Smoked maple syrup and pecan ice cream

By Kitchen Exile April 19, 2019 BBQ, Dessert, recipes

I've been wanting to do a smoked ice cream for quite some time. Decided on using pecan wood as it has a subtle smokiness and would work well with the sweetness of the maple syrup and pecan nuts. Rather than smoking the custard base I hot smoked the cream for a nice backnote.

I used dry, not pre soaked woodchips, soaking them only produces thicker smoke and lots of steam which you do not want.
4 egg yolks
10g sugar
100ml maple syrup
500ml cream
80g unsalted pecans

For the Pecan smoked cream
Set your BBQ up for indirect cooking with pecan wood chips at 130c and allow the initial white smoke to die down
Once you have thin blue smoke, the BBQ is ready for cooking
Place the cream in a heavy duty pan and place in the BBQ continue to heat the cream until just before boiling point (90c) and take off the heat

You will now be finishing the custard base on the hob
Whisk the sugar maple syrup and egg yolks in a bowl
Pour the cream, milk and vanilla pod mix slowly into the sugar and egg yolk whisking as you do
Pour the mix back into the pan on the hob and continue to whisk slowly on a low heat until it reaches 70c, keep it at 70c for at least 5 minutes which will pasteurise the custard

Allow to cool and place the in fridge for at least 4 hours or preferably overnight

Turn the ice cream maker on for at least 5 minutes before using

Next strain the custard into a jug using a fine mesh sieve
Turn on the ice cream function and pour in the infused custard
The mixture will take about 35 - 40 minutes minutes to churn

Add the pecan nuts in the last 5 minutes of churning