Behold the first ice cream of the season! I call it Thai tea ice cream...or "the ice cream that didn't wanna." Let me explain...This ice cream officially kicks off my 2009 ice cream making season, but was supposed to kick off the 2008 ice cream season. I had been dreaming of Thai tea ice cream all 2007/2008 winter long, and when the weather warmed up and it was time to break out the ice cream maker, I could not for the life of me find Thai tea any where.
I could find individual packets of instant Thai tea, but no bags of loose leaf tea and spices, or what is sometimes called Thai tea powder. And I'm fully aware of the awesome powers of purchasing goods online (Amazon is my savior), but was determined to find the tea at one of the many Asian markets along Washington Ave. in Philly. It was a principle thing. There's also Thai tea syrup, and you can even make it yourself.
Well, I never found the tea all summer long (didn't look too hard, just whenever I was in a store). Cut to this past winter, and the tea magically appeared at some market the boy was shopping at, and he thoughtfully bought me a pack since he knew I had been on the hunt for quite some time.Yes! Thai tea ice cream is going to happen!
Not so fast! Doh, I forgot to put the ice cream freezer bowl in the freezer. The bowl usually lives in the freezer all the time, ever at the ready, but I took the bowl out for the winter to make more room in the freezer.Plans dashed, I settled on a day late. I tweaked a Vietnamese coffee ice cream recipe from David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop, but the ice cream turned out way too sweet and too strongly tea flavored. Ugghhhh!
The next day, work got in the way, so there was no re-do.
Finally, the following day I tweaked my tweaked recipe and made a Thai tea ice cream that's fit to show off. One year and a couple of tries later.
I hope you enjoy the recipe; it's quite good, and is possibly the most anticipated ice cream of my ice cream making career. Worth the wait? I would have preferred to have it last year!
Thai Tea Ice Creammakes about 1 quart
After steeping the loose leaf tea, you'll need some way to strain the tea. Many who regularly make Thai tea have these large tea socks that do the job. I did not have a tea sock, nor did I want to buy one. I found that the coffee press I had worked just fine.
1/3 cup loose leaf Thai tea
2 1/2 cups water
1 cup sweetened condensed milk
1 cup half and half
- Add 2 1/2 cups of hot/boiling water to loose leaf Thai tea, and steep for 20 minutes (this is more water than the brewed tea called for in the recipe, because some of the water will be absorbed by the leaves). Strain tea (I pushed the French press plunger down) and let cool to room temperature.
- Mix 1 1/2 cups brewed tea, sweetened condensed milk, and half and half in a large bowl.
- Process mixture in an ice cream machine. Chill overnight in the freezer before serving.
15 comments:
The color is beautiful!
yumm. two of my favorite things, thai iced tea and ice cream. i bought loose leaf thai tea at the thai place at reading terminal. although that was years ago, not sure if they still sell it.
Ahh! What a good idea! I might have to invest in an ice cream maker now...
I think there's a phrase for this: Om nom nom nom
I love Thai iced tea; this looks so yummy!
That looks downright delicious! If I ever get an ice cream maker, I'm SO using this recipe. Thanks for tweaking up a storm.
I've been wanting to do this ever since I got my ice cream maker in the fall, and had the same problem not being able to find the tea! But yesterday I went to a Thai festival on campus and asked some students there where they got their tea, so I just might have found my answer. I'm glad to see someone else made this already, so I don't run the risk of screwing it up whenever I get my hands on the tea.
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I've had green tea ice cream, which I really liked but I bet this ice cream is even better. I also wanted to let you know that You're Appreciated over at my blog. Come check out the post.
i haven't had great luck making frozen yogurt with my ice cream maker (the kitchenaid attachment). have you had any success making creamy frozen yogurt that isn't tart?
Jess - I haven't had any success with frozen yogurt yet that I would post as a recipe on the blog. Straight up yogurt, I find is great right out of the machine as soft serve, but is too hard after staying in the freezer due to it's low fat content. I did make a frozen yogurt that also contained milk and egg yolks, and the consistency was much better and not so tart. Maybe such a recipe would cut your tartness.
What a cool idea!
great minds think alike I guess... I recently found a great Krups ice cream maker from the 80's at a thirft store for $5 and Thai Tea Ice Cream will be the third batch (after a thanksgiving batch of Prickly-Pear and Rosemary sorbet, and a killer espresso ice-cream that would only ever reach a "soft-serve" consistency.) Google led me to your blog about your version. My on the fly recipe is very similar, though I'm trying it with a custard style base made with egg yolks and sweetened condensed milk rather than sugar and cream.
Where in Philly did you buy your tea? I just found this recipe and I'm so excited to try it.
Caitlin - I didn't buy the tea, but my boyfriend did, so I'm unsure which store it came from. It was definitely from one of the Asian grocery stores on Washington, and probably 1st Oriental, since it's the one we most frequently go to.
This recipe came out AMAZING! I found this recipe ages ago and have always wanted to make it. We finally got an ice cream maker and this was the first batch of ice cream we made. I found the loose leaf tea at a local oriental store and I have to say this was so simple and easy to make and tastes just like the delicious drink we always enjoy.
I do have to say that people should pay attention to the owner's manual of their ice cream maker; depending on your model, it may not stop churning since this recipe makes less than what our 'fill line' suggestion is. We checked it after about 45min and had soft serve ice cream which we stuck into the freezer (but not before tasting it).
Thanks for sharing!
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