Recipe: Green Tea Ice Cream

#blogjune Day 1

Since I got an ice cream maker a few months ago, I started experimenting and have been eating too much ice cream 🙂 It’s a lot of fun and I’d like to make ginger ice cream next. I made a batch of green tea ice cream for our house warming party and since then, that is what we’re asked to bring to dinner parties. I guess I must be doing something right and I should share the recipe.

This recipe is derived from the Cuisinart recipe booklet and it contains instructions that require a Thermomix. Of course you can achieve the same result without it, it’s just so much easier to make the perfect ice cream mixture with one.

Ingredients

• 2 cups whole milk
• 1 tub thickened cream (300ml)
• 4 tablespoons green tea powder
• 5 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup castor sugar
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch

1. In a saucepan bring milk, cream, and green tea powder to a low simmer, stir with a whisk to dissolve as much green tea powder as possible.
2. Remove milk mixture from heat, stand for at least 15 minutes.
3. In Thermomix, mix egg yolks, sugar, and cornstarch for 2 minutes speed 6 or until mixture is thick and pale.
4. Scrap down side of bowl, at speed 1, slowly pour warm milk mixture into the the egg mixture.
5. Mix and cook mixture for 4 minutes speed 3 at 70°C until thick
6. Pour into a glass container through a strainer
7. Cover with a sheet of cling wrap directly on top of the mixture
8. Refrigerate at least 6 hours or overnight
9. The mixture is now ready for churning according to your ice cream maker manufacturer’s instructions

This recipe makes just over 1L of ice cream and can be stored in an air tight container in the freezer for 3 days. No it didn’t last that long, I just ate the last bit 😉

Thermomix recipe – Chinese sweet almond soup

Sweet almond soup, or sweet almond tea, is my favourite Chinese dessert. It’s made of sweet and bitter apricot kernels, rice, and rock sugar. It’s very simple but difficult to perfect. Nothing can compare to the version made by my awesome grandma, she’s a great cook. When I was little, I love helping in the kitchen, I know my grandma enjoyed the company of her little helper too, as she’s still telling others how I made my perfect tangyuans :). I still ask her for cooking advice these days, via FaceTime, of course.

I haven’t made sweet almond soup in a long time because it’s very fiddly, and without the right tool, it’s not going to taste as good, and I’d rather not eat it. Since I got my Thermomix late last year, I’ve been trying to convert grandma’s recipe to a Thermie one. I’ve made this 6 times, I’m still not 100% happy with the recipe, but it’s very close.

And here’s the recipe…

Ingredients:

• 100g sweet apricot kernels (the best quality kernels I could get were from the Chinese herbs place, Hong Ninh, in Northbridge. They’re massive and full of flavour!)
• 10g bitter apricot kernels
• 15-20g white rice
• 70g rock sugar
• 700g warm water

Method:

• Soak rice and kernels for at least 4 hours
• Place drained sweet and bitter apricot kernels, rice, and 300g water into TM bowl and blend for 2 minute on speed 8. Scrap down side of bowl and blend for another 1 minute on speed 8.
• Add remaining water and sugar and cook for 12 minutes at 90°c on speed 2.
• Boil for a further 2 minutes at 100°c on speed 2. You have to watch the TMX at this stage as it might start to boil.
• Strain and serve warm or cold (some people prefer their soup strained, some don’t, personal preference)

Edit: We don’t use almonds in this recipe. We refer to apricot seeds as almonds, it would sound very strange if I don’t call it almond soup 🙂