Saturday, July 01, 2006

chestnut ice cream



Simple and satisfying, chestnut ice cream is my contribution to my summer ice cream event!

I am growing increasingly fond of chestnut as a flavour. A versatile nut, chestnut can be eaten candied, boiled or roasted. Another important use of chestnut is ground as flour, which can then be used to prepare bread, cakes and pasta. My favourite chestnut recipes include roasted chestnuts, marrons glacés and chestnut cake.

The ice cream I describe here tastes of pure chestnut. The recipe calls for less sugar because the chestnut spread used as an ingredient is very sweet. Chestnut puree can be used instead; however, the quantity of sugar will then need to be increased. I decided to use chestnut spread partly because it contains glucose, and glucose helps create a smoother (less icy) ice cream that tends to last longer. Sweetened chestnut spread can often be found in ethnic or specialty food stores.


Chestnut ice cream

1 cup 35% cream
1 cup whole milk
1/4 cup sugar
5 egg yolks

1 - (225g) can of sweetened chestnut spread

1. Place cream and whole milk in a small saucepan. Bring to a rolling boil over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally.
2. In a small bowl, whisk 1/4 cup of sugar with the egg yolks until well mixed. Temper the egg yolk mixture with 1/2 cup of the hot cream mixture.
3. Once tempered, add the rest of the egg mixture into the cream mixture. At this point you can add the sweetened chestnut spread and mix until combined. Bring the mixture up to 85ºC or until it coats the back of a wooden spoon.
4. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve and cool. Let the mixture sit in the refrigerator over night or until completely cool, at least four hours.
5. Process in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions.

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9 comments:

Anonymous said...

This looks great! My parents love to eat chestnut paste out of the can, with sour cream and jam, so I bet they'd love this ice cream. I'll have to make it for them at some point.

Sam said...

Hi Danielle,

Thanks for your lovely comment. The chestnut ice cream was an experiment and came out better than I expected. Thanks again for your contribution to the ice cream event.

Anonymous said...

Nice. I actually had an idea similar to this one at the restaurant I work at using chopped roased chestnuts, and chestnut honey. This looks positively delectable.

Riana Lagarde said...

Oh, mon mari would love this! I'll try it!! thanks!!

julie said...

I think it is a great idea too, must try it!

Sam said...

Hi Chopper Dave, Riana and Julie,

Thanks for visting and for your lovely comments. Chestnut is just a yummy flavour.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the experiment! My grandmother has 2 chestnut trees in the back yard and every year I make chestnut puree to pour over desserts and add to homemade ice cream... I still hadn't found a recipe that highlights the flavor - but I just made this (its cooling as I write for our Thanksgiving meal) and flavor is WONDERFUL! I made a double recipe - and used 1/2 raw sugar and 1/2 brown sugar - and added about a 1/3 of a vanilla bean.

If you have access to fresh chestnuts, here's the recipe...

2 lbs chestnuts (weight while shelled)
2 cups milk
stick of butter (softened)
Simple Syrup:1 cup sugar & 1 cup h20

Cut nuts in half, add to boiling h20 - boil 10-ish minutes (until nutmeat is tender)
Drain & shell
Mash nutmeats
Add simple syrup, butter, milk

You can add as much or as little milk as you like - thicker puree is great for filled chocolates or spreading on bread... this recipe is a bit thinner than that.

If its too chunky, you can always run it through a blender.

Enjoy and thanks for the great blog!

Anonymous said...

I was so happy to find this recipe on your blog (which is great btw). I recently purchased a marron glacé ice cream which was good but very expensive, and since I love making homemade ice cream I knew I could recreate it if I could only find a good recipe. I tried yours, and it's terrific--rich and creamy, and the chestnut flavor comes through nicely. Thanks for posting it!

Anonymous said...

I just made this recipe, and it is awesome! The texture is very smooth, and the flavour is fabulous! I'm using the same brand of Chestnut puree you are using. The only thing I change next time is that I'll use a lot less sugar than even just 1/4 cup. Probably I'll just skip the sugar, because the chestnut puree is already really sweet. Thankyou sooooo much for your post, this is an icecream recipe I will certainly treasure!