I had never made something from scratch that even resembled ice cream and Mum still refuses to get an ice cream maker (and yet she wants to buy a salad spinner - we never make salad), so I came across this recipe while trawling the Internet for ice cream-y things that could be frozen in a cake tin. Though the method requires a lot of steps, this delicious, tooth-achingly sweet semifreddo doesn't disappoint!
Recipe Adapted From: Citrus and Candy
Ingredients - toffee
100g caster sugar
1/2 tsp salt
Ingredients - caramel
100g caster sugar
50mL water
50g butter
1 tsp salt
150mL cream
Ingredients - semifreddo base
6 egg yolks
50g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
350mL thickened cream
Method
1. Make the toffee! Prepare a baking tray with a silicone mat (or lightly greased baking paper) on top. Then heat the sugar in a heavy based saucepan until the edges start to melt and the sugar is slightly brown. Get a silicone spatula and stir the melted sugar gently into the centre of the pan. Keep stirring until all the sugar has dissolved.
2. Stir every once in a while until the toffee starts to smoke and is an amber colour. Working quickly, stir the salt into the sugar and pour the toffee onto the baking tray. Lift the tray up and tilt it so that the toffee spreads out (like crepe batter). Try to make it as thin as you can! Then set the toffee aside to cool.
3. After the toffee's cooled, you need to break it into little pieces. I rolled mine in the silicone mat, but since the toffee breaks into sharp shards, I ended up poking a hole in the silicone! I suggest using a rolling pin and bashing it to break it up.
4. Make the caramel! Combine the sugar and water in a heavy based saucepan and stir over a medium heat until the sugar has dissolved. Brush any sugar that's crept up the sides of the pan back into the mixture and cook until it's a deep amber colour, which should take about 8 minutes.
5. Add the butter and salt to the sugar mixture. Be careful because the butter will spit, and it's hot! Stir to combine, then add the cream and stir until completely mixed in.
6. Whisk the egg yolks with the 50g caster sugar and vanilla extract until pale, fluffy and thickened.
7. While the mixer is running, slowly pour the caramel in until it's all incorporated. Mix for another five minutes or so to cool the mixture down a bit.
8. Whip the 350mL cream until soft peaks form.
9. Gently fold the cream and the crushed toffee into the egg mixture.
10. Pour the semifreddo into a container (I used a square metal cake tin - you can use different sized containers depending on how deep you want your semifreddo to be), cover with cling wrap and stick it in the freezer for at least six hours. If you don't leave it in the freezer for long enough, the top will look all good and set but the bottom will still be syrupy. I know this.
11. After it's set, take the semifreddo out (set it aside for a few minutes if it's difficult to spoon out) and consume.
Look at that delicious caramel toffee goodness! This was so sweet. I'm not joking about the toothache thing.
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| You can see the syrupy un-set bottom here...my brother and I were impatient. |
It was so good, we eventually gave up scooping it into bowls and just ate it with a spoon. My first foray into handmade frozen goods was a success!
Does look very rich! Perhaps the syrup on the bottom was because the caramel was warm when you folded in the cream?
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