Honey roasted pistachio matcha ice-cream

Call me the Dairy Queen

Honey Roasted Pistachios, crunchy and delicious in some sweet creamy smooth matcha green tea ice-cream. This ice-cream brings back childhood memories of summers spent in NY and several trips made the Ice-cream Factory to fill my face with pistachio grape-nut ice-cream; Creamy sweet crunchy perfection.

I’ve always loved pistachio ice-cream. My aunty Nadene in particular was the one who first gave us a cone of pistachio grape-nut; I was instantly hooked. The pistachio grape-nut flavor became my immediate favorite and it still Is one of my top choices. I knew I had to attempt a recipe for it this month. I have been making ice-creams for about three years now, and not once have I attempted to make pistachio ice-cream. Which now that I’m thinking about it, is pretty strange that it took me this long to do it.

One thing I wanted to try was making it without artificial coloring. That’s how the matcha green tea got involved. It’s healthy easy to work with and most importantly its Green. So since matcha is a ‘thing’ now it just Fell perfectly into place with my plans. 

Jeni’s splendid ice-cream base is truly versatile. This is the 5^th ice-cream this month and each of my flavors have been back to back hits. This recipe is a keeper, and a must try for anyone who loves pistachio ice-cream, especially if you love it as much as I do.

Ingredients  (printable recipe)

(Jeni’s splendid ice-cream base)

2 cup Milk

1 ¼ cup Cream

2/3 cup Sugar
 2 tablespoon Corn syrup

3 table spoon Cream cheese

1 table spoon plus 1 teaspoon Corn starch

2 tablespoon milk

2 tablespoon matcha green tea powder

½ teaspoon almond extract

Honey roasted pistachio

1 tablespoon melted butter

1 cup pistachios

1 tablespoon honey

1 teaspoon sugar

Instructions

For the Pistachios

• In a dish stir together melted butter, honey and pistachios
• Spread on a lined baking sheet and sprinkle with sugar
• Place in a 350 degree oven and Bake until golden brown and fragrant (burns very easily)
• Remove from heat and set aside to cool

For the ice-cream

•  In a dish make the cornstarch slurry by combining the corn starch and 2 tablespoon milk
• In a separate bowl lightly whisk the cream cheese, almond extract and salt
• In a pot bring to boil the cream, milk, sugar and corn syrup for 4 minutes exactly
• Once it’s been boiling for four minutes remove from the heat and stir in the cornstarch slurry
• Place back on the heat and stir allowing it to slightly thicken for a minute
• Pour the hot milk mixture into the bowl of cream cheese to dissolve it remove lumps
• Take a portion (about 1 cup) of the warm mixture and blend with the matcha to remove lumps
• Add the mixture aback to the batch and completely incorporate
• Pour contents into a zip lock bag
• Prepare a bowl filled with ice
• Place the zip lock bags in the ice bath and allow the mixture to completely cool
• Churn the milk mixtures in an ice-cream maker
• Layer in a baking pan, honey roasted nuts and ice cream
• Press down parchment paper on the top surface of the ice-cream and allow it to harden for at least 4 hours in the freezer.

Greedy tips:

• The honey roasted pistachio Is not a set it and forget it, You need to watch it like a hawk, I almost burned one batch and in an attempt to get the second batch perfect I looked away for two minutes and completely burnt it even worse than the first. So keep a steady eye on it, the sugar burns very quickly.
• If you don’t like the added sugar you can dry roast the pistachios they will roast slower than the honey roasted. 

Xoxo Greedygirl