Day One Hundred Eight

I don't post nearly enough ice cream recipes. It's weird. We make ice cream all of the time, especially in the summer. I can only blame the fact that we rarely measure what we throw into our ice cream maker. We just sort of Frankenstein some fun stuff together and enjoy the results, even when they aren't quite what we expected.

Like this one. This one didn't turn out how I expected it to turn out.

It turned out better. It turned out MIND-BLOWING. As in, just thinking about the almond, dark chocolate, and cherries together in that magnificent homemade ice cream is making me happy. Happy thoughts are good. Happy thoughts about ice cream are fantastic.

And so is this ice cream.

I had to make it a couple of times before I remembered to measure everything I was throwing in there. Yeah. I kept forgetting. Let's go with that, and not try to blame the fact that I just wanted more of it.

Which I did. Shhhh!

Dark Chocolate Cherry Ice Cream with Almonds

1 1/2 cups pitted and halved cherries
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon white sugar
1/2 cup light rum (or water -- rum is better, but water works)
1 1/2 cups whole milk (or heavy cream, if you're feeling REALLY decadent)
3 large egg yolks
1 cup dark chocolate chips, divided
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
3/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 cup almond slivers

1. Start by preparing your cherries. You're going to put all of the cherries in a large saucepan. Add the 1 tablespoon of white sugar and the rum and cook them over medium heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until you have a fun syrup and some soft cherries. It takes about 15-20 minutes. Throw the cherries in the fridge once they are done.

2. Place the 1/4 cup of white sugar and milk in a new medium saucepan. Heat over medium heat, stirring occasionally with a whisk, until the sugar is fully dissolved.

3. Place the egg yolks in a medium mixing bowl and whisk them together. Take 1/2 cup of the warm milk and sugar mixture out of the saucepan and very slowly add it to the egg yolks. Keep whisking the whole time you're adding. Make sure you're adding the warm milk slowly because you don't want your eggs to turn into scrambled eggs.

4. Now you're going to add the eggs into your milk-filled saucepan. Keep the heat on medium and slowly add the eggs into the saucepan, whisking the whole time. Keep stirring and stirring and heat until your milk is at least 170 degrees. If you don't have a candy thermometer, place a spoon in the milk. It's done when you pull the spoon out and it stays coated with milk.

5. Remove what is soon to be ice cream from the heat.

8. Add the butter and 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips. Stir until everything is melty and smooth and perfect.

9. Stir in the heavy cream and almond extract. Take a second to enjoy how fantastic your kitchen smells while you're doing it.

10. Refrigerate the milk mixture until cool, about two hours.

11. Pour the cooled milk mixture into your ice cream maker and turn that sucker on. Let it go until it is super thick.

12. Once you clearly have a chocolate almond ice cream thing happening in your ice cream maker, add in the cherries, almond slivers. and remaining 1 cup of dark chocolate chips. Either let your ice cream maker mix them in or use a spoon. I'm not going to judge no matter which way you do it.

13. Toss the bowl in the freezer for at least two hours so that the ice cream can fully set.

14. You're welcome. That is all I have to say about that.