Proper Strawberry Ice Cream
a gorgeous no-churn recipe anyone can make
I am going to be, to the annoyance of my husband, one of those South Africans who announce to anyone willing to listen, that they ‘HAVE TO’ make this recipe! But honestly you should…
Most South Africans have a lot of ‘have to’s’ in our life - I get it, we are bossy.
BUT, this ice-cream is too good not to make and a true celebration of some warmer weather finally heading our way!
Although easy to make, it is, yes, a bit ‘faffy’ but I am not even going to apologise, because sometimes great things takes a bit of effort.
The importance of real strawberries
Without sounding preachy, it’s not even worth making this ice cream with non-organic strawberries – I’m sorry, it just isn’t.
In our world dominated by big food and industrial agriculture, we have forgotten what real strawberries look and taste like.
There is off course a place for gorgeous looking supermarket strawberries (pavlovas!) but not in this dessert where they are the magic ingredient, they are worth the wait, I promise.
Where to source
When in season, you can find a punnet at your local farmers market, local organic supermarket or your local food club.
Taste test
At home we had a bit of a taste test, whereby I chopped beautiful looking supermarket strawberries in one bowl, and small organic tiny (a bit scruffy looking) strawbs in another bowl, I made the kids and Nsona, my sous chef, blind taste the strawberries and off course the organic strawberries won hands down on taste.
In fact, Mia said worringly:
I wish everyone get to taste what real strawberries taste like, because people are going to forget, Mamma.
So there you have it, if you are in late spring or early summer and the tiny imperfect strawberries are in season, MAKE THIS!
Also, please try to source organic cream from small scale dairies – because finding a fantastic tasting cream (and eggs! but enough preaching) is the foundation of ice cream, its really worth sourcing the best.
There are 2 steps in this ice-cream
whipping the cream to gentle peaks (really floppy gentle peaks, no stiffness)
whisking the egg yolks and sugar together in a glass bowl – over gently simmering water (like you would melt chocolate)
Equipment
You will need an electric hand or stand mixer (kitchen aid)
Ingredients
700 g organic strawberries
20 g icing sugar
200 ml organic cream
2 egg yolks
1 whole egg
180 g caster sugar
1 tsp lemon juice
salt
Method
Put the strawberries in a food processor, blitz to a puree and pass through a large sieve set over a bowl. Use a spatula to help push the through the puree, leaving the seeds in the sieve, you should end with about 450ml puree.
Pour 150ml of puree into a small bowl and add the icing sugar (I sieved the icing sugar to prevent lumps), mix well. Set in the fridge. Put the remaining 300ml in a second bowl and also refrigerate.
Pour the cream into a med bowl and whisk to soft peaks, making sure not to over-whip - put the cream in the fridge.
Fill a small saucepan with enough water to come up about 5cm up the sides, bring to a gentle simmer.
Put the egg yolks, whole egg, sugar and lemon juice into a large bowl, one that would fit over the simmering water.
Whisk briefly with your hand mixer (or electric mixer) to combine the ingredients and place the bowl on top of the saucepan with simmering water, making sure the base of the bowl does not touch the water.
Whisk continuously for 6 minutes, until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is warmed. Take the mixture off the heat and whisk on a medium/low setting for 5 minutes, until the mixture is thick, pale and cooled. TIP: you can use your electric mixture (kitchen aid).
Add the 300ml strawberry puree to the thickened mixture and gently mix, fold in the whipped cream, spoon the mixture into a large, glass freezer container and freeze for at least 12 hours, overnight is best. TIP: I swirled a few tablespoons of the sweetened puree through the ice cream to create a swirled effect (see the pic).
Troubleshooting: if you whipped the cream too far and there are lumps of cream in your mixture, don’t worry, you can give the mixture a quick whizz to remove the lumps.
Ten minutes before serving, remove the ice-cream from the freezer to soften lightly. Scoop the ice cream into bowls and add the sweetened strawberry puree dolloped on top. Enjoy!
x Adré