Blueberry ice cream
Blueberry in quantity: deep purple, tart and fruity, with the jammy note cooked fruit gives and the freshness of raw fruit.
The cooked part and the raw part do different jobs: the boiled one releases colour and pectin and gives body; the one added cold keeps the fresh aroma, which is the first thing heat destroys.
Ingredients
For 1 kgTick each ingredient as you get it ready.
Need to adjust the formula?
Step by step
9 steps · follow the order for the best result
Chef's notes
- ·Blueberries split: a third cold at the start, two thirds with the mix already at 4 °C.
- ·Do not skip the cold ageing: it hydrates proteins and stabiliser and clearly improves the texture.
- ·The serving temperature depends on your recipe: if you formulate to a softer PAC than your freezer (say -11 °C with the chest at -18 °C), temper it for 5–10 min before serving; if the PAC matches your freezer, it can be eaten straight out.
- ·Why formulate at -11 and not at -18 °C: even though your freezer sits at -18 °C, formulating at -11 makes the ice cream tastes better — at -18 it is so cold that the taste buds barely pick up the flavour and the fat is slow to melt in the mouth. And keeps better: ice cream formulated at -11 and kept at -18 has less free water, suffers less from Ostwald ripening (ice crystals joining and growing) and keeps its creaminess longer.
- ·Keep your own notes: write down the POD and PAC that work best with your machine.
The texture
spot on
Creamy and firm, with the cream well present despite all that fruit. The blueberry's water pulls towards ice and the milk solids offset it, so it stays dense without being heavy. The acidity cuts the cream and leaves a clean finish.
All about this blueberry ice cream
The blueberries go in generously, and it is the split that makes the recipe: one third cold at the start, with the milk and the cream, and two thirds once the mix has come down to 4 °C. With only the raw part the ice cream would taste fresher but come out watery; with all of it cooked it would have body and no aroma.
The base is calculated at the centre of the fat band, with cream and milk, and reaches the right solids thanks to the milk powder. The sugars are split between dextrose, 38 DE glucose and sucrose, with the sweetness slightly high on purpose: the fruit is sharp, and acid masks sweetness.
The serving temperature stays within band, so that the water the blueberries bring does not turn into crystals.
The ingredients and what each does
Every ingredient has a technical job: cream brings fat and creaminess, milk powder raises the non-fat solids, the sugars set the sweetness and the freezing point, and the stabiliser controls crystal growth during storage.
Technique and controlling the numbers
Adjusting the POD (sweetening power) and the PAC (antifreezing power, given as a target temperature) lets you match sweetness and hardness to your taste and your machine. With the selectors in the side bar the formula recalculates itself and you will see how the amount of each ingredient changes.
Storage and common mistakes
Store at -18 °C in an airtight container and avoid freeze-thaw cycles. The commonest faults are not ageing it enough, too much sugar so it never freezes properly, and over-churning, which whips in too much air and wrecks the texture.
Recommended for this recipe
Equipment and ingredients that make the difference.
Ad links: we link to Amazon. We are not an Amazon affiliate in your market yet, so we earn nothing from these links.
Answers to your questions
Frequently asked questions
Other recipes
you might like
Missing a sugar?
Tick the one you haven't got and which alternatives you do have. We'll tell you whether you can make it with what's there.