Honey Recipes: Toasted Sesame Honey Ice Cream

Toasted Sesame Honey Ice-Cream

Lucky beekeepers (and those we love) have more honey stashed away than the modern world knows what to do with. Personally, I keep a collection of high-honey-use recipes like this one to burn up excess honey.

Toasted Sesame & Honey Ice Cream

Inspired by the flavors of honey halva, I’ve adapted this recipe from David Lebowitz’ basic vanilla recipe. It pairs ridiculously well with these sumptuous chocolate tahini cakes. Even better, the entire combination is gluten-free.

Ingredients:

5 egg yolks

1 1/2 cups milk

1 cup heavy cream

1/2 cup honey (I like amber honey here, but if you’re omitting the sesame for some reason, use light honey instead.)

1/3 cup white sesame seeds

pinch of salt (IMHO, salt is key in this recipe as it balances the honey by adding warmth)

Steps:

1. Toast the sesame seeds until lightly colored. Set aside to cool.
2. Whisk the egg yolks and honey in a large bowl, blending until thick and pale yellow. This may take a couple of minutes.
3. Set up an ice bath by placing a 2-quart (2l) bowl in a larger bowl partially filled with ice and water. In the dry bowl, pour  the cup of heavy cream. You’ll come back to this bowl in a few minutes.
4. Heat the milk in a saucepan just until it barely boils. Gradually pour some of the milk into the yolk mixture, whisking constantly as you pour. Scrape the warmed yolks and milk back into the saucepan.
5. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly and scraping the bottom with a heat-resistant spatula, until the custard thickens enough to coat the spatula.
6. Strain the custard into the bowl with heavy cream. Stir over the ice until cool, add a pinch of salt, then refrigerate to chill thoroughly. Preferably overnight.
7. Freeze the custard in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. A couple minutes before the ice-cream is complete, add the toasted sesame seeds.

Tags: gluten-free, recipes