Black-Zaftig-Cherry Ice-Cream (Sous-Vide)
The inspiration for this recipe came from none other than my daughter Sophie aka Sophinator. She's been asking me to make Cherry Ice-Cream for a few months now. Even before Cherries were in season. Simple Cherry Ice-Cream is not my style, so I had to kick it up a bit, which is what I am presenting to you now.
Along the way, I ran into a few bumps, but I worked it all out. Even my Ice-Cream "Bumps" tasted excellent, and no one complained. One issue I ran into was the lack of Cherry flavor. The addition of the Chocolate paste diluted the character of the Cherries. A simple fix you might think is to increase the Cherries or reduce or even eliminate the Chocolate paste entirely. I wasn't about to remove the Chocolate, and if I increased the percentage of Cherry concentrate, I would throw off the balance of the Ice-Cream. The other stumbling block I ran into was the texture. The Ice-Cream had a crazy chewy texture, and it was stretchy too. Although this batch was freaking awesome, it was not what I was looking for in an Ice-Cream. I googled stretchy Ice-Cream, and it's an actual thing. It took me a few days of pondering as to why it was chewy and stretchy. Anyhow, I came to the conclusion it was the pectin inside the cherries that gave it the stretchiness. In ripe fruits, gelatinous polysaccharide was the culprit, which is a setting agent in jams and jellies. Boom!!! I got a fix based on math and ratios along with trial and error. I love troubleshooting and experimenting and ultimately resolving issues. The good news is now I know how to make a stretchy chewy Ice-Cream. 
Anyhow about that name "Zaftig"? And yes it's Yiddish. It has several colloquial meanings but just think of this Ice-Cream when looking it up.
Before I begin, I wanted to say thank you to Serious-Eats for doing a great job of showing us all how to extract the most from Cherries. I am using most of their methods to obtain the most from the fruit.
Having done this a few times now, I finally nailed it down. You need to start out with about 1300 grams (minimum) of Cherries to make this Zafitg Ice-Cream. I first removed the stem and gave them a quick wash before proceeding.
Place Cherries in roasting pan with sugar and mix thoroughly. How to calculate sugar needed? I used 10% of the cherries weight for the sugar value. 1300 grams X 10% = 130 grams (Sugar)
Roast Cherries at 400f for 40-45 minutes.
ONE- Strain out Cherry Concentrate into a saucier or saucepan.
TWO- Once the cherries have cooled remove pit. A cooked cherry makes pit removal very easy.
THREE- Set aside pit for later use. We will steep the pit in the Ice-Cream base to enhance the Cherry flavor.
FOUR- Place pitted cherry fruit into the saucier that contains the cherry concentrate.
Use a stick-blender to pulverize the pitted Cherries. Add a pinch of salt too.
After you have pulverized, everything simmers on low a flame for about 10 minutes. This will extract even more juice from the fruit.
Save the Jam and set aside the Cherry Concentrate. I did all theses steps 2-days before I made the Ice-Cream.
This next part is essential, so please pay attention. My goal is always to give specific, clear instructions with the intentions of replications and flawless results every time.
So what's up with the scale? We need to reduce the Cherry Concentrate all the way down to 380 grams for the recipe. The weight of the Saucier is 935 grams + Cherry Juice 487 grams = 1422 grams (Total weight of Saucier & Cherry Juice). The Cherry Juice needs to be reduced down to 380 grams for the recipe. So that means I need to reduce/lose 107 grams. But how do we accomplish this? 487 grams (Total weight of Cherry Juice) - 380 grams (what I need) = 107 grams in total weight to reduce/lose. 1422 grams - 107 grams = 1315 grams (Weight of Saucier & Cherries). We now have 380 grams of Cherry Concentrate. Make sure it cool before adding it to the Ice-Cream base or refrigerate until ready to use. I made this 2 days prior.
This is extremely easy to make. In a Saucier, add water and bring to a boil. Turn off heat and add the sugar and salt, once dissolved add in Cocoa powder and mix well. Once the Cocoa is dissolved, add in the Dark Chocolate and mix thoroughly and set aside to cool. See Vid HERE.
These are the products I used for the chocolate paste.
Ok, now we are finally on to the recipe. Note- Milk ratios are exactly one half of the Cream and the Cherry Reduction. These ratios give a flawless texture. If you want more of a stretchy chewier Ice-Cream reduce milk or eliminate entirely.
The steps in this recipe are no different from my other Ice-Cream concoctions. For this recipe you will need a Mixer and if you have a Vitamix even better.
I now use my Vitamix for all my Ice-Cream recipes, which makes it so easy. I Sous-Vide-Processed everything at 150f at 2 hours.
You can use any mixer you want. Using the tare feature on the scale measure everything starting with the dairy. All in all, my preference is weight to volume when measuring ingredients. Of course, there are exceptions. (Pictures not from this recipe).
I'm going to be very specific, so please pay careful attention. After you add the dairy add the Vanilla Extract, Cherry Extract, Kirsch and mix on low for about 10 secs. Add the Cherry Concentrate and mix for about 10 secs.
In a separate bowl add 3 Egg Yolks to 73 grams of sugar and whip until the Ribbon stage. Add this to the mixer and mix on low for about 10 secs.
In a separate bowl add the Skin-Milk-Powder and 70 grams of sugar, Avacream, salt, and mix until thoroughly combined. Add this to the mixer in thirds and mix incrementally until combined.
IMPORTANT- Add the Chocolate Paste in one Tablespoon Increments. I used a total of three but feel free to add less or more. Taste it along the way.
You can use any mixer you want. Using the tare feature on the scale measure everything starting with the dairy. All in all, my preference is weight to volume when measuring ingredients. Of course, there are exceptions. (Pictures not from this recipe).
I'm going to be very specific, so please pay careful attention. After you add the dairy add the Vanilla Extract, Cherry Extract, Kirsch and mix on low for about 10 secs. Add the Cherry Concentrate and mix for about 10 secs.
In a separate bowl add 3 Egg Yolks to 73 grams of sugar and whip until the Ribbon stage. Add this to the mixer and mix on low for about 10 secs.
IMPORTANT- Add the Chocolate Paste in one Tablespoon Increments. I used a total of three but feel free to add less or more. Taste it along the way.
Pour everything from the Vitamix into a Vac-Bag. I use a one-gallon pitcher for stability.
Note- Add the Pitts that were set aside earlier to the Vac-Bag. Adding the Pitts to the Ice-Cream base while SV-Processing will enhance the Cherry flavor.
Using the displacement method submerge the bag and SV-Process for 2 hours at 150f.
After the Sous-Processing the Ice-Cream strain out the Pitts into a large bowl. Shock the Ice-Cream base with Ice-Cold water.
Not the actual photograph but shock the Ice-Cream Base in something that looks like this.I usually refrigerate the base overnight before churning. Although I have an Ice-Cream-Maker with a Compressor (Cuisinart ICE-100), I still stick everything in the freezer for about 30 minutes. Getting everything ice cold before churning will reduce the proliferation of Ice-Crystals. This includes the dasher, bowl, and container the Ice-Cream will be store in too. The base will be stirred at least twice over the 30 minutes.
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