How to Make Beer Ice Cream

I first had beer ice cream at Sweet Action here in Denver and was really impressed. They are masters of incorporating odd ingredients into ice cream (sour cream and chives!?!?) and it’s a regular stop of mine.

I knew I had to give beer ice cream a shot, but I had never even made ice cream before let alone with beer in it. It turns out making ice cream is stupid simple. It’s also a hell of a lot of fun.

For the beer, I use Left Hand’s Nitro Milk Stout. 8-ounces gives you a nice beer flavor without being too intense. Adjust up or down as you wish. Others beers work too of course. I really like it with Great Divide’s Hibernation Ale.

I really want to try it with a big buttery English Strong ale, like Geary’s Hampshire Special. This is one application where diacetyl is desired.

Enjoy the video. The written recipe and directions are below.

Beer Ice Cream Recipe

• 8 oz of beer (helps if you pour it early and let it flatten)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 6 egg yolks
• 1 pint (16 oz) heavy whipping cream

Beer Ice Cream Instructions

1. Whisk together the yolks, salt, and sugar in a sauce pan or pot. Then mix in the whipping cream.
2. Slowly heat to 180°F, stirring often. This should take 10 minutes or so. You don’t want to go too high and scramble the eggs.
3. When the mixture hits 180°F, remove it from the heat and pour it through a fine mesh strainer into a medium-sized bowl.
4. Whisk in the beer.
5. Immediately put the medium bowl into an ice bath to cool it (this should feel familiar to homebrewers).
6. When the mixture hits 70°F, remove it from the ice bath. Put Saran wrap on top and put the bowl in the fridge to cool overnight.
7. When chilled, remove the bowl and pour the mixture into the spinning ice cream machine. The machine’s container should be completely frozen.
8. It will take 20-30 minutes to make the ice cream, during which time you can add any ingredients you want to it.
9. If you let it sit in the freezer for a while it will harden up.

Links

• The ice cream maker I use
• Making ice cream without a machine

If you make your own beer ice cream, let us know in the comments how it turned out and what beer you used.