Mandarin Ice Cream Served in Its Own Peel

This ice cream is very easy to make. The trick is to serve it inside the mandarin's own peel, which not only looks unusual but also releases the aroma of the peel as you eat it.

I particularly like it because I'm lucky enough to have, at my parents' house, a tree of an old variety of mandarin with a special perfume (it reminds you of mandarin sweets). The problem is that it has loads of pips, which is why they're hard to find in the markets.

As you know, they tend to offer us seedless fruit, perhaps prettier and bigger, even though we lose out on aroma. Personally I'm sure it's a mistake; 99% of you will agree, and the remaining 1% are like the dentists who recommend sugary chewing gum.

Mandarin ice cream

To make the ice cream, start by slicing off the top of the mandarin at about 4/5 of its height and scoop all the flesh out through the top. It's quite fiddly; it's easier if you make the opening bigger, for example at 3/4. Set aside both parts of the mandarin peel: one will be the lid and the other the container.

Blend the flesh (pips included) to a paste and pass it through a chinois. Measure the juice you get and mix it with the same amount of single cream. Add sugar to taste (add and taste); I won't dare give a quantity here, because it will depend a lot on the mandarins you use.

If you don't have an ice-cream maker, put the mixture in a container in the freezer and take it out every hour to stir it well and break up the ice crystals that form. After about 2–3 hours, fill the mandarins with this not-yet-fully-frozen mixture. If you've kept both parts of the mandarins, you can close them. If the peel of the mandarins you're using isn't very aromatic, you can serve it in another container. In that case I recommend freezing the mixture in ice-cube trays and then blitzing it in the Thermomix (or similar), which will give you an almost restaurant-quality texture. Anyone with a Pacojet, make the most of it.

🌐 Llegeix aquesta recepta en català