No-Churn Honey Ice Cream
No ice cream machine, no custard, no standing over a pot tempering egg yolks.
Three ingredients and a whisk.
What makes this one work is that nothing gets cooked. A traditional ice cream base is heated, which is fine for sugar but wasteful with a good honey. Here the honey goes into cold cream and stays exactly as it came out of the jar, which means you taste it properly. Jarrah in particular comes through as deep toffee and malt rather than generic sweetness.
Ingredients
Makes about 1 litre
600ml thickened cream, well chilled
1 × 395g tin sweetened condensed milk, chilled
⅓ cup Jarrah honey, plus more for serving
1 tsp vanilla extract, optional
A pinch of salt
To serve
Toasted almonds, roughly chopped
More Jarrah honey, for drizzling
Method
Chill everything first. The cream, the condensed milk and the bowl. Cold cream whips higher and faster, and a warm bowl is the usual reason no-churn ice cream turns out dense.
Whisk the condensed milk, honey, vanilla and salt together in a large bowl until completely smooth. Do this before the cream goes anywhere near it, because honey will not fold evenly into whipped cream.
In a separate bowl, whip the cream to stiff peaks. Stop as soon as it holds its shape. Over-whipped cream goes grainy and you can't bring it back.
Add a third of the cream to the honey mixture and stir it through to loosen everything.
Fold the rest through in two goes, gently, with a spatula. You want it light and streak-free without knocking the air out.
Pour into a loaf tin or a container, cover the surface with baking paper pressed straight onto it, and freeze for at least six hours. Overnight is better.
Take it out five minutes before serving so it scoops properly.
To serve
Scoop into glasses or onto plates, scatter over toasted almonds and drizzle with more Jarrah.
The almonds matter more than they look. Toast them in a dry pan for a few minutes until they smell nutty, and the contrast against the soft ice cream is most of the pleasure.
Why Jarrah
It's the one we'd use here. Rich, toffee-like and bold enough to stand up to cream, which lighter honeys don't. Blackbutt TA35+ is the more unusual choice if you have a jar, darker again and almost molasses.
Coastal works well too if you'd like something gentler, and it's the sensible option if you're making a double batch.
A honey affogato, while you're at it
Put a scoop in a glass, pour a shot of hot espresso over it and add a spoonful of honey. The coffee melts the edges, the honey pools at the bottom, and it takes about forty seconds to assemble.
It's the best thing you can do with a scoop of this, and it's what's in the glass in the photograph above.
Keeping it
It'll keep for a month in the freezer, though the texture is best in the first week or two.
Press baking paper directly onto the surface before you put the lid on. That's what stops ice crystals forming, and it's the step most people leave out.