One of my favorite ice creams is the Mint and Chocolate Ice Cream. I love how the mint feels cool in the mouth and paired with the crunchiness (and yumminess) of the chocolate, it is just perfect. This ice cream never lasts more than 3 days in our house. It is my go-to ice cream when we have a very hot summer.
If you want a more fruity ice cream, you can also try my Melon Sorbet!
What do I need to make the Mint and Chocolate Ice Cream?
You won’t need much, however this recipe calls for an ice cream machine. You can find very good ones now for a good price. I use the Cuisinart ICE-100 and I am very happy with it. I had it for over a year now and still works as it did the first day.
Thermometer: I like being precise when cooking sugar, crème etc. You can skip it once you know the right consistency of crème and sugar, but for beginners, it is a must
Ice Cream Container: to store properly your ice cream and avoid freezer burn
Immersion Blender: to blend the mint with the mixture.
Polyethylene Sheets: also called guitar sheets, they can be a bit hard to find in the US. they are usually used for chocolate work. You can use parchment paper instead, it will be a bit more complicated to use but still give a very good results.
And of course bowls, saucepan, whish, spatula etc
How to have a nice green color?
Most of the recipe will give you a yellowish ice cream unless you use food colors. This is because they only infuse the mint leaves in the cream and discard them. For this recipe, we use the mint as a whole in order to get this very nice green color and a fresh mint taste.
Place your mint leaves with sugar in between two polyethylene sheets (also called guitar or acetate sheets) and crush them using a rolling pin until you get a paste. Polyethylene sheets can be a bit hard to find in the US. You can find some one Amazon (click here) or in very specialized store. If you can’t find them, you can use parchment paper instead, it will be a bit messier but still does the trick. We will add this paste to our preparation, and it will give us a wonderful color and taste.
You may also add one drop of blue color (one drop ONLY, no more) if you want to get a very green color, close to store bought ice cream. But it is not necessary.
The importance of using fresh mint
As said above, we are crushing the leaves to get a paste out of it to prepare our Mint and Chocolate Ice Cream. This wouldn’t be possible with dried mint so make sure to use fresh one for this recipe. By doing so, we will extract the mint flavor as well as the chlorophyl contained in the leaves (taste+color). In order to boost a little bit more the taste of the ice cream, you can add one drop of mint extract (one drop only 😊 )
How to properly store the Mint and chocolate Ice Cream
Once your ice maker cycle is over, transfer the ice cream as fast as possible into a ice cream container and freeze at least 1 hour before using. Always try to be fast when you handle ice cream, so it doesn’t melt and freeze again. This will impact the quality of the ice cream and cause freezer burn. Prepare all utensils (ice scoop, bowl with warm water, cups, cone etc) you might need before taking out of the freezer. Place back in freezer right after you’re done serving.
What about the chocolate?
You don’t have to use chocolate, you can skip it all together and have a perfectly good fresh minth ice cream.
But, if like me you are a chocolate lover, you can add chocolates chips. You can also adjust the quantity to have more or less chocolate in your ice cream.
Play with textures
Use chocolate shavings if you want it to melt in the mouth. Use chocolate chips if you want little bites of chocolate or go for chocolate chunks if you really want to have big pieces of chocolate. If you can’t find shavings, chips or chunks already made, you can buy a good quality chocolate bar and cut it in pieces with a knife. You will be able to size the pieces the way you want, and you’ll most probably end up with a mix of chunks and shavings.
Ingredients and substitute
Mint: make sure to use fresh mint of the best quality. The leaves need to be of a beautiful green and give out a powerful smell
Sugar: just your regular white sugar here
Milk: use whole milk for this recipe
Whipping Cream: it wouldn’t be called ice cream without a bit of cream, right ?
Milk powder: this will give a better consistency to the ice cream. If you don’t have any and don’t want to buy a whole box just for this recipe, skip it
Glucose: the use of glucose makes the ice cream more unctuous. If you don’t have any, use the same amount of regular sugar. The texture of ice cream will be different
Egg yolks: if possible pasture raised, they are the best or at least free range
Mint extract: totally optional, it just adds a little “cool” effect to the ice cream
Chocolate: use good quality dark chocolate. You can use chocolate chips, chunks, shavings etc Sky is the limit
Now that you know everything, let’s get to the actual recipe! See below, hope you like it!
Mint and Chocolate Ice Cream
Equipment
- Ice Cream maker
- Immersion blender
- Thermometer
- Ice Cream container
Ingredients
- 30 g fresh mint leaves only
- 115 g sugar
- 500 g whole milk
- 120 g whipping cream
- 20 g milk powder
- 40 g glucose
- 75 g egg yolks
- 1 drop mint extract
- 150 g dark chocolate chips
Instructions
- Place your mint leaves with sugar in between two polyethylene sheets (see article for more details) and crush them using a rolling pin until you get a paste. Put aside in a bowl.
- Whisk egg yolks and remaining sugar.
- In a saucepan, heat milk, cream, milk powder and glucose. Once it reaches 45C, pour slowly 1/3 of it into the egg yolk/sugar while whisking. Whisk until well combined.
- Pour the mixture into the saucepan and cook until it reaches 85C.
- Remove from heat and add the mint paste. Combine using a spatula. Add one drop of mint extract.
- Blend with an immersion blender.
- Gently train the mixture. At this stage, you don’t want to push the mint into the preparation. Discard the mint fibers.
- Refrigerate for at least 4 hours.
- Pour into your ice cream maker and start a cycle of 45 minutes (+ or – depending on your machine).
- Add the chocolate chips 5 minutes before the end of the cycle.
- Transfer content into an ice cream container and freeze.
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