Low Carb Gouda “Butterfinger” Ice Cream

I found an article online titled, “Cheese And Dessert Pairings That Will Blow Your Mind” that piqued my interest. Some of the pairings were familiar, some were new, but one stood out: aged Gouda and dark chocolate. The claim was that it “tastes like a grown-up version of a Butterfinger.” How can I resist?

Low Carb “Lite” Butter Pecan

Butter pecan ice cream was my first attempt at low carb ice cream many years ago. The first batch froze like a rock because I didn’t consider the effects a lack of real sugar would have on the recipe. This flavor was very simple to make and extremely satisfying since it’s pecan halves cooked in salted butter with the salty browned butter mixed into a sweet cream base. The only downside is that it’s extremely calorie dense. Now that I have a relatively low calorie, low carb ice cream base to play with, I thought I’d try making a “lite” version of butter pecan.

Low Carb Whole Milk Replacement for Ice Cream - Part 2

Let’s recap the results of part one. Replacing whole milk with almond milk for use in ice cream can be achieved by adding whey and casein proteins. In order to ensure these proteins and the fat from the heavy cream result in a homogeneous ice cream mix, we will require the following:

Low Carb Whole Milk Replacement for Ice Cream - Part 1

Chefs that make regular sugar-based ice creams use ingredients like corn syrup, nonfat milk powder, and cream cheese because they contain simple sugars like glucose and/or milk proteins that improve aspects of the finished product. I’m going to concentrate on the milk proteins for obvious reasons.

Home ice cream recipes generally use a 2:1 ratio of heavy cream to whole milk yielding a product that’s a little over 20% milk fat. (The legal minimum milk fat required for ice cream in the USA is 10%.) Heavy cream is great for low carb dieting since it has very little sugar and is high in fat. Whole milk is relatively low in fat and higher in sugars like lactose that are not only a poor source of nutrition, they’re undesirable for making hard ice cream. The parts of whole milk that are useful are the proteins. Whey protein provides a lot of benefits such as water binding, viscosity (thickness), and emulsification. Casein adds body (chew), texture (smoothness), and resistance to heat shock. Substituting whole milk for almond milk means we’re missing out on these important milk proteins. The solution is simple: add them back in...and then some!

Low Carb Goat Cheese Ice Cream with Honey Walnuts

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “This all sounds very familiar.” Yes, I already did a Low Carb Roquefort and Honey Ice Cream. So why am I doing this one? What’s the big whoop? I found this in “The Perfect Scoop” by David Lebovitz and I assumed it would just be a simple swap of blue cheese for goat cheese. No, not exactly. There’s double the cheese and zero heavy cream in this formulation probably due to the stronger flavor and harder consistency of blue cheese relative to goat cheese. There’s more milk used in this one, thus one more egg yolk.

The two recipes are very different in the book, but my low carb conversions ended up similar, especially the mix-ins. However, the two ice creams are nothing alike as far as flavor is concerned. If you tasted this one without knowing it contained goat cheese, you’d swear it was an attempt at a cheesecake ice cream. If you wanted to try making ice cream with low sugar fruits, this would be a good base to use.

Low Carb Cracker Jack Ice Cream

Cracker Jack had been absent from my thoughts for years until it popped up in a moment of nostalgic reflection. I remember how my father used to frequently remind us kids that the prizes were a lot better when he was young. They were so bad in the 1970s that it became entertaining, in a weird sort of way, to dig out the tiny trinket and marvel at how sucky the “toy” was. From what I hear, the prizes haven’t gotten any better. I never had a great love for Cracker Jack as a child. It was way too sticky. The caramel coating stuck to your fingers and teeth. Oh, and if it got stale... God help you if you got a box of stale Cracker Jack. Nevertheless, it’s an iconic brand with a unique flavor. Yes, there are similar products like Fiddle Faddle and I even preferred it to Cracker Jack, but let’s face it... Nobody’s going to know how the hell “Low Carb Fiddle Faddle Ice Cream” tastes from the title alone.

I found a copycat recipe for Cracker Jack and discovered the secret ingredients: popcorn, caramel, brown sugar, molasses, and redskin peanuts. I’ve done a popcorn inspired ice cream with great success, so that’s what I’ll use for my base. Caramel is an easy addition using LorAnn Oils Flavor Fountain Flavorings and I’ll add some molasses and brown sugar flavorings, too. Spanish redskin peanuts were a little difficult to find, but I eventually tracked them down at Walmart.

Low Carb Chocolate Chipotle Barbecue Ice Cream

I made a spicy chocolate ice cream a while back called Low Carb Aztec “Hot” Chocolate Ice Cream and it was great. I never got around to repeating it with ground chipotle chili powder. The people at CoolHaus had a similar idea using pureed chipotle chilies and a swirl of whiskey barbecue sauce, too:

This flavor was inspired by the famous Franklin Barbecue restaurant in Austin, Texas. Imagine you had just eaten a spice-rubbed, long-smoked brisket doused with a tangy barbecue sauce. Then you plopped some chocolate cake onto the plate. The resulting sweet, smoky, zingy, peppery, perky, tangy blend is truly complex, as only great Texas barbecue can be.

This is my first attempt at a low carb conversion from the CoolHaus book of ice cream recipes. I like their flavor combinations, but not many can be adapted. I also found many of the recipe instructions were confusing and written poorly. I’m using Guy’s Award Winning Sugar Free BBQ Sauce plus a little bit of bourbon. I figure the alcohol will keep the sugar-free sauce from freezing, plus...well, booze. Is any other reason necessary?