Pina colada ice cream
Pineapple and coconut, like the cocktail: tropical, rich and very aromatic. No rum, but all the flavour.
Raw pineapple contains bromelain, an enzyme that breaks down milk proteins. That is why it goes in last and gets churned immediately: the less time it spends in contact with the mix, the better.
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
- ·The coconut as it cools to 4 °C. The pineapple, after ageing, then straight to churning.
- ·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
Light and thoroughly tropical: the pineapple brings water and acidity, and the coconut supplies the fat the cream does not cover. It stays fresh and loose in the mouth, more drinkable than chewable, with coconut holding the base.
All about this piña colada ice cream
This is a two-fruit ice cream whose fruits do not go in together. The coconut purée is added once the mix has already come down to 4 °C, before ageing. The pineapple purée waits until the base is aged: in it goes, blend, and into the machine.
That order is not a whim. Raw pineapple contains bromelain, which attacks milk protein; the less time it spends with the milk, the cleaner the ice cream stays. It is the same reason the banana ice cream adds its fruit at the end, though there it is about oxidation.
The recipe sits below the usual band on both solids and fat: it comes out lighter, more a fruit ice than a custard.
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.
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