Thursday 10 April 2014

Toasted Sesame Seed Ice Cream











We were in the city the other night and after dinner we set out to find some gelato, as you do. It was cool and rainy and we jumped puddles and swerved umbrellas until we found the nearest Gelateria (not hard in Melbourne). We took a while to choose our flavours, then sat in silence, cones in hand, and ate creamy gelato (hazelnut for me) with our coats on. Newly inspired, I came home and made Toasted Sesame Seed Ice Cream. It's still raining and I'm tempted to put my coat on, take a scoop of ice cream and sit outside. Eating ice cream with my coat on in the rain might be my new hobby.



Toasted Sesame Seed Ice Cream
slightly adapted from Gourmet Traveller
makes about 1 litre

80g sesame seeds
250ml milk
3 teaspoons tahini
500ml pouring cream
6 egg yolks
120g caster sugar

Pour the sesame seeds into a large frying pan. Heat the frying pan over medium heat and toast the sesame seeds until they are light golden. Stir or shake the seeds often as they burn easily. Remove the from the heat. Reserve 1 teaspoon of seeds for serving and then pour the rest of the seeds into a small saucepan. Add the milk, 250ml of the cream and the tahini and bring to the boil. Remove from the heat, allow the mixture to cool to room temperature and then chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.

Once the milk-cream mixture has chilled and the sesame seeds have released their flavour, strain them through a fine sieve and discard the seeds, reserving the milk-cream and put it into a saucepan with the remaining 250ml of cream and bring to the boil.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk the egg yolks and sugar until thick and pale. With the mixer on low speed, add the hot cream mixture a little at a time. Pour the mixture back into the pan and cook over a low heat, stirring constantly until it coats the back of a wooden spoon thickly (5 - 10 minutes). Pour the mixture into a clean bowl and chill it in the refrigerator until completely cold.

Churn the mixture in an ice cream machine according to manufacturer's instructions. Scoop it into a container and freeze until firm enough to scoop. Serve with a sprinkle of the reserved toasted sesame seeds.

16 comments:

  1. Be still my beating heart! How exquisite! Pinned.

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  2. Wow, looks amazing! I don't know of any gelato shops in our immediate area. We have a lot of ice cream and frozen yogurt though! This looks divine!

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    1. Gelato is a religion here. I think the Italians make the best ice cream in the world... apart from my own of course *happy face*.

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  3. That seems to be an ideal ice cream when it's raining! I love it :) & I love when you told your stories, it's always magical!

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  4. Oh my! What an awesome idea. I never would've thought to make ice cream from tahini but it looks delicious. Haha... I've eaten ice cream in the snow before, in padded snow gear, gloves and a beanie. It's fabulous as not one drop of ice cream dares to melt (just like eating ice cream whilst in the freezer, ha!) x

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    1. The tahini is amazing in this. You're going to love it. I think it would have to be a catastrophic weather event to stop me from eating ice cream.

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  5. I just found a recipe for a honey-sesame see pie that uses tahini too :) sounds delightful! we could pair up the two for dessert-fest!

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    1. We would be a serious dessert machine if we combined our fire power. x

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  6. Oh goodness me. I want to eat the whole tub! I love gelati, ice cream, sorbet - if it's frozen and contains sugar I am all there. The flavour of this sesame based one must be so unique as well. I can just imagine it with some gorgeous dark chocolate topping...

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    1. Thanks Amy. Chocolate topping would take this to the next level and ground floor is pretty darn good even if I do say so myself.

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  7. Your recipe reminded me of a dessert that used to be on offer in one of our favourite local restaurants (now sadly no more) which was halva ice cream. As you are most likely aware halva is a Greek sweet made with sugar or honey and tahini either plain flavour or combined with other flavours (e.g. chocolate) and also containing pieces of pistachio or other nuts or just plain halva. However, this halva ice-cream dessert was basically the ice-cream on its own combined with large pieces of halva. Anyway the memory only came back to me quite a while after the initial excitement of the very thought of combining tahini as an ingredient or rather as the basic ingredient in terms of flavour for an ice-cream or in fact for any kind of a sweet or dessert. I am rather partial to the flavour of tahini as part of our local cuisine here in Cyprus. Great recipe needless to add. Now I think I just have to get myself an ice-cream machine!

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    1. Thanks so much for this lovely comment Manthos. We have halva here. I love that stuff. The tahini in this ice cream is really lovely. I know it's a rather unusual ingredient to put in ice cream, but it really works. You should get yourself an ice cream machine, make this ice cream, then tell me all about it.

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