Marion’s Vanilla Ice Cream
This much loved recipe was found after months of looking, scrunched up underneath Mum’s vintage meat mincer, with a label saying “do not touch”. We can only assume this was directed at our Dad… We are incredibly grateful to have found it, as she never showed anyone how to make her vanilla ice cream. She probably thought we just knew from watching her make it so many times, the task has been on us to try and recreate it. She used her Gaggia ice cream machine almost weekly to make huge amounts of this, which she would serve to guests at every opportunity. Her secret was to add a generous amount of real vanilla, and serve it with homemade chocolate sauce. I couldn’t look at her ice cream machine after she died, I actually hid it from view. But with time it’s been bought out cleaned and has been humming away making ice cream all Summer long. I know that would make Mum so happy.
ingredients
ice cream machine
200ml whole milk
2 vanilla beans, split
4 egg yolks
80g sugar
200ml heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
A tale of two ice cream machines: the machine Mum gave me and the one she always used. I love using hers though, the sound of it churning reminds me so much of her.
method
Split the vanilla beans and scrape the vanilla out. Put the milk, the vanilla, and the bean husks into a small saucepan and heat to just before the boiling point. Remove from heat, cover, and let stand for 15 minutes. Remove the vanilla husks and let the milk cool.
In a separate bowl mix the yolks, sugar, double cream and sea salt. Then add the cooled vanilla milk and stir well. Pour into a pre-cooled ice cream maker and set the timer for 30 minutes. Once beaten you should have beautiful vanilla ice cream. Decant into an ice cream tub and store for at least 8 hours in the freezer before serving, or until needed.