Did you know one of the best ice cream shops in the country is in Columbia, South Carolina? It's true, Sweet Cream has received dozens of accolades for their ambitious flavor combinations. And one of my most favorite scoops from them is (of course) a super-limited edition flavor: rose chocolate ice cream. It usually only comes out around Valentine's Day and every so often it springs forth, with their beckoning on social media to get it before its gone. I recently saw the rose chocolate ice cream signal and totally freakin' forgot to drive by there on the way home and I lost out.
Luckily a pantry reorganization project brought to my attention some rose water I got from some fancy gourmet ingredient store and I decided to try my hand at recreating my rose fantasies. This recipe is a Philadelphia-style ice cream meaning that it is not custard based and contains no eggs AND no cooking, something that weird me out when making ice cream. Why does heat gotta be part of this, it's ice cream?!
Rose Chocolate Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 1-2 squares of Baker’s semi-sweet chocolate grated
- ¾ cup whole milk
- ½ cup sugar
- 16 oz whipping cream
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp rose water
- 1 drop pink or red food coloring
- Whole food-grade rosebuds
Instructions
- Grate the chocolate and set aside.
- Mix the sugar and milk in a stand mixer for a minute.
- Add the whipping cream and continue to mix. Then add the rest of the ingredients, except for the chocolate.
- Remove from the mixer once the ingredients are combined.
- Pour into a prepared ice cream maker and let it churn according to manufacturer’s instructions.
- Once it starts getting a little thick, add the chocolate shavings and let continue churning.
- Remove once it’s done, and freeze overnight so that it ripens and get that nice icy ice cream texture.
- Garnish with more shaved chocolate if you like, but do not garnish it with crushed food-grade rose petals, those things are like eating wood shavings. Garnish with whole ones if you want.
And no worries, I won't give up the Sweet Cream version when I can catch it, as I think theirs is custard-based, which has it's own glitteringly delicious appeal. Or maybe one of their other flavors will catch my fancy and be a new favorite, who knows?!
Check out some of my other ice cream flavors, like lavender earl grey ice cream, sweet tea ice cream, masala chai ice cream, and watermelon ice cream.
