Wild AK Blueberry Ice Cream

by Emily | Apr 22, 2015 | Foraged, From the Garden, Recipes | 0 comments

This ice cream isn’t too hard to master but all your friends will me amazed when you tell them you made this yourself!

A couple of years ago I went berry picking in the fall with my friend Jenn (I wont tell you where! It’s a secret, of course!). I don’t have a ton of patience for sitting in one spot monotonously picking pea-sized things off the ground, so I only managed to get about a quart of blueberries. When I brought them home I found I also did not have the patience to pick all of the teeny-tiny stems off the berries so I took the lazy way out. I blended them, stems and all. I then ran the puree through cheese cloth sitting in a mesh strainer. What I ended up getting out of all that was about two cups of thick blueberry puree.

I froze this for about 4 months and dug it out of the freezer for a New Years dinner. I used about half of it for a blueberry gastrique I made with lamb, and the rest seemed like enough to keep, but I had no clue what for.

We’ve had a Cuisinart ice cream maker for about two years (one that Nina generously gave me), and I never had managed to churn out anything good. Well I let my very precise husband loose on the machine and whereas I had always simply eyeballed the recipes, my husband managed to create a masterpiece of a dark chocolate stout ice cream. A remembered the blueberries and a light bulb seemed to go off in my head! Make ice cream with it, my brain screamed! But of course I am not the ice cream master, so I sat there as my dear husband concocted this blissful creation.

Seriously though. MAKE YOUR OWN ICE CREAM. It’s so creamy, and rich, and you can put anything you want in it! The key is in the custard!

Note: Best results come from putting your freezing canister in the bottom of a chest freezer for 24 hours, or better yet, put in outside in Fairbanks, Alaska in the middle of January!

 Ingredients:

• 1 cup milk (we used 2%)
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 4 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup blueberry puree
• 1/2 sugar (for the blueberries)

Instructions: 

First heat up the blueberry puree with about 1/2 a cup of sugar, just to get the sugar to dissolve. In another pot mix milk, salt, and sugar and heat on medium low until steam starts to rise off of it. You can still stick your finger in the mixture at this point, but it’s pretty hot. In a separate bowl whisk four egg yolks until they are completely broken apart and a slightly lighter color. VERY SLOWLY pour the hot milk mixture into the eggs a little bit at a time as you whisk continually. Once all of the milk is incorporated pour the egg/milk mixture back into the pot and mix constantly with a wooden spoon until it begins to thicken. When it’s about the viscosity of maple syrup try the wooden spoon test. Pick your spoon up out of the mixture and run your finger horizontally over the back of the spoon. If the custard on top of the line doesn’t run down over the gap your finger made then it’s ready. Pour the custard through a mesh strainer into a bowl. Finally whisk in the heavy cream and the cooled blueberry sauce. Toss into ice cream maker and mix for about 30 minutes. When it is done it should be about the consistency of soft serve. Place into a storage container and freeze until it firms up completely.