Salted Caramel Ice Cream

This is a stunningly delicious ice cream that's also super easy to make. From start to finish, it takes just 20 minutes. The hardest part is waiting for it to set! This is just perfect to beat the heat.

Ingredients:

Egg yolks - 5
Sugar - 3/4 Cup
Double cream - 1 Cup
Milk - 1 Cup
Salt - 1 teaspoon (more or less, depending on your taste)
Vanilla extract - 1 teaspoon

Beat Yolks

In a bowl, beat the egg yolks till light and pale. Set aside.

Make Caramel

Reserve 3 tablespoons of sugar for the garnish. Place the rest of the sugar in a pan and place over medium heat; cook till it caramelises. Try not to stir it around. If you must move the sugar around, do so by swirling it in the pan. Always be careful when you handle caramel because it is very hot!

Add the Dairy

The moment the sugar caramelises completely, turn off the heat and immediately add the cream. Be careful as it is extremely hot and will bubble up. Now add the milk, and heat till all the hard caramel has melted into the milk.

Make the Custard

1. Now carefully, while simultaneously stirring, add 1/3 of the hot caramel/milk mixture to the beaten yolks. Keep stirring to prevent curdling. Add the rest of the milk and mix well.
2. Put this mixture back in the pan and cook on medium heat till it becomes thick and coats the back of a spoon. Be careful not to let it boil, or your custard will curdle.
3. Take off the heat. Mix in the vanilla and salt. Make sure you add the salt little by little, tasting after each addition. You can always add more, but you cannot take away once added. Strain it into a freezer safe bowl.

Tip: This custard is what you would call a creme anglaise. You could stop at this stage, and instead of freezing it, pour it warm or cold over desserts like cakes, puddings, etc. It is absolutely delicious like this.

Freeze the Custard

If you have an ice cream machine, use that. If you don't (like me), simply freeze the mixture till it is almost frozen, then beat it smooth or put it in a blender till smooth. Then freeze again. Repeat this a couple of times.
To serve, I garnished the scoops of ice cream with hard caramel. For the garnish, take the 3 tablespoons of sugar reserved from earlier, and caramelise it over medium heat. Let it thicken slightly, before making shapes with it on a baking paper, silicon sheet or aluminium foil. let set before using as garnish. You could also sprinkle some flakes of sea salt on top, if you wish.