Dark Chocolate Cherry Custard Ice Cream is a thick dessert made with whole milk, heavy cream, sugar, and pure vanilla extract. This luscious ice cream is blended with dark bing cherries and dark chocolate chips for a rich balance to the sweet cream.
If you love the cherry chocolate ice cream Ben and Jerry’s is known for, the thick cherry chunks make this a delicious summer treat that you can make at home. Cherry chocolate ice cream brands usually incorporate some sort of additional cherry flavoring which can be overpowering.
Ours is a decadent vanilla custard that plays on the cherry and chocolate by focusing on the natural flavors from the chunks and bits. It’s a subtle frozen dessert that has become a favorite throughout our family, and we are sure yours will love it too.
This recipe uses fresh picked cherries from our family orchard, but you can use frozen if you prefer. Just dice them into chunks and add them to the custard cream.
Everything will be blended together in our favorite ice cream maker by Cuisinart. It is budget friendly, easy to use, and creates a thick and delicious ice cream every time. We love to enjoy this frozen treat in late summer. It is refreshing, scrumptious, and has a delicious blend of flavors.
If you love ice cream, be sure to check out our French vanilla bean ice cream, ice cream sandwiches, and a few fruit infused ice creams as well.
How do you get a thick, creamy ice cream?
Dairy is always the key ingredient to a creamy, silky, thick ice cream. Whole milk, heavy cream, and eggs will yield a smooth texture and prevent crystallization. This is because the fats prevent the ice particles from forming, which will make the ice cream gritty and crunchy.
Using an ice cream maker will also help to achieve the perfect ice cream consistency. These machines are not only designed to take the extra work off your hands, they are also built for efficiency and high quality results.
Ice cream makers will help keep your delicious cream at the proper temperature the entire time, and mix all of the flavors and ingredients fully. Here are some tips and tricks for you to follow to get the very best ice cream every time.
- Chill your ice cream maker base. Having a chilled base will help your ice cream churn and come together quickly which reduces crystallization and yields a silky, creamy product.
- Prioritize fats for a creamier cream. Boosting butterfat will result in a thicker, silkier ice cream partly because the fats act as a barrier to the sugars crystallizing which makes ice cream grainy.
- Adding liquid sweeteners like honey, maple syrup, even corn syrup will help sweeten the ice cream without adding a grainy texture that granulated sugars do.
- Follow recipes exactly until you’re ready to play around with experimentation. Chill time and execution are crucial in attaining the very best homemade ice creams. Be patient and follow the steps for the best result.
How do I mix candy or fruit into my homemade ice cream?
Simply prep the ingredients that you will be adding by chilling and dicing them into bite sized pieces. You will then add it the to the cream and put everything into your ice cream maker. The ice cream maker will combine everything and stir the fruit or candy chunks throughout the mixture.
Chocolate Cherry Ice Cream recipe
Black cherry chocolate ice cream is made with a velvety vanilla custard and blended with chunks of fresh cherries and dark chocolate chips. This ice cream dessert is a wonderfully mild cherry ice cream that does not use extra cherry flavoring; just simple, natural ingredients that bring a wonderful flavor and consistency.
Custard is the best method for a truly creamy ice cream. Custard uses eggs and creates a luscious, silky smooth texture with a rich flavor. It’s a bit more work than the non custard recipes, but well worth it.
Here is a step by step guide to make this dark chocolate cherry custard ice cream.
- In a medium sauce pan combine, milk, cream, sugar, salt and vanilla. Turn heat to medium and whisk until sugar is thoroughly melted. Remove from heat and set aside.
- Beat the egg yolks in a separate bowl and slowly add into the cooled milk mixture. It can be slightly warm, but not too hot or it will cook the eggs.
- Once the eggs are whisked into the mixture, return the pot to the stove on medium heat.
- Whisk constantly until the custard slightly thickens and leaves a thin coating over a spoon.
- Remove from heat and whisk constantly until room temperature. You can quick cool it by placing the pan in a bowl of ice if you prefer.
- Cover and chill until cold. We recommend refrigerating for at least an hour until it has cooled through.
- Using chilled chocolate and cherries, dice everything into bite sized pieces.
- Your custard is ready to churn! Start your churn and pour in the custard. Follow your ice cream makers instructions from here.
We froze the ice cream overnight, and in the morning it was gorgeous, creamy and so tasty! The consistency was firm, but scoop-able. Freeze according to how hard set you would like the ice cream.
Your Printable Recipe Card
Dark Chocolate Cherry Custard Ice Cream
Dark Chocolate Cherry Custard Ice Cream is summer time fruity freshness and dark chocolate decadence blended into a creamy base of frozen custard. So good!
Ingredients
- 1 Cup Whole milk
- 1 Cup granulated sugar
- 2 Cups heavy cream, I used whipping cream
- pinch salt
- 2 tsp.pure vanilla extract, or one vanilla bean
- 6 egg yolks, I'm using free range from our chickens-makes the custard yellower
- 1/2 Cup bing cherries pitted and rough chopped
- 1/2 Cup dark chocolate chips, or a 4 0z. semi sweet dark chocolate barrouchly chopped or shaved
Instructions
- Place in a medium sauce pan, milk, cream, sugar, salt and vanilla. Turn heat to medium and whisk until sugar is thoroughly melted. Remove from heat. set aside.
- Beat the egg yolks in a medium bowl and slowly add into the cooled (slightly warm is ok but not hot!) milk mixture.
- Whisk the eggs into the milk mix and return the pot to the stove on medium heat.
- Whisk constantly until the custard slightly thickens(lightly coats a spoon). Just UNDER a boil.
- Remove from heat and whisk constantly until room temperature(quick cool over ice if desired).
- Cover and chill until cold(refrigerate at least an hour or so to chill thoroughly)
- chill (but do NOT freeze) the chopped chocolate and cherries.
- Your custard is ready to churn! Start your churn and pour in the custard.
According to your machine's directions.
- I mixed the custard about 15 minutes and then added in the chocolate and cherries. It took another 15 minutes or so to get the custard to firm up to soft ice cream stage. We froze it overnight (after experiencing some of the best soft serve Ice cream I have ever had!) In the morning It as gorgeous, creamy and so tasty! Very hard but scoop-able. Set on the counter 10 minutes to soften if necessary.
Notes
I mixed the custard about 15 minutes and then added in the chocolate and cherries. It took another 15 minutes or so to get the custard to firm up to soft ice cream stage. We froze it overnight (after experiencing some of the best soft serve Ice cream I have ever had!) In the morning It as gorgeous, creamy and so tasty! Very hard but scoop-able. Set on the counter 10 minutes to soften if necessary.
Nutrition Information
Amount Per Serving Calories 221
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this creamy custard recipe was found at Bakedbyrachel.com
Linda
Thursday 30th of June 2022
Loved this recipe, easy to make. Turned out great!
Diane
Thursday 30th of June 2022
Hi Linda, We are so happy you enjoyed this ice cream. Thanks for letting us know!
Trish
Sunday 9th of May 2021
Can you use frozen cherries in this recipe?
Diane
Sunday 9th of May 2021
Hi Trish, That is fine as long as they are not full of ice crystals. That will affect the ice cream texture a bit. If they have ice crystal on them just run the cherries through some water in a sieve until the crystals melt off then use as fresh cherries. Enjoy!
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Alik
Friday 8th of May 2020
This looks amazing and I can't wait to try it!! You mentioned you had the best soft serve ice cream. I recently purchased the Cuisinart Soft Serve Ice Cream maker. Were you able to get the cherries and chocolate to fit through the dispense
Diane
Friday 8th of May 2020
Hi Alik, I think you have a different ice cream maker than I do. When I say soft serve I mean it's soft when first done. Then if you freeze it will harden up some.If you try to do the fresh cherries and chocolate chunks in a soft serve dispenser they will get stuck. You may have luck pulverizing the cherries in a food processor and melting the chocolate in the custard. Best of luck!
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