Ren Behan - Author Wild Honey and Rye

Food Writer

Blackcurrants

White Chocolate and Blackcurrant No-Churn Easy Ice Cream

Could it be that I have found the perfect ice cream recipe? You don’t need an expensive ice cream machine. You don’t need to make a custard base with egg yolks and sugar. All you need is a can of condensed milk and some double cream and you pretty much have it right there. It’s no secret that you can make ice cream using condensed milk as a base and there are many recipes on-line and a couple of different quantities and methods that you can try. Once you know that you just need two ingredients to start with, the fun part kicks in when it comes to flavouring.

I am grateful to Kavey over at Kavey Eats for challenging us to use condensed milk as a base. Firstly, because there has been a can of condensed milk sitting in my cupboard for some time. I can’t even remember what I originally bought it for, but it definitely wasn’t ice cream. Luckily, it was still in date, but it’s easy enough to pick up at the shops. I used the full fat version, but you can buy lighter versions now, too. Secondly, I now know exactly how easy it is to make no-churn ice cream at home and the end result was very delicious. Perfectly creamy with a nice crunch from the chopped up chocolate.

The most challenging bit of my recipe is making a blackcurrant or forest fruit puree. Only in as much as you have to whizz it or blend it, then pass it through a sieve. But you could use any coulis, or you could leave the blackcurrant out altogether and just go for white chocolate. Or, you could follow my cherry compote recipe and blitz that down, too for a cherry ripple and white chocolate version. You chose.

I used one can of condensed milk (there didn’t seem to be any point in using half as for the BBC Good Food recipe, here) because what do you do with the rest of it? And I used four small pots (600ml in total) of double cream. But I have seen that whipping cream (or heavy cream in the US) works well, too. Blackcurrants are in season, but sadly I couldn’t find any yet, so I used frozen berries.

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White Chocolate and Blackcurrant No-Churn Easy Ice Cream

Prep

Total

Ingredients

  • 250g fresh or frozen blackcurrants or forest berries
  • 600ml double cream
  • 397g can of condensed milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract or the seeds of one vanilla pod
  • 100g white chocolate (I used Green and Blacks Vanilla), finely chopped or grated

Instructions

  1. Firstly, make the blackcurrant coulis/puree. Place the blackcurrants in a pan and add a tablespoon of water. Boil for just a minute or two, until the fruit begins to breakdown and soften slightly. Take off the heat. Using a hand blender or a stick blender, whizz the blackcurrants into a puree. Then, pass the blackcurrants through a fine sieve, pushing down with the back of a metal spoon, so that you have a smooth puree. Discard anything in the sieve. Leave the coulis/puree to one side to cool.
  2. For the ice cream, pour the can of condensed milk and double cream into a bowl. Add the vanilla extract or scrape in some vanilla seeds from the pod (by cutting it in half lengthways and using the tip of a knife to scrape them out). Use an electric hand whisk to beat the condensed milk, cream and vanilla until the mixture is quite thick for four-five minutes. It should be as thick as buttercream.
  3. Add the finely chopped or grated white chocolate and your cooled blackcurrant coulis/puree to the creamy mixture. Stir together lightly. Pour the mixture into a freezeable container or loaf tin, cover and leave overnight. There is no need to stir the mixture at all while it is freezing. Before serving, leave it to stand for twenty minutes or so, until you can easily scoop it.

Notes

Leave overnight to freeze

Recipe by Ren Behan

As mentioned, I am linking this post up to the Bloggers Scream for Ice Cream challenge over at Kavey Eats, using consended milk as the base.

IceCreamChallenge_thumb

Also, Choclette over at Chocolate Log Blog is hosting We Should Cocoa with a theme of blackcurrants, so I hope the white chocolate and blackcurrant coulis fits here.

Finally, I am linking this up to Sporting Snacks, too, hosted by me!

Hope you get to try this over the summer-time. Let’s hope it encourages the sunshine to come out!

What’s your flavour ice cream flavour combination? Have you ever tried making your own?

 

Honey Nut Toasted Oats with Ribena Berry Sauce

This is a quick breakfast post in response to Helen’s Breakfast Club challenge this month hosted by Helen herself over at Fuss Free Flavours.

The theme this month is cereal and we are asked to do something interesting with it. So, I made homemade ‘granola’ using rolled oats very lightly coated with honey, rapeseed oil and mixed nuts gently toasted in the oven.
Granola is very popular breakfast cereal in America, essentially it is a cereal made of oats that are baked until crisp and then dried fruits are added. Muesli (Swiss) is also a well-known breakfast cereal, but in muesli the oats are not baked. Granola is really easy to make, stores well in an airtight contained and best of all as you are making it yourself you can adjust the flavours, for example, to include more cinnamon. I used cinnamon sugar as I had it in my cupboard but if you don’t have that use brown sugar and add a teaspoon of cinnamon powder instead. This granola can also be sweetened with maple syrup too instead of honey before baking.
Once baked the granola is crisp and crunchy and can be eaten either with milk or yoghurt. You could also make it healthier by adding fresh fruit to your bowl. This weekend we had ours with little pots of homemade blackcurrant compote – calling it ‘Ribena Berry Sauce’ encouraged my kids to add some to make their cereal purple! I also slightly defeated the pursuit of crunchiness by pouring hot milk over mine – but that’s just because I am fan of having hot milk with all kinds of cereal.

Add your fruit, whether dried or fresh to the oats and nuts after baking. You are looking out for a gentle golden colour so be careful not to burn!

 

Honey Nut Toasted Oats with Ribena Berry Sauce
Oats inspired by a recipe for ‘Crunchy Granola’ by Michelle Stern
The Whole Family Cookbook

Ingredients

300g rolled oats (not quick cook)
50g pecan nuts, finely chopped
50g almonds, finely chopped
75g cinnamon sugar
A pinch of salt
60ml honey or maple syrup
60ml rapeseed or vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
50g raisins and/or chopped dates

For the Blackcurrant Compote/Ribena Berry Syrup

150g blackcurrants
2 tablespoons caster sugar
60ml water

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees celcius

2. Put the oats, nuts and cinnamon sugar into a bowl and mix well.

3. Combine the honey, oil and vanilla in a separate bowl, mix and then pour over the oats and nuts. Stir well to combine – it won’t be greasy.

4. Pour the mix onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof or baking paper and spread into an even layer.

5. Bake for 20 minutes and stir after 10 minutes to ensure the top bits don’t get too toasty.

6. While this is baking, put the blackcurrants, sugar and water into a small pan. Heat until the mixture begins to bubble, stir and cook for five minutes. (Check your oats in the oven!!) If you want the blackcurrant sauce to be thicker, cook for a further few minutes on a low heat. Take off the heat and leave it to one side.

6. Take the oats of the oven and leave to cool. Add the raisins and/or chopped dates.

7. Serve with cold or hot milk or yoghurt. Store the rest in an airtight container.

 

Blackcurrants are in season in the UK at the moment – they are a wonderful summer fruit – so I will link this up to Simple and in Season too.