cake batter ice cream (with real cake!).

I've always wanted to try cake batter ice cream, especially after seeing so many of such recipes floating around the baking blogosphere. And there's cake batter popcorn, cake batter blondies, cake batter cookies... I've never tasted raw cake batter before but obviously I'm missing something!

I don't bake in big batches so to specially buy a cake mix for this recipe would be quite a waste. I tried to search for a homemade cake mix formula and turns out that many people think the same way too (like duh). The two main types of homemade mixes are: one without butter, and one with. Basically the typical dry ingredients for a cake are mixed together, and then butter is cut into the mixture like you do for pastry dough. I think the real commercial stuff uses shortening because there's no way you can store cake mixes containing butter at room temperature. I chose to follow a recipe that didn't call for butter (I forgot why), although I gathered that such mixes would then fall under the category of yellow cake mixes and taste better than white cake mix in ice cream.

The making of the custard was pretty uneventful, except that I boiled it a bit too far and it ended up very thick and gloopy. The original recipe said to bring it to 160F like a creme anglaise but I reasoned that because the flour coating the egg yolks prevents scrambling, it was okay to go a little crazy with the heat. I think danger of scrambled eggs or no, it's best not to heat the custard too much because too thick a consistency will give the ice cream an unpleasant mouthfeel. I easily solved my problem of gloopy custard by adding more milk. I wish all solutions were this straightforward. I didn't add enough extra milk and so my ice cream had a slightly chewy quality to it. I didn't mind so much because at least the ice cream didn't melt fast.

Oh yes, and cake batter ice cream is a perfect way to use up cake scraps too! Or any kind of ice cream for that matter. If you think about it, cake and brownies belong to the same baked good family and there should be no reason why cake is used less often in ice cream than brownies.

And I topped my ice cream with rainbow sprinkles! What would life be without them? Of course, if hot fudge is your thing, there's no one to stop you.

Cake Batter Ice Cream
lightly adapted from allrecipes, cake mix adapted from here

I used evaporated milk for a lower fat version and added almond extract. You can really taste the almond in the ice cream so if you don't like the taste of it, you can cut down on the amount of extract up to about half. The ice cream was so creamy, it could have been made with heavy cream.

Homemade cake mix:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup milk powder
3/4 cup sugar

For the ice cream:
3/4 cup cake mix (above, or any cake mix)
1/2 cup sugar
2 egg yolks
1 cup milk
2 cups evaporated milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract

cake pieces from a baked cake (optional)

In a medium saucepan, whisk the cake mix, sugar and egg yolks together until the egg yolk is thoroughly combined with the dry ingredients. Add a bit of milk if it gets too dry. Add the milk and and evaporated milk and bring the mixture to a boil, whisking constantly. There's no need to worry about the egg yolks scrambling because the flour would prevent it. When the mixture thickens enough for your whisk to leave streaks in it, remove from heat and stir in the extracts. Pour the custard into a bowl to cool. It will continue to thicken further so don't cook the custard too far. If you do, just stir in additional milk to loosen.

Chill the custard until completely cold and pour into your ice cream machine for it to do its work. After churning, stir in the cake pieces and freeze the ice cream until firm.