Mango Ice Cream

Leo has been pressuring me into making mango ice cream for a long time. Strange that I should resist such a delicious potential, but the truth is that ripe and tasty mangoes are incredibly difficult to find, especially way up here in Scotland. We have made mango ice cream a few times, even combining it with ginger (and recently strawberries), but like the mango’s own elusive flavour, the perfect batch is always slipping away from our reach.

The best mango ice cream I’ve ever made was in Ghana, where the quality of the mangoes far exceeds that which gets imported from Pakistan or South America. I’m not sure why these deliciously sweet and luscious mangoes don’t get imported to Scotland, but it could have something to do with the distinctly low African population up here… Or it could be that the trade-off for the best tasting mangoes is stringy flesh that gets caught in your teeth. Prior to my visit to Ghana, I was also a major supporter of the Pakistani honey mango. Such is the pain of experience that now I find them to have a slightly chalky taste that pales in comparison to the West African variety. Anyway, I digress.

So Leo gave up asking me to make it and decided to make the mango ice cream himself. My half-gallon machine was on loan to a friend visiting Turkey, so he had no choice but to fill the 6-quart (5.7 litres) machine. Leo splurged on no less than 15 mangoes, which resulted in just shy of 2kg of fruit pulp.

Again, this is a fairly standard recipe. Here’s the break-down:

• nearly 2 kgs of mango pulp (blended until smooth)
• 6 cups (1.4 litres) of double cream
• 3 cups (675g) of sugar
• 4 eggs + an egg yolk
• approximately a litre of milk

Unlike strawberry ice cream, where I put in so much fruit there’s no room for milk, it’s important to leave room for milk on this one. Mango is very thick and if you just went the fruit and cream route, the ice cream won’t have much water in it and as a result won’t have that cold, refreshing taste we’re after.

As usual, start by mixing eggs and sugar, then add the fruit pulp and cream and milk until you’ve reached the capacity.

Load up with ice and salt and crank like crazy!

This made a super-rich and creamy mango ice cream that easily rivalled my Ghanaian masterpiece. We didn’t have a neighbourhood full of kids to help us nail the massive batch, but somehow it all disappeared within a couple days.

Mango ice cream is particularly delicious served with sliced fresh strawberries. Mmmm! Thanks Leo!