As we enter what seems like the 15th straight week of 30 degree heat in the UK (and before you moan about how that’s not very hot – we don’t have air conditioning here, alright?) I felt it was only proper to share with you my latest homemade ice cream recipe. And it’s a fun one, especially if you’re as much of a cereal lover as my wife. Let me introduce my latest food-crush… Lucky Charms Cereal Milk Ice Cream!
Cereal Milk What?
Yeah, cereal milk ice cream. I’m not the only one who loves that scrummy sugary milk that’s left in the bottom of your breakfast bowl, and now you get to enjoy all that fun in an ice cream sundae. It’s definitely going to be a winner if you’ve got someone in your house who adores breakfast cereal as much as my wife.
If you’ve never made homemade ice cream before, there are basically four ingredients involved – double cream, sugar, egg yolks, and milk. To turn plain old ice cream into cereal milk ice cream you are going to want to leave some cereal to soak in milk for about half an hour – just long enough so that all the cereal flavour and sweetness has transferred into the milk. This is the same method I use when flavouring a lot of my homemade ice creams, as it’s really easy to get flavours into milk by steeping it for a while.
You’re then going to want to sieve the milk to get rid of the soggy bits of cereal (make sure you pop your cereal into the compost bin or your food waste) and set the sweet milk aside for later.
These days Lucky Charms are relatively easy to find even in British supermarkets, or on Amazon (UK / US). Long gone are the days of having to bring boxes of the stuff back from the States in my suitcase! As you will see from the photos, I didn’t actually use ‘official’ lucky charms for my ice cream, as I have got a massive bag of cereal marshmallows stored away in the cupboard that I wanted to get some use out of. I picked these up from Amazon (UK / US).
If you’re a long-time reader of this blog, you may remember that these little dehydrated marshmallows popped up in my Lucky Charms Granola recipe too. They are great to add to different types of cereal if the actual cereal in Lucky Charms isn’t your favourite, but you’re all about the candy.
Homemade Ice Dream
If you’re new to the world of homemade ice cream then you will be pleased to know that it’s really actually very simple to make. – it doesn’t take masses of your time, and you don’t even need an ice cream maker (although it does make things a little easier). In fact, I’ve written a whole post about how to make ice cream without the aid of a machine. The basic idea is that you stir the ice cream around every 45 minutes or so whilst it’s freezing, which helps to prevent ice crystals forming in your otherwise smooth and creamy dessert. I haven’t got round to unpacking my ice cream maker as yet, and so I used this method for the ice cream you see before you – and not an ice crystal in sight!
If this Lucky Charms cereal milk ice cream has got you brainstorming other delicious ice cream flavour combos, then I’ve got you covered with Lemon Ripple, Champagne Truffle, Easter Egg, and even a Birthday Cake sundae. And I’m sure there will be many many more ice cream treats coming out of my kitchen over the remaining summer months – I’m hoping to be inspired by my upcoming trip to Italy. Gelato anyone?
- 300ml (1¼ cups) whole milk
- 40g (1 cup) lucky charms cereal (without the mallows)
- 300ml (1¼ cups) double or heavy cream
- 115g (½ cup plus 1 tablespoon) caster sugar (US granulated sugar)
- 3 large egg yolks
- 40g (1 cup) Lucky Charms marshmallows
- Put the milk and the cereal into a mixing bowl or jug, and leave to soak for half an hour. Once soaked, pour the milk through a sieve and discard the soggy cereal. Set the milk aside.
- Place the sugar and egg yolks in a small bowl, and beat together using an electric whisk until pale and fluffy. When you pull the beaters out of the mixture, it should fall back on itself in ribbons. Set aside.
- Pour the cream and the cereal milk into a medium saucepan and heat on medium-low until almost boiling, stirring occasionally to stop a skin from forming. Remove from the heat. Spoon a couple of tablespoons of the hot milk into the egg and sugar mixture and stir together to loosen up the eggs. Then pour all of the egg and sugar mixture into the saucepan with the milk, immediately stirring together well.
- Return the saucepan to a medium-low heat and heat for 8-10 minutes, or until the mixture coats the back of a wooden spoon. Make sure to constantly stir the mixture while cooking, as you do not want it to burn.
- Once the custard is thick enough, remove from the heat. Place the saucepan in a sink of cold water to cool down (not letting any water get into the ice cream batter). Stir occasionally to avoid a skin forming. Once cooled to almost room temperature, cover the surface of the batter with cling film (or plastic wrap) and place in the fridge for at least 4 hours - overnight is best. This is to ensure the batter is as cold as possible before churning.
- The next day, place the ice cream batter in the frozen ice cream maker bowl and churn as per the manufacturer's instructions. My machine takes about 25 minutes to churn this ice cream batter. Once the ice cream is the consistency of soft-serve ice cream, remove from the machine and place in an ice cream container or loaf tin, adding cereal marshmallows between the layers of the ice cream. Top the ice cream with more marshmallows. Place in the freezer to firm up - this should only take a couple of hours or so.
- Homemade ice cream will not keep as well as store-bought, so do not keep for longer than a month. If the top of the ice cream crystallises, then the ice cream underneath may still be good, so don't throw it away just yet!
