I love ice cream.  I love it so much that when I was little (Read: still now) if I couldn’t go to sleep I would shut off all my thoughts and visualize clouds of ice cream that I could jump from.  A playground of ice cream.  Different colored scoops of frosty tasty ice cream would be the image I conjured to put me to sleep.

So, yea.  I love ice cream.  Which is why, when I say that this Almond Ice Cream is the best ice cream I’ve ever made, you should take it with—ermm—a grain of salt. Because I said that this Pistachio Ice Cream was the best I ever made.  But then that quart of ice cream is gone, and there is only this delicious, marzipan and toasted almond tainted custard left.  And today it is the best ice cream I’ve ever made.

Life is hard.

Almond Ice Cream

1 cup shelled roasted and lightly salted almonds, skin on is perfect

¾ cup white sugar

2 cups low-fat or whole milk

2 teaspoons almond extract

4 large egg yolks

1 cup whipping cream

1 cup roasted and lightly salted, almonds, coarsely chopped

1.  Add 1 cup almonds and ¼ cup sugar to the bowl of a food processor.  Finely grind, until the pistachio approaches the point of nut butter.  Bring milk and ground almond mixture to a boil in a heavy-bottomed saucepan, whisking to combine.  Remove from heat and add in almond extract.

2.  Whisk egg yolks and remaining ½ cup sugar in a medium bowl.  Add about ½ cup of the hot milk mixture, whisking constantly, to temper the yolks.  Gradually add in the remaining hot milk mixture until combined.  Return custard to the saucepan and cook over low heat stirring with a wooden spoon until custard thickens and leaves a path on the back of spoon when finger is drawn across, stirring constantly, about 10 minutes or just before simmering.  Do not boil.  Strain the custard into a large bowl.  Stir in the whipping cream and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight.

3.  Process chilled custard in ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions.  Add the chopped almonds to the maker during the last couple minutes of mixing.  Transfer to a container and freeze before serving to ice cream can set.

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