Scarlett WMiniature Choc Ices
February 7th 2008 15:06
Miniature Choc Ices
About Miniature Choc Ices
This is an unashamedly fun recipe, great for special parties and at winter Christmas, or to serve instead of chocolates or mints at the end of a meal. But although it’s fun, the choc ices are seriously good to eat, particularly if you buy the best-quality ice cream. This dessert use three different chocolate toppings, but to make it simpler, you can use just one.
INGREDIENTS
Makes 25 - 30
a 500 ml tub of good-quality vanilla ice cream
150 gm / 5 oz dark chocolate, 70-75% cocoa solids, broken into pieces
150 gm / 5 oz good-quality white chocolate, broken into small pieces
150 gm / 5 oz good-quality milk chocolate, broken into small pieces
2 heaped tablespoons shelled unsalted pistachio nuts, roughly chopped
2 heaped tablespoons toasted chopped hazelnuts, roughly chopped
a 13 X 20 X 6 cm / 5 X 8 X 2½ inch shallow polythene box with a lid
a 2.5 cm / 1 inch melon scoop
about 30 cocktail sticks
1. You need to begin this recipe the night before, as soon as you get the ice cream home, transfer it to the polythene box and spread it out in an even layer, then put the lid on and pop it in the freezer overnight.
2. Line 2 baking trays with baking parchment, place these one on top of the other and put them in the freezer as well.
3. To make the choc ices, put a small saucepan of water on to boil.
4. Remove the ice cream and one baking tray from the freezer, then dip the melon scoop in boiling water before making each ice.
5. Just draw the scoop all along the frozen ice cream to form little rounds, and quickly transfer each one to the frozen tray. You do need to work at high speed here, so no distractions, if possible, but if you find the ice cream is getting too soft to work with, just whack everything back in the freezer and continue later. (With no interruptions you should be able to do them all in one session.)
6. Insert a cocktail stick into the centre of each ice.
7. Put ices all back in the freezer for a minimum of 2 hours, because the ice-cream balls need to get really hard again.
8. Place the broken-up pieces of dark chocolate in a large, heatproof bowl sitting over a saucepan of barely simmering water, making sure the base of the bowl doesn’t touch the water. Keeping the heat at its lowest, allow the chocolate to melt slowly, it will take about 5 minutes to become smooth and glossy.
9. Remove from the heat, give it a good stir and let it cool. It’s very important to allow each chocolate to cool completely to room temperature before coating the ices, or ice cream will melt.
10. At the same time, repeat the process of step 8 - 9 to melt the white and milk chocolate, they will take 3-4 minutes to melt.
11. Coat a third of the ice-cream balls with white chocolate – lift each ice cream up off the tray, using the cocktail stick, and, holding it over a plate, spoon the chocolate over to coat the ice cream completely.
12. Scatter with a few chopped pistachios (but not over the bowl of chocolate).
13. Return the coated ices to the baking tray, you’ll find the chocolate will harden around the ice cream immediately.
14. Coat a third of the ice-cream balls in milk chocolate, repeat the process of step 11. Then the rest coat in the plain chocolate, and scatter these with the toasted hazelnuts.
15. Pop them back in the freezer as soon as you can.
16. Serve straight from the freezer.
Tips:
1. You can use other nuts, or finely chop up 4 pieces of crystallized stem ginger and mix with one of the kinds of chocolate before coating the ice creams.
2. If you want to make these a long time ahead, cover with freezer foil.
**From “The Delia Collection Chocolate”**
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