudding. Put the milk, cream, orange strips, cinnamon, vanilla pod and seeds in a saucepan, and cook for about six minutes on a medium heat, until just about to come to a boil. Remove from the heat, set aside to cool, cover and leave to infuse for a couple of hours, and preferably overnight in the fridge.
Pour the milk for the ice-cream into a saucepan and cook on a medium heat for five to six minutes, until it just comes to a boil. Add the basil and lemon rind, remove from the heat and leave to infuse for an hour. Strain through a fine sieve, pressing the leaves to extract as much flavour from them as possible, then discard the leaves and lemon rind. Beat the sugar and yolks until light and fluffy, combine with the infused milk, and return the mixture to the pan. Simmer on a medium heat for six minutes, until the custard thickens, then remove, set aside to cool, then add the lemon juice.
Lightly whip the cream, then fold it into the custard. Churn in an ice-cream machine until almost frozen (or put in a suitable container and freeze, giving it a good stir every half-hour or so). Transfer to a container and freeze for at least an hour. (Remember to remove it from the freezer 10 minutes before you are due to serve, so it softens.)
Heat the oven to 170C/335F/gas mark 3. Lay the brioche slices on a 22cm x 32cm oven tray lined with parchment – don't let them overlap.
Put 35g caster sugar in a bowl with the eggs, and whisk until pale. Pass the infused milk and cream through a fine-mesh sieve on to the egg mixture, whisking continuously, then pour evenly over the brioche. Bake for 25 minutes, until the custard is cooked through, puffed up and golden-brown. Set aside to cool, then cut into eight rectangular pieces.
Preheat the grill to its highest setting. Sprinkle the remaining caster sugar evenly over the brioche pieces and grill for two to three minutes, until the sugar has caramelised and the bread started to go crisp. Remove and leave to cool for a few minutes, then serve topped with a generous scoop of ice-cream and some raspberries.
Yotam Ottolenghi is chef/patron of Ottolenghi and Nopi in London.
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