I have made my first successful ice cream, it had a fantastic texture, not icy like my other attempts! I realize that what was holding me back was the type of cream that I was using. Here in Singapore, cream is not sold as single cream or double cream. The type of cream available are “pure cream”, “thickened cream” or “whipping cream”. “Pure Cream” has 45 % milk fat which is as close to the 48% found in double cream.
I discovered this while reading Gordon Ramsay’s “Just Desserts” before bed. It’s a great read with very good recipes and useful hints. There are many recipes which I have tried including the crepes, lemon curd pudding (fascinating lumpy mixture that bakes to a soufflé top and creamy lemon curd pudding at the bottom), shortbread, custards and hopefully many more. I’ve adapted this recipe from Gordon’s Ramsay’s classic vanilla ice cream. I adjusted the ratio of cream to milk as I wanted to finish what I had. Leftover cream always spoils and get thrown away in my fridge. I bought my vanilla beans from Mustafa, its organic from India and 2 for $2.50. I had this scooped on to chocolate madelines, recipe from here. The madelines are very rich and buttery, they don’t rise very much though because of the richness of the batter. I know I have a thing with moulds!! I love making individual portioned cakes and desserts.
Classic vanilla ice cream
400ml pure cream
100ml milk
5 egg yolks
50g sugar
1 vanilla pod
Whisk egg yolks with sugar in a bowl till thick and pale. Split vanilla pod with scissors and scrape seeds with knife. Put pod and seeds, milk and cream into a saucepan. Put on low heat for about 5 minutes till steam rises from mixture and small bubbles appear on the edges of the saucepan. Use a balloon whisk to whisk mixture. Add half the cream mixture to the egg yolks in bowl and whisk. Pour the yolk and milk mixture back into the saucepan and cook on low heat, continuously whisking till the mixture is thick, about 5-10 mins. DO NOT BOIL.
Pour into a jug and keep covered. Leave to chill for 4-5 hours or preferable overnight. Switch on your ice cream machine and start the motor. Pour the mixture steadily into the spout. Churn for 25-10 mins till the ice cream is a soft serve scoopable texture. When you lift the paddle out of the machine, there should be clumps of ice cream on it. Scrape into a plastic container and place into freezer to set.
Wow, Farhan, what a success! Those madeleines look so good, and the ice cream sounds totally decadent. I have to resort to other techniques for the creamy ice cream thing, as I’ve never found anything more that 35% cream here in Canada. I’m glad you solved your ice cream problem, though. It looks perfect.
P.S. I think I might die unless I get the recipe for that lemon curd pudding. Could you pass it on to me? Yes, it seems that I’m on a very serious lemon kick.
yeay, congratulations! btw, i saw double cream just yesterday at Jason’s Marketplace at Paragon! maybe you can try that. by the way, do you know what the equivalent of “heavy cream” is?
Success indeed! The combinations is very classy and fabulous!
Shafaa: heavy cream is equivalent to what they sell here as “whipping cream” in those small cartons
Cream is the high-fat component of milk. All creams in the United States are at least 18 percent milk fat. Some creams have higher fats than others
According to the U.S. government’s Code of Federal Regulations, heavy cream must consist of at least 36 percent milk fat, whipping cream has at least 30 percent but no more than 36 percent. Varieties of cream are defined by how much milk fat they contain.
- Heavy cream and heavy whipping cream are different names for essentially the same thing: cream that is 36% or more milk fat, and which doubles in volume when whipped.
- Light whipping cream is between 30 and 36% milk fat, and can also be whipped.
- Light cream, table cream, coffee cream or single cream are names for cream that is around 18% to 30% milk fat and will not whip.
OMG SO CONFUSING!! Thanks for enlightening me!!
I’m a sucker for madeleines and to pair them with this luscious ice cream is a sin!
Oh wow! Very beautiful photography as usual. It looks absolutely delicious.
I’m going to try that ice-cream recipe next time. It’s a little different to the one I usually use and yours looks so nice
Hi hi, I chanced upon your blog when looking for the type of cream to use my semifreddo(lighter version of icecream). Recipe calls for single/pouring cream, i read from some website that single/pouring cream is 10 to 15% fat. So i can actually use Bulla brand pure cream which is 35% fat? Will it be too creamy?
Nice blog! =)
Single cream can have up to 35% milk fat, I think it’ll be good for youe semifreddo as I find the higher the milk fat content, the better the texture of these frozen desserts are..
Unless you’e health conscious
I think it’ll work out fine!
Hi happygrub, thks for the advice! I can’t wait to whip up the semifreddo.
[...] such delightful bitefuls and so easy to make. I have made a cake out of the batter and chocolate madelines recently. This time the twist was flavouring them with vanilla pods. I then arranged them on a plate [...]