Milk Tea Ice Cream

Long time no see, ice cream blog!

I've been a little preoccupied with life lately, so I apologize for being a total no-show the last ten months... This past year I've experienced some real downs... but followed by a truly wonderful up : the birth of my baby boy, Teddy! He is just over 6 weeks old now. He's inspired me - between the constant nursing and fussing and chuckling and giggling and non sleeping -  to feel creative and alive again... which is a nice feeling. So here goes nothing.

 Milk tea! Asians, raise your hands! Who loves milk tea! milky tea anything! Milk tea flavoured bubble tea, a milk tea flavoured cookie... or just a cup of milky sweet tea. Okay, not just Asians (like myself) are nutso about this flavour. The British seem to love a perfect cup of cream and sugared tea. And I'm sure many many many others. So comforting and delicious. Yum. I want to brew a cup right now.

You can use any tea for this - I used six Earl Grey tea bags, but good old orange pekoe will do, too.

{Milk Tea Ice Cream}

You will need:

2 cups of heavy cream (33% milk fat)
6-10 black tea bags ( I used Earl Grey)
1 cup milk (I used 2%)
2 egg yolks
1/2 to a full 300 ml can of sweetened condensed milk (depending on your sweetness preference!)
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Make it!

1. In a medium sized saucepan, heat the 2 cups of heavy cream to a low boil. Remove from heat and add tea bags to steep for ten minutes.
2. Squeeze out the tea bags (careful not to tear the bags) and discard. Whisk tea/cream mixture to combine.
3. In a medium sized bowl, whisk the egg yolks and the sweetened condensed milk to combine.
4. Place tea/cream mixture back on stovetop and add yolk mixture. Bring to a low boil and stir constantly with a heatproof spatula or wooden spoon - you want the mixture to thicken. Once it thickens, remove from heat.
5. Slowly whisk in 1 cup of additional milk and add the pinch of salt and transfer the final mix to a medium sized bowl.
6. Power-chill mixture in medium sized bowl covered with plastic wrap for 30-45 minutes (make sure it doesn't freeze). The point is to make the mix nice and cold before it goes into the ice cream maker! Or, chill overnight in the fridge.
7. Pour cold ice cream mix into your ice cream maker and make according to machine's instructions. I churned mine for 22-24 minutes.
8. Serve immediately and chow down like a piglet! Or, transfer to container and enjoy your milky tea ice cream over the next few days.