Coffee Ice Cream

[JulianCook]

As far a being able to enjoy the coffee flavor and avoid the finer notes that get destroyed when using heat, seems like you might want to make a cold brew with your preferred coffee, then make a reduction from that. Since you aren't applying heat directly against the bean you are avoiding the nastiness that comes with unwanted oils coming out from the bean, but now that I am typing this, I realize that heat of reduction may destroy the finer notes of the cold brew.

As an alternative, maybe u could try dehydrating the cold brew and making a powder. Ideally freeze drying would be preferred ....

I could be wrong about all of this but it is a nice brainstorming exercise

 

EDITED: I did not read the entire thread so I'm not sure I am adding anything to the discussion but I can't thank you enough for starting this thread. So much good info.

Edited April 27, 2018 by JulianCook
Clarity (log)

[paulraphael]

Cold brew seems to be a popular method for coffee ice cream, but I'm not so interested in it because it actually de-emphasizes the origin character of the beans. You extract fewer of the acids and aromatics than when hot brewing. I think this is why it's popular with casual coffee drinkers ... if the coffee beans aren't great quality, you can still get a satisfying cup out of them. But if the coffee beans are awesome, you lose a lot of what makes them so.

 

The sugar and dairy tend to mute those acids and aromatics, so I think you'd risk getting coffee flavor that's all low notes. A final issue is that you get less extraction overall than you do from hot brewing, so to get equivalent strength you have to use more coffee. I'm already putting about $6 worth of coffee into a quart of ice cream ... it would be nice to not spend even more.