After years of making mince pies and Christmas cakes, we wanted to try something a little different this year. This Christmas recipe combines soft chocolate cookies with Christmas pudding flavoured ice-cream.
Ingredients
Cookie mixture
- 113g vegetable shortening
- 250g light brown sugar
- ½ tsp baking powder
- ¾ tsp salt
- 60g dark cocoa powder, sifted
- ½ tsp instant espresso powder
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 220g plain flour, sifted
Chocolate Christmas Pudding Ice Cream
- 2 cinnamon sticks, snapped in half
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
- ¼ tsp caraway seeds
- 4 cloves
- 300ml full-fat milk
- 100g dark chocolate
- 3 large egg yolks
- 100g caster sugar
- 300ml double cream
- 250g Christmas Pudding
- 2 tbsp brandy
Method
Cookies
1. Pre-heat your oven to 170°C. Prepare two or three baking sheets with baking paper.
2. In a large mixing bowl beat together the shortening and sugar with an electric mixer for 2-3 minutes.
3. Add the baking powder, salt, cocoa powder, espresso powder, ground ginger, ground cinnamon and vanilla extract. Mix again until combined.
4. Mix in half the flour and 2 tablespoons of water.
5. Mix the rest of the flour and 2 or 3 tablespoons of water. The dough should be well combined and soft but not sticky.
6. Roll the dough out between two pieces of baking paper until the dough is about 5mm thick.
7. Use a circular cookie cutter to cut out cookies and transfer them to a baking sheet. Re-roll any scraps until you have used it all up.
8. Place the baking sheets in the freezer for 10 minutes or the fridge for an hour. The longer you leave them the less they will spread.
9. Bake for around 7 or 8 minutes until the cookies have just set. Don’t overbake them.
10. Remove from the oven and allow them to cool.
11. Keep in the fridge or freeze until you are ready to use them.
Ice Cream
1. Prepare a large baking pan by lining with foil or baking paper.
2. Crumble the Christmas Pudding and place in a bowl. Pour the brandy over and leave covered.
3. Place the cinnamon sticks, ground ginger, nutmeg, caraway seeds, cloves, milk and chocolate in a saucepan. Bring to the boil slowly and stir to mix in the chocolate. Take off the heat once it starts to boil.
4. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until pale and thick. Slowly pour the hot milk mix over the top, whisking all the time. Pour it all back into the saucepan.
5. Place on a low heat and cook gently, stirring all the time. The custard is ready when it is thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon.
6. Cool in the fridge overnight.
7. Whisk the double cream until it forms soft peaks.
8. Pour the custard through a sieve and fold the cream into it.
9. Churn in an ice cream maker until it is frozen.
10. Stir in the brandy infused Christmas Pudding and pour into the prepared baking pan.
11. Freeze until firm.
Putting them together.
1. Remove the ice cream from the freezer and lift out of the pan using the foil.
2. Use the same cookie cutter as for the cookies to cut out the ice cream. Place between two cookies and freeze the sandwiches.
3. Decorate if you wish and serve.
