World Ice Cream Day: 5 innovative ice creams to make at home

Every year, the third Sunday of July marks World Ice Cream Day, a day most ice cream lovers don’t need to be told to celebrate. Today, step away from the basic store-bought tubs of vanilla and chocolate ice cream and do the day justice by trying out some creative recipes at home.

Coffee and chocolate fudge ice cream

Start by mixing coffee powder, cocoa powder and water, and keep aside. To make the base of ice cream, whisk fresh cream, condensed milk and sugar together. Then add in the coffee mixture, vanilla essence and chocolate ganache. Pour a thin layer of the mixture into a baking dish, then add some spoons of chocolate ganache and almonds. Continue layering the ice cream mix with the ganache until you fill the tin. Freeze it for eight hours and then enjoy your decadent treat.

Matcha Flavoured Mochi ice cream

This subtle green tea ice cream, wrapped in sweet, stretchy dough is a Japanese-inspired dessert. For the ice cream, whisk matcha powder, condensed milk and whipping cream until thick, and then freeze for four hours. Scoop the ice cream into balls and place on a baking tray to freeze for another hour. Next, mix glutinous rice flour, sugar, water and then steam this mixture. Once you have the dough, cover it in corn starch and roll it out thinly. 

To assemble the mochi, cut the dough into squares, place the squares in silicone baking moulds. Put the balls of frozen ice cream in the dough making sure they’re completely covered. Freeze for another two hours for the mochi to set. You can also try mochi with a filling of common ice cream flavours like strawberry and mango or with the more authentic ube flavoured ice cream that’s a vibrant purple.

Banana nice cream

This vegan recipe is incredibly creamy and delicious despite using no dairy at all. For the base of the ice cream, all you need are frozen banana slices. Make sure the bananas are not overripe before you freeze them, so that your ice cream doesn’t have an overpowering taste. You can blend these frozen bananas along with any flavouring or frozen fruit to make ice cream with the texture of soft-serve. Try out something refreshing like strawberry nice cream or pina colada nice cream or go for something more basic like chocolate nice cream.

Gulkand Pista Kulfi

To make this delicious rose and pistachio-flavoured kulfi, start by heating whole milk and sugar in a saucepan on the stove. Separately, mix one part of corn flour and four parts of milk, and then add it to the saucepan. Then add cardamom powder, pistachio powder, gulkand and cream to the milk mixture. Once it thickens a little, add a splash of rosewater and some pink food colouring. Let the mixture cool and then pour into kulfi moulds to freeze overnight. Garnish with dried rose petals and chopped pistachios and enjoy.

Custard ice cream

This ice cream is simple to make and great if you don’t have condensed milk at home. Mix vanilla-flavoured custard powder and milk in a bowl. On the stove, boil two cups of milk and then stir in the custard mixture. Leave it on medium heat for a few minutes and then add sugar. Let the mixture cool and then freeze for an hour. Next, whisk whipping cream using a hand mixer till it forms stiff peaks and then mix in your chilled custard mixture. Freeze overnight and then garnish with nuts and tutti-frutti before you tuck in!