Designer Recipe: Brown Bread Ice Cream

September 14, 2009 6:28 pm

Designer Recipe: Brown Bread Ice Cream

It's Fashion Week in NYC! To celebrate, we're bringing you favorite recipes from some of the world's top fashion designers. Each dish is part of ASSOULINE's new American Fashion Cookbook: 100 Designers Best Recipes. Today's recipe for "Brown Bread Ice Cream" comes from style maven Lela Rose...

"This is an old Southern recipe and one that my mother has always made. There are two ways to make a brown bread ice cream: as frozen custard and as regular frozen ice cream. I have included directions for both."—Lela Rose

Ingredients:

5 tbsp. unsalted butter
1 3/4 cups coarse brown bread crumbs
1/3 cup dark brown sugar
4 large eggs, separated, at room temperature
1/2 cup superfine sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1-2 tbsp. rum or brandy
1 3/4 cups heavy cream, very cold
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups sliced almonds

Instructions:

1. In a sauté pan, melt butter and then add breadcrumbs.

2. Allow breadcrumbs to fry, stirring to coat until crumbs begin to crisp, 5 to 10 minutes.

3. Add brown sugar. Cook until sugar melts and becomes dark and caramelized, 5 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

4. Remove from the heat, turn crumbs onto a piece of foil and let cool completely.

5. Place the breadcrumb mixture in a plastic bag and crush with a rolling pin, or pulse a few times in a food processor to grind coarsely.

6. Pulse almonds in a food processor and spread onto a baking sheet. Toast in oven at 350 degrees until golden brown.

7. Next, mix almonds in with breadcrumbs. Set aside.

8. Beat egg yolks together with superfine sugar, vanilla and liqueur (optional), until pale and fluffy.

9. Whip cream until soft peaks form (do not over beat). Fold whipped cream into the egg mixture.

10. Using an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the room temperature egg whites together with the salt until stiff but not dry, then fold into the whipped cream and egg mixture.

11. Fold in breadcrumb/almond mixture.

12. Freeze for at least 4 hours or until hard. Serve.

*For a regular frozen ice cream, use an "old fashioned" vanilla recipe (one that uses eggs). Add 1/2 tsp. of almond extract and freeze in an ice cream mixer. Add the breadcrumb/almond mixture.