Fresh Mint Ice Cream (with cookies!)
06Although this mint ice cream is featured in my ice cream bible, The Perfect Scoop, I neglected to really notice it until I came across David’s recent blog post about it.
Mint and chocolate combinations are a relatively newish love of mine. I think ever since I found Trader Joe’s Candy Cane JoJos a few years back, I’ve been a wee bit obsessed. I’m looking forward to the holidays for an excuse to make many, many chocolate/mint combo desserts. At any rate, I debated what type of chocolate to add to this ice cream and landed on Oreos. To be honest, I reallllly wanted brownie chunks but I was too lazy to make brownies and I didn’t want to pay for them, either. The upside (besides, of course, that the Oreos tasted great with the ice cream) was that I had an extra half package or so of Oreos to make cookies and cream ice cream the next week!
When I first tried the ice cream (okay, okay, I tried the custard before it was really ice cream…), I wasn’t sure what to think. Actually, I thought it was a bit odd. Good, but odd. But the more I ate it, the more I really liked it. It’s much different than your standard mint ice cream, so if you’re looking for that, this is not the recipe for you. This ice cream is very herbaceous, but really refreshing and delicious. I couldn’t help thinking that with some rum and lime juice, it would also make a fabulous mojito ice cream. 🙂
Fresh Mint Ice Cream with Oreos
Makes 1 quart
Adapted from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop
1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy cream
pinch of salt
2 cups packed fresh mint leaves
5 large egg yolks
10-15 chocolate sandwich cookies, chopped
Warm the milk, sugar, salt, and one cup of the cream in a medium saucepan to steaming. Add the mint leaves, cover, and remove from the heat. Let steep at room temperature for 1 hour.
Remove the mint with a strainer, then press down with a spatula to extract as much mint flavor as possible. Discard the mint.
Pour the remaining cup of heavy cream into a bowl and set a strainer on top.
Rewarm the infused milk. Whisk the egg yolks together in another bowl. Slowly pour some of the warm milk mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly, and then pour the egg mixture back into the saucepan. Cook the custard, stirring occasionally with a heatproof spatula, until it’s thick enough to coat the back of the spatula (about 170 degrees).
Immediately strain the mixture into the cream, and stir over an ice bath until cool. Refrigerate the mixture thoroughly, then freeze it according to your ice cream manufacturer’s instructions. Fold in the chocolate sandwich cookies as you’re transferring the churned ice cream to a container.
Oh wow! What a combo! Very ingenious to combine the Oreos with mint. Love the pic too!
<y son will love me forever if I make this ….Love the chunky cookies in the ice-cream!!
I just made this recipe too – it was different than I expected – but I loved it too! Yours looks great with the Oreos 🙂
I love this Elly. I better break out the ice cream maker summer has returned!!
Your description sounds pretty intriguing. I have always been a lover of the standard mint chocolate chip ice cream, so now I feel like I have to try this fresh mint combo. With cookies, of course!
I’ve read so many blogs that rave about his book I got it checked out from the library. 🙂 I so have to make this one! Love mint chocolate chip, and of course with hot fudge. Yum.