Banana Pudding Ice Cream

When I made the Apple Pie Ice Cream, Brian's gears started turning. He tasted it and said "You know what you should make? Banana pudding ice cream!"

Banana's are on my list of "Don't want to try, don't like them, never have, never will like them" list. The only things that are banana flavored that I will eat are Laffy Taffy's and the banana Runts. That's the extent of my banana consumption and I don't plan on changing that any time soon. Potassium intake be damned.

So, I had Brian design up the ice cream. He wanted the Cinnamon Ice Cream base that I used with the Apple Pie Ice Cream and then add in some bananas and Nilla wafers.

Cinnamon Ice Cream
Source: David Lebovitz, The Perfect Scoop

1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
Pinch of salt
Ten 3-inch cinnamon sticks, broken up
2 cups heavy cream
5 large egg yolks

Warm the milk, sugar, salt, cinnamon sticks, and 1 cup of the cream in a medium saucepan. Once warm, cover, remove from the heat, and let steep at room temperature for 1 hour.

Rewarm the cinnamon-infused milk mixture. Remove the cinnamon sticks with a slotted spoon and discard them. Pour the remaining 1 cup cream into a large bowl and set a mesh strainer on top.

In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the egg yolks. Slowly pour the warm mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly, then scrape the warmed egg yolks back into the saucepan.

Stir the mixture constantly over medium heat with a heatproof spatula, scraping the bottom as you stir, until the mixture thickens and coats the spatula. Pour the custard through the strainer and into the cream. Stir until cool over an ice bath.

Caramelized Bananas

2 bananas
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 Tbsp. melted butter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cut up bananas and place into a large bowl. Toss with the brown sugar, cinnamon and butter. Place in a 8x8 baking dish and bake for 15 minutes. Let cool to room temperature.

For the Banana Pudding Ice Cream

Puree the bananas and their syrup in a food processor. Once your cinnamon ice cream is ready to be chilled in the refrigerator, whisk in the pureed bananas. Chill in the fridge until thoroughly cooled. Freeze in your ice cream maker per your manufacturer's instructions. In the last few minutes of churning, add in some crushed Nilla wafer cookies.