Hot tip for ice cream enthusiasts! Vanilla Sauce, a stirred cooked custard, can be churned and frozen to become vanilla ice cream.
The base can be infused with flavors, like coffee or fruits, or mixed with inclusions like crushed toffee or chocolate sauce. All of the ingredients add flavor to the ice cream, but each one also plays a part in determining consistency and mouthfeel. The eggs make it rich and smooth. For best results, use a mixture of milk and cream to avoid having too much butterfat in the mix. The milk and cream allow for incorporation of air during freezing, giving the final product a smoother mouthfeel and lighter body. However, too much incorporated air will diminish the flavor, make the ice cream too soft, and make it melt quickly. Sugar both adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point of the base, keeping the ice cream from freezing too hard.
There are a number of different methods for adding flavorings to ice creams. You may simply infuse the sauce with flavor while you are heating the milk (or cream, or a combination) for the vanilla sauce. Purées can be blended into the custard after it has cooled, or folded into still soft, just-churned ice cream for a swirled effect. Melted chocolate can be added to the still warm, just-cooked ice cream base, while nut pastes such as peanut butter and praline paste can be added to the milk and cream and cooked into the base mixture.
Some fruit juices or frozen concentrates such as lemon, orange, or passion fruit have very intense flavor. Add these slowly, tasting along the wya, until you've added just enough to give the proper flavor. It is not necessary to reduce the volume of liquid in the base; adding this amount of additional liquid will not noticeably affect the ice cream’s texture or volume. The ice cream base should be allowed to rest, or mature, in the refrigerator at for several hours before freezing. This will result in a smoother ice cream.
To churn the ice cream, run the chilled base in an ice cream freezer only to soft-serve consistency. Extract it from the machine, pack into containers, and place in a freezer for several hours to allow it to firm to a servable temperature and consistency.
