A superior creamsicle, and a waste of tea

[redbird]

Last night, I decided to try making a tea-flavored ice cream. This is an idea that drifted across the net a couple of months ago, and of course I didn't take notes, but the suggestion as I recall it was to heat cream almost to boiling, infuse some tea leaves by soaking them in the cream for 15 minutes, chill the cream again, and go on to use a simple vanilla ice cream recipe.

It seemed reasonable. I used a double-boiler to heat the cream, and when it was hot enough, added the tea, turned the light off, covered the cream, and left it for 15 minutes. Remove tea, chill, proceed.

This is where it got unexpectedly interesting. I had grabbed a bottle of what I thought was vanilla extract, and added some to my milk-and-sugar mixture, without measuring, just by eye. As I poured it in, I smelled it. Orange, not vanilla. OK, let's go with the idea (rather than getting out more milk and sugar). So, I added some vanilla as well, mixed in the cream, and put the mixture in the ice cream maker.

When that was done, I spooned it into containers suitable for the freezer, and tasted a little of the half-frozen mixture. It tasted like orange and vanilla, and not tea.

Tonight, after it had frozen properly, I had a bowl of ice cream. Orange and vanilla, and not tea. Fortunately, around here we like orange and vanilla.

I have discussed this with adrian_turtle, who told me that soaking tea in cream instead of water isn't an effective way to get much flavor out of the leaves. Possibilities at this point include trying a tea (or tea-and-something) sorbet, or brewing a few ounces of very strong tea, and substituting that for part of the milk in the ice cream. This project may well wait a while; I have these blueberries. And plans for next weekend that aren't focused on cookery.

Comments

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

It occurs to me that an alternative might be to use the tea infusion just as you did, but not add any extracts or spices at all. Rancatore's makes a sweet cream ice cream, with no added flavors that I know of. Adding tea flavor, even quite a mild tea flavor, to something like that could be to your taste.

[treadpath.livejournal.com]

We make a very yummy chai ice cream with tea, but chai is fairly heavily spiced and really that's what really comes out in the flavor. We don't heat the cream though--our ice cream recipe calls for a cup of whole milk in addition to the cream, so we heat the milk and then steep the tea for 10-15 minutes, then strain and cool the milk and then mix it with the cream. We've been meaning to try the method with Earl Grey though... I'll let you know what happens. :)

[baratron.livejournal.com]

I think that tea-and-something sorbet should work, because it isn't all that different from the various slushie-type frozen drinks sold by the expensive coffee chains. They work perfectly well, so why shouldn't tea sorbet?

Richard thinks (with his great experience of being British and drinking tea!) that rather than brewing a few ounces of very strong tea, you should brew it at normal strength and then try to evaporate off the excess water. He thinks if you brew it extra-strong, it will go bitter.

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

If memory serves (I saw it done only once, c. 50 years ago) the Japanese simply add a rather large amount of powdered tea -- the kind used in the Tea Ceremony -- to the ingredients for making Green Tea Ice Cream (much as Instant Coffee can be used), possibly without actually steeping or cooking it. This would, I suppose, require grinding leaf-tea in a mortar, and could produce icecream with a brown or almost-black color, but it might taste more tea-like.

[jonbaker.livejournal.com]

Also see http://japanesefood.about.com/od/japanesedessertsweet/r/greenteaice.htm

[redbird]

Folks, I'm sure that works just fine. However, I don't like most green teas. If I wanted green tea ice cream, I could easily buy it.

There is no actual rule about this, but given the other things I have to do with my time, I'm not likely to bother with homemade ice cream in flavors where I'm satisfied with the commercial product: for example, I doubt I could make as good a chocolate as I can buy, and I'm perfectly satisfied with the strawberry. So, I make lemon ice cream. I made a straciatella once, but it was more trouble than the result was worth. I am thinking of blueberry.

[jbsegal.livejournal.com]

The Baitcon Thai Tea IC is one of the best things in this world, and uses a direct-in-milk infusion.

1 part Thai Tea Powder
4 parts whole milk
4 parts heavy cream
2 parts sugar
1–2 parts sweetened condensed milk

Heat half the whole milk until it is almost boiling (do not scald it).
Remove from heat and add the tea powder. Stir.
Wait 20–30 minutes then strain the milk with as fine a strainer as you can find (an espresso machine basket is perfect).
Squeeze as much milk as you can out of the grounds you have strained out.
Add the rest of the milk and the other ingredients.

Freeze.
---------------
The only other Tea IC recipe we have on record is also a in-milk infusion.

It works.

(Note: some of the notes we have about sassafras ICs say that "little bark, long infusion" is the way to overpower the bitter with the flavor you want. I have NO IDEA if this works with tea, too.)

I'd always imagined something less pleasant

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Do you mean to say your ice cream turned out to be almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea?

Re: I'd always imagined something less pleasant

[redbird]

Well yes. Unlike tea as such, anyhow.

A bit like tea as I drink it: it did contain milk and sugar, though the proportions are way off.

Re: I'd always imagined something less pleasant

[baratron.livejournal.com]

*groan* ;D

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The superior creamsicle flavor I've got in my freezer from my favorite local place is a mix of a very fine vanilla ice cream and a very fine mango-passion fruit sorbet. It would work at least as well with a very fine orange sorbet, I'd expect, and more classically creamsicle, but I have no idea how difficult it would be for you to mix two flavors of frozen thing without industrial equipment. But the sorbet keeps the tang of the fruits intact. Yum.

[janetl.livejournal.com]

Never tried infusing tea into milk for ice cream, but if you're looking for some different flavors, have you considered lavender? I haven't tried making ice cream, but I've infused lavender into milk for pastry cream. Warm a quart of milk to just short of boiling, remove from heat, add 2 tablespoons of flowers, and go to the local pub for lunch. Come back about an hour later, strain out the flowers, and proceed as usual. The resulting fruit tart had a slight perfume of lavender to it.
The pastry chef I took a class from warned me not to use too much lavender, as the flavor can go bitter.

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

Herrell's makes a lovely Earl Grey ice cream, which in a sugar cone has a nice tea-and-cookies effect. I tried to duplicate it some while ago, and got best results through mixing cream with small quantities of very, very strong tea.

[frostfox.livejournal.com]

Tea=boiling water.
The full, fabulous, subtle, heartwarming joy of (black) tea can only be obtained by pouring water at a rolling boil on the leaves. Hot or even very, very hot won't do it. Fresh boiled water (not re-heated).

Mm, tea.

I bet Earl Grey makes nice tea ice ceram too. And, as said in comments, chi tea ice cream is lovely.

FF

[redbird]

I knew it wouldn't be actual tea; what I was hoping is that it would be tea-flavored. Caffeine isn't necessary here, and it might even be better if the ice cream weren't caffeinated, given that I often eat ice cream near bedtime.