Servings: 6-8

I love to make this Rhubarb & Vanilla Ice cream when the rhubarb first appears in Spring time.

Cooking time: 1 hour

What you’ll need

Ideally an ice cream machine and a food blender.

Ingredients

Ice cream base

• 350ml double cream
• 250ml full fat milk
• 1 vanilla pod
• 6 egg yolks preferably free range, organic
• 100g caster sugar

Rhubarb

• 1 kg rhubarb, wash, dry, trim
• 150g caster sugar

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 C / 160C Fan
2. Cut the rhubarb into 2 cm pieces and put it in a single layer in a baking dish. Sprinkle over the sugar and cover with foil. Place in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes or until the rhubarb is completely soft.
3. Puree until smooth in a food blender.
4. Begin by making the custard. Put the cream and milk in a heavy-based saucepan. Use a small knife to cut the vanilla pod in half lengthways and scrape out all of the seeds and add to the pan. Add the scraped-out pods too.
5. Heat on a medium heat until scorching point. This is the point BEFORE boiling. The cream and milk will start to shimmer. Then turn off the heat, move the pan and leave the mixture to infuse for 5 – 10 minutes.
6. Meanwhile, in a bowl add the egg yolks ( keep the whites for meringue !) and then whisk in the sugar just to combine.
7. When the milk has infused pour it over the egg and sugar whisking to combine. then pour the mix back into the pan.
8. Cook over a low to medium heat stirring CONSTANTLY until the custard starts to thicken slightly. This will take about 5 – 10 minutes. It will just coat the back of the wooden spoon and should have the consistency of pouring double cream. It’s important not to overcook the custard as it will turn into scrambled egg very quickly !
9. Immediately take off the heat and pour the custard through a sieve into a clean bowl and then leave it to cool.
10. When the custard and rhubarb puree are cold whisk them together and then churn in an ice cream machine if you have one. If not place in a container and freeze and every 20 minutes or so give it a whisk up until frozen.