July Heatwave – it’s a scorcher!
In Yorkshire it is traditional to serve Wensleydale Cheese with a piece of fruit cake – a match made in heaven! (although we’ve been experimenting and have paired all sorts of different cheeses with our fruit cakes!)
So how about taking this glorious tradition a step further and making a Wensleydale Cheese ice cream to accompany your fruit cake? A perfect treat for the hottest day of the year so far! It is a truly delicious combination, and of course you could serve the ice cream with your favourite dessert too!
Wensleydale Cheese Ice Cream has a subtle, lemony flavour, not quite savoury but not really sweet and so is a perfect complement to a rich, sweet fruit cake.
Ingredients
2 egg yolks
50 g (2 oz)caster sugar
75 ml (¼pt) whole milk (I use Our Cow Molly Full Milk)
250 ml double cream (I use Longley Farm extra rich Jersey Double Cream)
150 g (6 oz) Wensleydale cheese, grated (I used Wensleydale cheese‘s neighbour; a Coverdale Cheese which is smoother and has a sharper flavour)
Method
- Whisk the egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl until pale in colour and fluffy.
- Pour the milk and cream into a thick-bottomed saucepan and heat the mixture until almost boiling. Turn off the heat just before it boils, and leave to cool slightly.
- Pour the cream mixture over the egg mixture, whisking slowly, and return the mixture to the pan.
- Stir the custard mixture over a moderate heat, stirring continuously. Once the custard is thick enough to thinly coat the back of a wooden spoon, remove it from the heat, add 100 g of the cheese to the custard and whisk until melted.
- Pour the cheesy custard into a cold basin and leave it to cool.
- Once it is cool, stir in the remaining cheese, then refrigerate the custard for a good half-hour before pouring into an ice cream machine and churn, following the machine instructions, until it is ready to serve with a lovely wedge of fruit cake …
If you don’t have an ice cream maker, pour the chilled custard into a freezer proof container, cover and pop it into the freezer. Remove from the freezer at one hour intervals and beat the custard thoroughly to prevent ice crystals from forming. Keep doing this until the mixture is creamy, almost frozen and ready to serve.
Tips and Tricks
The custard must not reach boiling point, but should start to thicken before it gets there. If you overheat the custard it will curdle (I guarantee it!), so make certain that the spoon gets right into the corners of the pan. Have a sink of cold water ready and if there is even the remotest sign of curdling, quickly dunk the pan into a sink of cold water to cool the sauce down and whisk like you mean it!