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Stracciatella Gelato
Stracciatella Gelato is kind of like American chocolate chip ice cream, except completely different. Instead of the chips and sometimes chunks you find in American product, Stracciattella has fine bits of chocolate throughout, which results in a smooth texture with just the slightest crunch in every bite. This is achieved by drizzling in a thin stream of melted chocolate during the final stages of churning, which hardens on contact and gets broken up as it churns. My two previous gelato recipes, chocolate and pistachio, were Sicilian style gelato, which has no egg or cream and is thickened with a crema rinforzata made from milk, sugar and cornstarch. Here, for a little variety, I went with a Northern Italian style vanilla gelato, made with an egg based custard.
Makes About 1 Quart
2 cups whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
4 egg yolks
1 cup heavy cream
4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
- Stir the milk and sugar together in a medium sauce pan over medium heat and add the vanilla bean. Heat until bubbles begin to form around the edges. Remove the pan from the heat and steep for 15 minutes.
- In a medium bowl, whisk the egg yolks together. Slowly whisk the warm milk mixture into the egg yolks and transfer the mixture back to the sauce pan. Cook over medium heat stirring constantly with a wooden spoon until mixture thickens and coats the back of the spoon, 8 – 10 minutes and remove custard from heat.
- Pour the cream into a large bowl and place a mesh strainer on top. Pour the custard through the strainer, discarding the vanilla bean, and stir it into the cream. Cover and refrigerate until chilled.
- Remove custard from refrigerator and process in ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions. While ice cream is churning melt chocolate in a sauté pan over low heat or in the microwave. Drizzle a very thin stream of the chocolate into the gelato during the last few minutes of churning.
If it wasn’t already, now is the time to fire up my ice cream maker. I love the simple, wholesome list of ingredients. Can’t wait to try it; I’m sure my kids will thank you!
I found you on TasteSpotting and am writing to say that if you have any photos that aren’t accepted there, I’d love to publish them. Visit my new site (below), it’s a lot of fun! I hope you will consider it.
Best,
Casey
http://www.tastestopping.wordpress.com
Jun 16, 2009 @ 8:52 am
Yet another reason to get the ice cream maker out of the freezer…
Jun 16, 2009 @ 9:08 am
This looks awesome and I just bought an ice cream maker this last weekend. Can’t wait to try this.
Jun 18, 2009 @ 7:58 am
We don’t have an ice cream maker. We make ours and just freeze it. It comes out a treat, those machines are so expensive for the amount of use they get!! Just goes to show that you don’t really need one.
Jul 03, 2009 @ 12:48 am
nice articel, thanks
Aug 15, 2009 @ 11:19 pm
http://chottuweb.com
Aug 15, 2009 @ 11:21 pm
great icecream
uspeh bumaga
Aug 16, 2009 @ 4:46 pm
I’ve made this a few times and it’s always good. Even my underweight son with no appetite likes it! We don’t have an ice cream maker, I stir the gelato well every half hour or so until it’s ready. Also, I blend the eggs and sugar, then add the warm milk while the blender runs, and put the lot back in the pot on the gas. (Lo.) Then I blend the custard before and after the refrigeration stage. This sounds a lot of work – it isn’t but you need to be at home that day. I do the custard the day before and refrigerate overnight – but if/when Cuisinart start selling their home ice cream maker in Israel we’ll buy one!
The melted chocolate threads I drizzle on warp&weft-ways, and we have chocolate lace in our icecream! Much finer than the choc looks in this photo.
A hot day in Connecticut? Try the heat here, we regularly hit 45C.
Sep 02, 2009 @ 2:42 pm