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Hello everyone, I'm Claire Saffitz. Welcome to my home kitchen. We are back from our vacation. It's fall in the Hudson Valley, and it's that time of year when everyone wants to get back in the kitchen. So today I have a very interesting recipe for you. We will make brownies and vanilla ice cream. I'm making a Brownie Sundae ice cream cake. I will make it with Halal vanilla. It's all so delicious: vanilla ice cream and chocolate. We'll also make hot chocolate sauce. It's so impressive, fun, and festive. Perfect for any time of year, it's a little more work than a regular brownie sundae, but it's for a big party. It can be prepared in advance. This is very interesting.
Brownie sundae is a true classic. I wanted to make an ice cream cake. I'm into making ice cream, and the brownie sundae is a classic, and I even think it tastes better as an ice cream cake than as a sundae. I love the contrast of warm and cold in a brownie sundae. But this way allows for more texture, it's a lot of fun, and you can cut it into many portions at once. We make vanilla ice cream here. So, one of the advantages of making ice cream for a cake is that you still need to soften it, so it's perfect for pouring straight from the ice cream maker into a mold. It already has the perfect soft consistency. We
use a lot of the same ingredients for different parts. We have the ice cream base, the ingredients for the brownies, and I've already made the hot chocolate sauce. I have an episode about hot chocolate sauce on the Dessert Person channel, you can watch it right there. And to finish off the ice cream cake, I have maraschino cherries and even more whipped cream, because we're going to cover the entire cake with whipped cream. For the brownies, I'll need light brown sugar, oil, dark chocolate, one whole egg plus yolk, cocoa powder (Dutch-style), salt, a little corn syrup, flour, and butter. That's all for O, and a little more vanilla extract, which I'll definitely add. For the ice cream itself, we'll need heavy cream, milk-in a
two-to-one ratio, a little corn syrup so it stays soft even after it's completely frozen, sugar, and six egg yolks. I only have whole eggs here. We will also add a little vanilla extract and a vanilla pod. So, out of the special equipment, the most important thing if you want to make this recipe like I do is an ice cream maker. Here she is behind me. There are many different types, you can use the one you like. I also have a bread pan lined with cling film. This is for assembling our ice cream cake. We will make it in the shape of a loaf, not round. I also have a baking sheet for brownies. My oven is preheated to 350
degrees, so everything is ready. Brownies, I love brownies, they are so quick and easy to make. Before I get to the recipe, I want to thank our friends at Heilala for sponsoring this episode. If you've been watching Dessert Person for a long time, you know that I often use vanilla in my baking, and it's always Heilala. Heilala has been operating for over 20 years. They work with vanilla-growing communities, and all pods are hand-picked, sun-dried, and cold-extracted over several months. What I love about vanilla is that, depending on how it's used, it can be the star of a recipe, like in my brownie cake with ice cream, where I use a whole pod to flavor the vanilla ice cream, or it can be left in the background
, accentuating the flavor of other baked goods. So I use their entire range: from extract and paste to whole pods and even vanilla sugar. I like to use them in a wide variety of dishes in my kitchen. This is a great holiday gift for all the pastry chefs in your life. If you follow the link in the description below, you can get a 20% discount on full-price Heilala products. I hope you'll take a look there, and now let's get back to the recipe. So, I'll start by mixing the chocolate. 6 tablespoons of unsalted butter. This is a quarter cup of alkalized cocoa powder. And now the oil. The oil also helps keep the brownie's texture chewy so it doesn't become hard when frozen.
Now I'm going to put this over low heat and stir occasionally until the chocolate and butter are completely melted. OK. So, I took it off the heat once it was almost melted, but not completely. Do not let this mixture overheat. And I'm going to add brown sugar to this. And our corn syrup. That's 2 tablespoons of corn syrup. Corn syrup is less sweet than regular sugar. So it's a functional ingredient. I don't add it because I want to replace the sweetness of sugar with another sweetness. I add it because corn syrup is an invert sugar, meaning it remains liquid at room temperature.
It simply prevents the sugar from crystallizing and keeps the baked goods moist, preventing them from becoming stale. So it's very useful for freezing. I think sometimes people hear " corn syrup" and are scared: "Oh my God, we're not supposed to use that ." But we're not talking about high-fructose corn syrup. This is a completely different thing. So just a little bit of syrup, it's like sugar. And now we add the eggs. That's one whole egg plus one yolk. I take one egg and the yolk because I don't want the extra water from the egg white. Egg white is mostly water, and water freezes into ice. And I want it to stay soft and stretchy. And here I actually add a little bit of plain
water. This is also one of the reasons why I don't use protein. About a tablespoon or so. This helps keep everything in an emulsified state. It will also help dissolve the sugar a little. What is needed for the right brownie texture? You need to beat this until the mixture is very smooth and shiny. I'll also add vanilla extract, about a teaspoon and a half. OK. The last step, the brownies-it's so easy and quick. It's 3/4 cup of flour and a little salt, kosher salt. This is the finished dough: I mixed 3/4 cup of flour with salt and now I just mix with a spatula to make everything come together evenly. It is
almost impossible to overmix brownie batter. Here it is, it looks very, very delicious. This brownie recipe is adapted for freezing as part of an ice cream cake, but you can also prepare it as a separate dessert. It is delicious on its own. We had a little taste of it last night. Okay, now I'm translating this into a prepared form. So now I take my angled spatula and just flatten the dough into the pan. And the same pan that I mixed the brownie batter in-as you can see, I did everything in the pan. I didn't even have to get a separate bowl. I'll rinse it because we'll also use it to make the ice cream base. So, we put them in the oven, they will bake for about 25 minutes, and the brownies are always done when they have risen a little but
are still shiny in the center. This is what we will strive for. It's about 25 minutes. Let's start with our foundation. We are essentially making crème anglaise, which is like custard that needs to be stirred constantly. So, custard is dairy products , sugar, and eggs. I'll start by pouring two cups of cream into a saucepan, and the essence of the technique is to heat the milk base. We beat the eggs with some of the sugar, and then mix everything together. I add two tablespoons of corn syrup along with a couple tablespoons of sugar. And I'm also going to add a pinch of salt. I did n't get it, but I'll definitely add it. Now
I'm going to add the split vanilla pod here. This is the main ingredient. They are so full. Their aroma is not at all what you imagine if you are used to the smell of artificial vanilla. He is much different. Less sweet, in a way. Much more complicated. And in many ways, this aroma comes from the pod itself. That's why I like to use whole vanilla pods: there are seeds in there, but there's also the pod itself, which has a lot of flavor that's a little different from the seeds. And he is incredibly versatile. So we'll infuse all of this in our milk base To get the seeds, we cut open the pod. When I do this, I like to cut it on only one side.
Imagine that the pod has a kind of skin filled with stuff inside. I prefer to cut the pod on only one side. So I'm not cutting it in half. I think of it like a zipper on clothes. It's like I'm unbuttoning it. Now we'll just reveal it. And inside are all these little grains. Vanilla is so highly prized. Growing it is very difficult and labor-intensive work. I chatted with Jennifer and Ruby from Heilala, learned about their process, and it made me appreciate vanilla as a product even more. So I'm always going to use a pod. I'm going to insist on it as a basis. And then I'll rinse it, save it, and
put it into my homemade vanilla extract that I'm working on. So I always save the pods too. OK. So, when you cut it, you will now use the blunt side of the knife. And I put, you put your finger on top to hold it in place. Now we're going to scrape the contents of the pod to remove all those seeds. You see how many there are from one pod. So, we have an empty pod and all the seeds. They will go into my cream. Here they go inside. For that amount of ice cream, one whole vanilla pod is a lot. This makes the ice cream very vanilla, but that's exactly what we want.
You know, when ice cream or anything else freezes, it muffles the flavors. So we need an intense vanilla flavor so that we can feel it in the finished ice cream. Okay, this will go on the stove and be brought to a boil. While it's heating, I'll separate the egg yolks. So now I have six yolks. That's an extra half cup of sugar. I'm going to add it. So, we're going to beat this until it's light and pale. Okay, now I'll bring it here. This has already reached a boiling point. And now I'm going to slowly add the mixture to the eggs, about 2/3 of the way through, whisking constantly. The idea here is to very slowly and carefully raise the temperature of the eggs.
Uh, and the idea is not to boil them so they don't curl. I don't. You don't want scrambled eggs. Okay, we added, say, 2/3 of the cream mixture to the eggs. Now we're going to pour the egg mixture back into the saucepan. We will cook everything together. So, we'll put this back on the stove. I'll take my instant thermometer. Since the brownies have been in the oven for 24 minutes, I think they are ready. We will get them. And we will cook this mixture on the stove until we reach a temperature of about 175 degrees. Oh, they look really great.
OK. So, you see, they've risen more at the edges than in the center, and the center is still very soft. So, they look great. Now they will cool down. And we will prepare our base. I think it was n't even two minutes of whipping on the stove before I reached 175 degrees, because the temperature was quite high due to preheating the cream. And we still have a vanilla bean there. This is very important. We will let it continue to infuse. And now the last thing I add is a cup of cold milk. And the point is that it's cold, it will lower the temperature, because we need to cool the base. You cannot pour
hot base into an ice cream maker. It just won't work. OK. Now I'm going to pour this over here.it's about 3 and a half cups. I'll pour this into a liter container so we can refrigerate it. And I have one batch that I made last night, it's already cold. In the past, if you've seen me make ice cream on the show, sometimes I would make the base and then put it in an ice bath to cool it down quickly. But I didn't want to do it. I just made an extra base. I thought having extra vanilla ice cream was a good thing. This is not bad at all. So, my brownies are still warm, but we'll move on to assembly.
There is one more preparatory step before I start making the ice cream, which is preparing the brownies. The idea is that the brownie serves as the base for the ice cream cake, as in the classic brownie and ice cream dessert. And then we'll add the trimmings, which will be part of the ice cream itself. So we're going to have vanilla ice cream with brownie crumbs, ribbons of hot chocolate sauce, and this brownie base. This will be so delicious. So, I have a cupcake pan. I covered it with cling film. A very, very good tip, perhaps the best of all, is to moisten the mold a little. I just rubbed a few drops of water into the mold, and now the film holds. So I'll cut out my brownie base.
You see, it sticks to the knife because the brownie is still a little warm. Good. So now we have the base for the ice cream cake. And then we have trimmings. I will cut these scraps into small pieces to add to our ice cream once it is finished churning. Last year I collaborated with Salt & Straw, an ice cream company based in Portland, and I really thought about what I like about ice cream and what I want to add to it. Because I'm very picky about this. And I decided I wanted to add crumbs to it. That moist crumb texture is so wonderful. So that's what we're aiming for here. So here are all my brownie scraps, all the pieces, diced up like little particles. And now we will freeze both. So we'll freeze both the base and the crumbs.
This is necessary so that when assembling the finished ice cream, it does not melt when we mix everything together. While they are freezing, we will make our ice cream. This takes about 15 minutes in the freezer. Here is our cold base that I made last night. Look how yellow it is because of the large number of eggs. But first we want to filter it. We have a vanilla bean in there and small pieces of boiled egg that we need to sift out. So we'll cover that. It will be whipped until it resembles thick cupcake batter that pulls away from the sides a little. At this point,
I'll grab my brownie pieces and we'll start assembling the dessert. I'll also show you that I have some hot chocolate sauce that I made last night, and it's at room temperature now. So, it's pretty thick. I'll probably add a drop of water to make it more liquid. We will lay it out in layers in a mold We'll have vanilla ice cream with brownie pieces. We'll layer the cake in the pan, alternating with the hot chocolate sauce to create a marbled pattern, and then add another layer of brownies on top. So, my ice cream is almost ready. It's time to add the brownie pieces. And then he
needs to cool down a little more. So it will continue to get lost. I'll take my bread pan that was in the freezer because a cold pan helps during assembly. So, I'll take that and my brownie base. The first thing I want to do is put some hot fudge on the bottom of the mold. It is at room temperature. I wouldn't want it to be even slightly warm because I don't want to melt the ice cream. So this part is very.it's quite chaotic. Just throw it in there and we'll layer the ice cream with hot fudge. And you really can't mess it up. The idea is that the fondant creates a ribbon in the ice cream cake.
What I like here is that there are larger pieces of brownie left over as well as crumbs. And now the brownie base. She is beautiful and cold. We'll just put it in there. Place it somehow in a bread pan. That's it. OK. And now I'll just wrap it in cling film. And it will freeze in the freezer. This will take at least 4 hours, but it is better to leave it overnight. I have a version that I made last night. We'll send it to freeze. I'll clean up here. We'll have a little dessert with ice cream for lunch. And then we'll go back to the final assembly, that is, the whipped cream. Before I get my cake out, because as soon as it comes out, I start
to worry that it will melt. I'll whip the cream to cover it. I have heavy cream. I'll add a little vanilla paste. I wo n't add sugar. There is enough sugar in the other ingredients. So I'll just make unsweetened whipped cream. I'll mash them up and then just strain out a few cocktail cherries. I was thinking about confectioner's sprinkles. But I decided to refuse. I don't think.she's definitely not needed here. But I wanted to add a little color. This is inspired by a sundae, so in my opinion, a cocktail cherry is a must here. When my parents first moved to Massachusetts, our whole family went to
Cape Cod and we stayed at family friends' houses. Family friends from St. Louis who had a house on Cape Cod. They didn't go there often because they lived in St. Louis. We went into the house. It was an old cottage of some kind. And the only thing we found to eat in the whole house was a can of cocktail cherries. So, my sisters and I just sat and ate them. I don't recommend doing this. Even a third of a can of cocktail cherries is too much for the stomach. But this whipped cream is almost ready. We will beat them only until soft.
Otherwise, when they touch the cold ice cream.even if they are medium peaks, they will thicken and not lay down as evenly So, we are almost at the finish line. I would say I'm whipping a glass of cream somewhere. I just added "by eye". OK. The view is wonderful. Now I'll grab my dessert and a serving plate to assemble it. One thing I will say: I didn't assemble this dessert as neatly as the one I showed earlier. I overfilled the mold a little, and the brownie wasn't cold. So he melted a little. So it looks a little.I'm not going to get perfectly sharp edges. Maybe I'll trim it. Actually, that's what I wanted to say.
Remember that the brownie layer is the base. So we'll turn it over. And we'll take a picture.Oh my god, oh my god, my chocolate Well, I guess we're saying goodbye to that chocolate. Goodbye, chocolate. Now add whipped cream on top. I'm in a bit of a hurry with the finish because I don't want it to melt. I want to cut off a piece. So I'll put the cherries on top. And now I'll cut off a piece. I have a serrated knife It is quite soft. I don't recommend opening and closing the freezer as often as I did while it was freezing. This is some huge piece. It's just incredibly big. Mm. Okay, the whipped cream is very slippery, but you can see in the cut all the layers of chocolate and brownie,
all those pieces of brownie inside. The serving temperature is ideal. It's just very difficult to cut. But you see, I can easily scoop up a brownie with a spoon, it hasn't frozen solid. Brownie pieces and chocolate. Perfect chewy texture. I love how the vanilla seeds combine with the brownie crumbs in the ice cream Everything mixes, it's so harmonious. I smell both brownie and vanilla. Such a creamy taste. Making ice cream at home is so much fun. I really think it's easier than you think. And there's nothing better than freshly made vanilla ice cream.
I remember when I was in culinary school, we had one day a week dedicated to baking with Chef Antoine, who had decades of experience, had been everywhere, seen everything, and tried everything. And yet, his favorite dessert was vanilla ice cream. And that day, when we were making vanilla ice cream, he, like a child, eagerly stood in front of the freezer and ate it with a big smile on his face. And this is from a pastry chef, a French pastry chef, who has, you know, tried everything. The bottom line is that vanilla ice cream is really delicious. I really hope you try making it or just enjoy the vanilla ice cream on its own. It is so delicious. I want to thank our friends at Heilala for sponsoring this issue. I add
vanilla to a lot of my baking and love using Heilala products. So if you want to check out Heilala's products, I highly recommend doing so. You can get a 20% discount on your order with the code Claire26. You can follow the link in the description below to view the products. This is great for the holiday season, gifts, and all your baking. So thank you very much for watching and don't forget to like and subscribe.
