Scooped: Ginger Green Tea Ice Cream

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Max Falkowitz

I hear two types of complaint about green tea ice cream.

The first: "I don't like green tea. I hate the bitterness."

Sorry, friend. I can't help you. Why are you reading a post about green tea ice cream anyway?

Then there's the second complaint: "Most green tea ice cream tastes like vanilla. I want real tea flavor!"

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"it's giving green tea its due: grassy and robust, but with sweet vanilla undertones."

To the macho green tea ice cream lovers out there—of which I occasionally count myself a member—who say such things, this is the ice cream for you. It's as loaded as green tea ice cream gets. That doesn't mean it's inedibly bitter, though—just that it's giving green tea its due: grassy and robust, but with sweet vanilla undertones.

I decided to cut the ice cream's considerable richness with some fresh ginger. Okay, a lot of fresh ginger. Enough to send some fresh, bright heat down your throat as you dig in. Unfortunately, fresh ginger has a tendency to slightly coagulate heated dairy, so don't be surprised if, when making this ice cream, you see some clumps. After cooking the dairy into a custard, straining it, and churning it, I've never had problems with lumps in the final scoop.

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It's an ice cream strong enough to hit you when you have a cold, rich enough to satisfy the more hardcore of green tea urges, and refreshing enough to beat the muggy summer days to come. Would that all ice creams were so bold.