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French Vanilla Ice Cream


It’s Thanksgiving which means pies, pies, pies. If you want to make you’re a la mode really special, you can make the vanilla ice cream yourself. I have an ice cream maker with a compressor unit, but I have also had luck with the freezer bowl machine as well (such as Kitchen Aid). The secret ingredient is the rum which prevents the ice cream from freezing solid.
I never liked vanilla ice cream until I made it for myself with a real vanilla bean. Holy moly- what an immense difference. Pure creaminess, no icy texture at all, and rich, floral vanilla flavor singing through…. I can’t eat storebought vanilla ice cream any more. This recipe has ruined it for me. My only substitute when I can’t make this myself is to go to a local ice cream shop and buy myself a half gallon of their French vanilla to tide me over. 
Make this at your own risk….
Ingredients:
7 egg yolks
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2 1/2 cups milk
½ cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon vanilla bean paste, or 1 vanilla bean
¼ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon rum
Method:
In a large bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, sugar and salt until light a fluffy.
Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan over medium heat, heat the milk, cream and vanilla bean paste (or bean pod and scraped beans) until simmering.
Ladle about a half cup of the hot cream mixture into the eggs to temper them, and then add the eggs back into the hot cream in the saucepan.
Cook the mixture for about 10 minutes, whisking constantly, until the mixture thickens. Pour it through a fine mesh sieve. Pour into a container and press plastic wrap right on top of it to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate overnight.
Process the mixture in your ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions.

 Serve it right away as soft serve or freeze it for a further four hours to firm it up more. Enjoy!

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