Vanilla Ice Cream - Pioneer Woman

By lindaauman

For the Kitchen Aid ice cream attachment, use a low setting to churn (Stir or 2).
From Shakespeare Movie Night episode.
Includes variations for chocolate ice cream and strawberry ice cream.

Ingredients

• For Chocolate Ice Cream Add to 1/3 of the Vanilla Mixture:
• 1 whole Vanilla Bean, Split And Scraped
• 3 cups Half-and-half
• 2 cups Sugar
• 8 (up To 9) Large Egg Yolks (or 5 whole eggs)
• 3 cups Heavy Cream
• 3 ounces dark chocolate chips
• 1 tablespoons heavy cream
• 2 T cocoa powder
• For Strawberry Ice Cream Add to 1/3 of the Vanilla Mixture:
• 1/2 pound strawberries, hulled
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 6 drops red food coloring

Details

Adapted from thepioneerwoman.com

Preparation

Step 1

Heat half-and-half and 2 cups sugar in a saucepan over low heat, adding vanilla “caviar” to the mixture. (You can also drop in the scraped vanilla bean, just to extract all the flavor. Make sure to discard the bean before moving to the next step.) Turn off heat when mixture is totally heated.

Beat egg yolks by hand or with an electric mixer until yolks are pale yellow and slightly thick. Temper the egg yolks by slowly drizzling into the 1 1/2 cups of hot half-and-half mixture, whisking constantly. After that, slowly pour the egg yolk/half-and-half mixture into the pan containing the rest of the half-and-half mixture. Cook over low to medium-low heat (depending on how hot your stove gets) until quite thick, stirring constantly. Drain custard using a fine mesh strainer, then pour into a bowl with the heavy cream. Stir to combine.

Chill mixture completely, then freeze in an ice cream maker until thick. Place container in freezer to harden for at least eight hours.

Serve with something chocolate. Enjoy!

For the chocolate ice cream:
Melt the dark chocolate chips with the heavy cream over a double boiler. When the chocolate and cream mixture is smooth and melted, add 1 cup of the reserved custard and combine. Return this mixture back to the pitcher. (This step is to ease the mixing process to make it easier to pour back into the custard and could therefore be omitted.) Whisk the cocoa into the pitcher. Pour into an ice cream maker and churn as per the manufacturer's instructions. (This will take approximately 1 hour.)

For the strawberry ice cream layer:
Combine the strawberries, sugar and red food coloring in a blender and puree until smooth (or you can stop just short of smooth if you want a little texture). Pour the pureed strawberries into the final third of the chilled custard mixtures and stir. Pour into the ice cream maker and churn.

To make Neapolitan Ice Cream, equally divide the vanilla custard into 3 bowls - one to use as the vanilla layer, one to use as the chocolate layer and one to use as the strawberry layer.

Line a 6-cup loaf pan with plastic wrap. Scoop the chocolate ice cream into the pan. Smooth over and place in the freezer for at least 1 hour.

For the vanilla ice-cream layer, add the vanilla custard to the ice cream maker and churn according to the instructions. Spread over chocolate ice cream layer and put in freezer for an hour.

For the strawberry ice cream layer, pour the strawberry mixture into the ice cream maker and churn according to instructions. Spread over the vanilla ice cream layer and put in freezer for at least an hour.

To serve:
Remove the loaf pan from the freezer, turn upside down onto a serving plate and remove the plastic wrap. Slice neatly with a knife that has been dipped in very hot water. Serve immediately.