Beer Ice Cream?!

There are recipes, and then there are tales of cooking adventures. This is one of the latter. Inspired by WC Dish’s 2nd Annual Ice Cream Crawl, I recently set out to combine my two true loves into one dish — beer ice cream. Friends told me I was crazy, that it couldn’t be done. People laughed or wrinkled their noses and said it would taste terrible.

They were right.

Despite never having made any type of ice cream and not having a reputable recipe for making beer ice cream, I was determined to make this dessert. After throwing around a few ideas (caramel pumpkin ale ice cream sounds good, doesn’t it?), I settled for a simple stout ice cream using Young’s Double Chocolate Stout (I was looking for Lancaster Milk Stout, but didn’t see it in the fridge at Ron’s School House where, by the way, you can mix and match a six-pack of great beers for less than $20). I invested in a small ice cream maker, researched several recipes for ice cream and went to work.

1. First, I poured a pint of the Double Chocolate Stout into a medium pot over medium-high heat and cooked for almost an hour, stirring frequently, hoping to burn off some of the beer’s alcohol to help the ice cream freeze more quickly.
2. After about 45 minutes I became impatient and poured in two cups of heavy cream, which I brought to a boil while constantly stirring.
3. Meanwhile, I mixed 3/4 cup sugar with 1 tsp of cocoa powder in a medium bowl. Then I added seven egg yolks, along with a bit less than a cup of milk and stirred well.
4. I poured some of the heated stout cream mixture to the sugar egg mixture, whisking to “temper” the eggs. Then I added that back into the stout cream mixture on the stove and cooked until it was thick

enough to coat a spoon. Or at least that was the idea. What I ended up with was a slightly runny, somewhat pungent mixture flecked with what I imagine were overheated egg yolk particles. Oops.

1. Undaunted and optimistic, I removed my mixture from the stove and poured it into another bowl to chill in the refrigerator (ice cream ingredients must be cool before placing them in an ice cream maker). After an hour it was still fairly warm, so I decided to let it cool overnight. Of course, the next day proved to be busier than I predicted, so I actually let it sit in the fridge for two nights. Oops again.
2. Finally, I put the chilled mixture in the ice cream maker and followed the maker’s instructions, letting it turn for about 40 minutes.

Some recipes recommend sticking your ice cream back into the freezer after making it, but I couldn’t wait to taste my creation. As I scooped out a spoonful of the rich brown ice cream, visions of myself as the new Ben or Jerry danced in my head. Once I put the spoon to my mouth, however, those visions quickly disappeared.

Instead of a creamy, bittersweet delight, I tasted an icy, foul-smelling disaster that left a burning sensation on my tongue. Rather than following in the footsteps of “Vermont’s Finest,” I had created West Chester’s Worst. So much for becoming an Ice Cream Goddess.

Although my recipe for beer ice cream may not have lived up to my expectations, I did have a lot of fun attempting it. Perhaps next time I’ll tackle a tamer, easier ice cream recipe and leave the beer ice cream to the experts. But then again, what fun is that?