This past weekend we pulled out our kitchenaid ice cream attachment and made blackberry fig coconut ice cream at home! It was our first time working with figs (I don’t think I’ve even eaten a fig before this). I bought some mission figs at Sprouts and let them ripen prior to using them. Another first for us: this is our first vegan ice cream! I am trying to be more cruelty free in my choices. I’m not vegan (yet?) but was excited to try out alternatives to using milk.
We used this recipe by Green Kitchen Stories, which makes about a liter’s worth:
10 fresh ripe figs (preferably mission figs, they are sweeter)
1/3 cup dried shredded coconut, unsweetened
fresh ginger, 1 inch (2,5 cm), minced (optional)
1/2 cup (1,2 dl) honey (vegans use agave nectar)
2 cups (5 dl) coconut milk
lemon juice, from 1/2 lemon
2/3 cup (1,6 dl) fresh blackberries
Start by removing the ends from the figs. Cut each fig into 8 pieces.
Put them in a saucepan, add water, lemon zest, coconut flakes and ginger. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes until the figs are tender.
Add honey and around 10 blackberries. Continue to cook for about 15-20 minutes (you might want to lower the heat a bit) until it reaches a jam-like consistency.
When it’s done, remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature. Use an immersion blender or food processor to quickly mix it together with the coconut milk and lemon juice. Don’t mix too hard, it’s nice with some fruit pieces here and there.
Chill well in the fridge before you put the mixture in an ice cream maker for about 25 minutes or however long your brand of ice cream machine suggests.
Serve with fresh blackberries and a few leaves of fresh lemon balm.
Our results were spectacular :)
We made this a vegan recipe by using agave instead of honey and a can of coconut cream (not coconut milk and not coconut beverage! We bought coconut beverage from trader joe’s not realizing it wasn’t coconut milk, this has added water so I think it wouldn’t have been as creamy. I think in the future I’ll continue to use coconut cream because I liked the resulting texture of this so much.
I couldn’t find lemon balm at any stores near me, so I used mint leaves instead.
We used the kitchenaid ice cream attachment. It requires at least 17 hours of freezing in the fridge, so make sure to do this! We did for about 24 hours just to be safe. Before churning the mixture we put it in the freezer for about half an hour as well. Once the churning was finished we put it in our Tovolo ice cream container. Resist the temptation to eat it now! We had a few spoonfuls before freezing it overnight and it was well worth the wait. Pictures were taken after freezing overnight and the texture (and imo the flavor) were spot on.
We’re thinking of making a vegan brownie and/or vegan coffee ice cream next. :)