Coffee Toffee Ice Cream

 My favorite ice cream flavor is Hershey's Cappuccino Crunch: Coffee ice cream with a dark chocolate spiral and almond toffee pieces. I can't find it around here, plus my daughter has a new interest in making ice cream (and also can't have almonds which are in the toffee crunch component of the real thing). So I cobbled together different recipes and I'm keeping my notes here for future reference. 

Toffee Bits

First I made almondless toffee according to this recipe. If almonds aren't an issue you can just use Heath bits, available near the chocolate chips. If you want toffee in every bite use a cup of bits. If you're not crazy about toffee chunks a half-cup will suffice. Or use Oreo bits as the original recipe suggests.

Fudge Swirl

(under construction)

For Round 1 I used the brownie batter element from this recipe. It was darn delicious, but didn't give that fudgy chew characteristic of real Cappuccino Crunch. I may just try hot fudge. I'm still working down the first batch, so I will update this after Round 2. Chocolate chips will not give the intended result. If you want to read more about that, check out this article about ice cream mix-ins. 

Coffee Ice Cream Base (recipe from King Arthur Flour)

1 cup (227g) cold whole milk
3/4 cup (149g) sugar
2 tablespoons (11g) espresso powder
2 tablespoons (11g) unsweetened cocoa, Dutch-process or natural
2 cups (454g) cold heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whisk or mix together the milk, sugar, espresso powder, and cocoa until the sugar has dissolved. Stir in the heavy cream and vanilla. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's directions.

When the ice cream maker is almost finished doing its thing, throw the toffee bits in for about 30 seconds. Quickly transfer half of it to a freezer container, layer on half of the Fudge Swirl, and repeat. Throw it in the coldest freezer you have. I love that this recipe stays scoopable. And I love the flavor of this coffee base, although I'm curious to try another version that includes sweetened condensed milk.

Round 1