Wasabi, White Chocolate and Lemon Swirl Ice Cream with Green Tea Biscuits

This dessert can be made as just the ice cream if you are in a pinch and finished with green tea powder or if you are feeling fancy make these green tea biscuits for an impressive ice cream sandwich with a twist.

Recipe by Ben Devlin

Serves 6-8

Ingredients:

Lemon curd
1 egg
80g sugar
50g lemon juice + zest of 1 lemon
25g butter

Ice-cream seasoning
1g Shima wasabi powder
10g green tea powder
50g icing sugar

White chocolate and wasabi ice cream
4 egg yolk, reserve whites if making dacquoise
125ml water
30g sugar
200g thickened cream
75g white chocolate
1g approximately Shima wasabi powder

Green tea dacquoise
180g almond powder
80g icing sugar
10g green tea powder
40g superfine sugar
200g egg whites

Method

Lemon curd

1. Whisk the eggs and sugar in a metal bowl over a pot of simmering water until they are thickened.

2. Add in the lemon juice, zest and butter. Whisk and cook until it is thickened, then cool in the fridge until needed.

Ice cream seasoning

1. Double sift the icing sugar, wasabi and green tea powder into a bowl and set aside.

White chocolate and wasabi ice cream

1. Break up the white chocolate into small pieces and put into a mixing jug you can put a stick blender into. Set aside.

2. In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring the cream to 80C.

3. Pour the hot cream over the white chocolate and add wasabi powder.

4. Using a hand blender, blend until smooth and cool in the fridge to below 10C. You can put it in the fridge briefly but don’t let it get too cold.

5. Whip the egg yolks in a stand mixer until pale and fluffy. Stop whipping and leave in the bowl.

6. Combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan over high heat. Bring the sugar syrup to 117C.

7. Once the syrup is at temperature, start whipping the egg yolks again and pour the syrup over the mixture. Keep whipping until cool.

8. Once the egg yolk mix is cool, fold through the white chocolate mixture.

9. Remove approximately 150g, about a third, of the mixture and put it into a bowl.

10.  Whisk the lemon curd into the smaller amount of ice cream base.

11. Pour the larger amount of ice cream into a container and then swirl the lemon curd flavoured ice cream through it, freeze the mixture for at least 8 hours or ideally overnight.

Green tea dacquoise 

1. Preheat the oven to 180C.

2. Line a baking sheet with baking paper or silicone baking liner.

3. Double sift the almond powder, icing sugar and green tea powder into a bowl and set aside.

4. Make French meringue by whipping the egg whites in a stand mixer until foamy then add the superfine sugar. Whip again until glossy, stiff peaks form.

5.  Fold the almond mixture into the meringue. 

6. Put the mixture into a piping bag with a large nozzle.

7. Pipe into 3.5cm disc or in Dacquoise ring.

8. Dust with icing sugar twice.

9. Bake for 15-20 minutes.

10. Let them cool completely.

To serve

1. Scoop the ice cream out of the container and finish by dusting the wasabi ice-cream seasoning over the top with a small strainer or sieve and a grating of lemon zest. 

2. If you have made the dacquoise biscuits, take one biscuit, place a scoop of ice cream on top and layer another biscuit on top to make a sandwich. Repeat so you have one sandwich per person. Finish, as above, by dusting the wasabi powder over the top of the sandwiches.